Lenovo ThinkPad Edge Hits Portability Price Performance Trifecta

At sub-$1,000 and four pounds, Lenovo's ThinkPad Edge 13.3"-display notebook provides 6+ hours of Windows 7 productivity in a stylish business-oriented package.If you're looking for a "triple-mugwump" notebook that strikes a balance between portability, price and performance -- i.e., something near-netbookish in portability, and under rather than over the thousand-dollar mark, but more like a full-sized notebook in performance -- take a look at Lenovo's ThinkPad Edge.

For the past two months, I've been trying a Lenovo ThinkPad Edge notebook -- the model with the 13.3-inch 1366x768 widescreen. (Lenovo also offers Edges with 14-inch and 15.6-inch widescreen displays).

I've been using the Intel U7300 1.3Ghz Core Duo CPU model (Lenovo also offers it with an AMD Athlon Neo X2 Dual-Core; the 14 and 15-inch machines use the 2.13Ghz Intel Core i3-330M), with 4GB RAM, 300GB hard drive, 6-cell Lithium-Ion battery, running Windows 7 Professional (64-bit).

The MSRP for this machine as of early May 2010 is $1,059 (currently on sale from Lenovo, as I write this, for $799.00) -- but Lenovo's in the process of refreshing their Edge family, including configurations and pricing. That's more than all but the priciest netbooks, but significantly less than any four-pound-or-under machine with a 13.3-inch display you're likely to find. At this price, even SMBs can afford to provision their road and "corridor" warriors.

I've taken and used it everywhere from dentist and doctor's waiting rooms to trade shows (including at the airport and in flight), weekend trips, business meetings, at my dining room table, and in my home office KVMed to my regular keyboard, trackball and LCD.

In addition to the obvious Microsoft Officing and web browsing to write articles like this, I've used the ThinkPad Edge to edit photos into slide shows, run Dragon Naturally Speaking, slim down video clips, watch DVD and web videos, listen to Pandora radio, and sundry other tasks. The Edge has handled all this -- not surprising, given the specs, but is reassuring. And did I mention that the outside is stylishly elegant, available in black or red? (Not that there was ever anything wrong with the ThinkPad's basic black.)

Lenovo's Edge is one of the new "CULV" breed of notebooks, using a Consumer Ultra-Low-Voltage CPU , which costs less than traditional notebook-oriented CPUs, and stretches battery runtime -- sacrificing some performance, but more powerful than what's on a netbook).

But don't let the "C" in CULV fool you -- this machine is aimed solidly at SMBs whose road and "corridor" warriors need more screen and keyboard turf than a smartphone offers as well as at SOHOs, prosumers and plain old budget-minded users. The hard drive has Lenovo's Active Protection System for shocks and vibration, the keyboard is spill-resistant. SMBs who want their users to be as IT-self-sufficient as possible will appreciate Lenovo's ThinkVantage Toolbox utilities, which include configuration, diagnostic/maintenance, rescue and recovery programs.

At four pounds (with the six-cell battery), the 13.3-inch-display Edge is light enough to carry around all day. It's not as svelte and small as a machine with a smaller screen, but it slides readily into any side bag, briefcase, backpack, or my old Eagle Creek notebook toter. The six-cell battery is rated for nearly eight hours; while I wasn't doing timed run-downs, I was regularly getting at least five to six hours of heavy WiFI'd working time. Add this to its full-sized keyboard, the Edge packs the usability and compute power for office productivity applications and probably anything else you'll throw at it.

Features include a TrackPoint (the "pencil-eraser-nub" pointing doohickey) and a multi-gesture touchpad, a video-chat oriented webcam, HDMI/VGA/3 USB/Ethernet/audio ports, and an SD card slot. The keyboard is good enough to be used all day for typing. The keys aren't the more deeply beveled ones I've been used to on ThinkPads, they're more shallowly indented, but they're great, and I'm a fast touch typist. The screen is bright, with stunning quality -- test it with a movie trailer -- and the speaker sound is good.

During the two months I've been trying this Edge out, it's performed near-flawlessly, like I said. Performance was always fast. Reconnecting to WiFi networks it knew about was automatic and fast.

The only hiccups: Oddly, the machine froze half a dozen times and blue-screened three or four. Some of these times, I had a lot of apps open, or was streaming audio, but not always. But in all cases, it rebooted normally (in one case, not until I removed a USB flash drive).

Similarly, sometimes the WiFI wouldn't work after returning from sleep or hibernate -- again, rebooting resolved the problem. And sometimes it took several tries to wake the Edge up, if I'd closed it without explicit shutdown. I have no idea whether these are Windows problems, hardware issues, my failure to tweak some configuration setting, or a mix.

WHAT IT LACKS: Like almost all machines in this price and weight class, the Edge doesn't include a built-in optical CD/DVD drive. The odds are most people will never need one, except for the occasional software install, or to watch/rip a CD or DVD -- and you can get a good, small, USB-powered external CD/DVD burner like LiteOn's eTAU208 or Samsung's SE-S084C for just under fifty bucks.

RECOMMENDATIONS: Obviously, max out on RAM, battery, Windows version, and WLAN/Bluetooth options, and consider mobile broadband. I'd also add one of the Lenovo warranty/protection packages, which can add up to $300.

For accessories, get an external optical drive if you don't have a compact one, and spring for a second AC adapter -- it's good to have one AC adapter for work and one for travel, and new higher-priced ones are much slimmer, run cooler, and also have a port or cable for charging mobile/USB devices. I recommend either a Lenovo 90W Ultraslim AC/DC Combo Adapter, MSRP $119.95, or a third-party one, like the Targus Premium Laptop Charger (AC/DC), which MSRPs for $20 more, but will be useful for more notebooks in your fleet.

You could spend less and get a netbook or a bigger machine. But for convenience, portability and productivity, you won't regret spending a modest amount more.

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