Cheap, small touchscreen laptops (11.6" for $249 & $279)

[Kaido]

11.6" Asus for $249: (store & online)

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/11-6-tou...rive/2032043.p

11.6" Lenovo for $279: (online only)

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/ideapad-...rive/2452121.p

For $30 more, the Lenovo gives you a faster CPU (1.9ghz Pentium vs. 1.5ghz Celeron) and a larger hard drive (500gb vs. 320gb). Both have 10-finger multi-touch screens and both are $50 more on Amazon. Acer has a new Chromebook coming out shortly, the C720P, that offers a Haswell-based Touchscreen for $299, so if you'd rather have access to a full OS, this will save you some green. As I found on a previous Toshiba I had purchased, Pokki is a nice store app for desktop versions of mobile apps to use on touchscreen computers.

 

[Pardus]

11.6" Acer for $249: (store & online)

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/11-6-tou...rive/2032043.p

11.6" Lenovo for $279: (online only)

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/ideapad-...rive/2452121.p

You're first link is an Asus, not Acer with an Celeron 1007U cpu.
The Lenovo has a Pentium 2127U cpu
Both laptops will be painfully slow, there cheap for a reason.

 

[Kaido]

You're first link is an Asus, not Acer with an Celeron 1007U cpu.
The Lenovo has a Pentium 2127U cpu
Both laptops will be painfully slow, there cheap for a reason.

Updated OP, thanks.

I have several laptops those those Ivy Bridge Celerons, they are plenty for basic tasks, not painfully slow at all!

 

[Roland00Address]

You're first link is an Asus, not Acer with an Celeron 1007U cpu.
The Lenovo has a Pentium 2127U cpu
Both laptops will be painfully slow, there cheap for a reason.

The pentium 2127u is a 1.9 ghz ivy bridge dual core. They are painfully slow if you were using them like a desktop replacement connected to an external monitor, but if you are using them like a netbook (they are 12" screens after all) they are not painfully slow at all. People use computers differently based on size for they multi task less, are less likely to do video rendering, are more mobile and less like to do content creation or business production. The biggest limiting factor would be the mechanical hard drive vs ssd for speed.

To put this in comparison, this cpu would be much faster than the 2010 macbook air (su9400 core 2 duo at 1.4 ghz) and barely slower than the 2011 macbook air (sandybridge i5 2467m at 1.6 ghz with turbo to 2.1 ghz dual core or 2.3 ghz ghz single core.)

 

[xSauronx]

You're first link is an Asus, not Acer with an Celeron 1007U cpu.
The Lenovo has a Pentium 2127U cpu
Both laptops will be painfully slow, there cheap for a reason.

its not the cpu. if the lousy entry level 5400 rpm hard drive they put in them.

not that they are speed demons, but i had an i3 1.2ghz, 3gb ram, 320gb hdd netbook and it was crap. horribly slow.

i put an SSD in it for cheap (found a refurb or something on ebay) and it was a word of difference. entirely usable for the basic tasks that you should get out of a netbook (some video streaming, email, web, word processing, old/lightweight games on steam)

honestly though, unless you need a keyboard regularly id rather get a tablet in that price range.

 

[RossMAN]

Save another $25 off $250 with Amex sync expires 12/31/2013.

I need a good travel computer, between these two choices which is likely to have the better keyboard?

On the American express offers tab.

Best Buy - Spend $250 or more, get $25 back
Facebook Signup Link - link above
Twitter Tweet - #AmexBestBuy

OFFER DETAILS
Get a one-time $25 statement credit by using your enrolled Card to spend a total of $250 or more at Best Buy
by 12/31/13.

TERMS
Valid in-store, at BestBuy.com or Best Buy Mobile. Not valid at Best Buy Express, on Geek Squad services made outside Best Buy stores, or at standalone Pacific Sales stores. E-gift card purchases excluded. If you order an item during the offer period but it is not shipped until after 12/31/13, it may not count towards determining whether your purchase qualifies for the offer. Enrollment for the offer is limited. Limit 1 statement credit per American Express Card across all American Express offer channels. Statement credit will appear on your billing statement within 8 weeks after American Express receives information from the merchant about your qualifying purchase. Note that American Express may not receive information about your qualifying purchase from the merchant until all of the items from your qualifying purchase have been provided or shipped by the merchant. Statement credit may be reversed if qualifying purchase is returned/cancelled. If American Express does not receive information that identifies your transaction as qualifying for the offer, you will not receive the statement credit. For example, your transaction will not qualify if it is not made directly with the merchant. In addition, in most cases, you will not receive the statement credit if your transaction is made with an electronic wallet or through a third party or if the merchant uses a mobile or wireless card reader to process it. POID: AUF6:0001

 

[Kaido]

its not the cpu. if the lousy entry level 5400 rpm hard drive they put in them.

I dunno, the modern hard drives are pretty good. That $229 Toshiba I picked up had a 7mm 2.5" 5400rpm drive that clocked in at 105.1 MB/s write, 113.4 MB/s read. Pretty dang zippy for a cheap laptop!

It also had a dual-core 1.8GHz 1037U Ivy Bridge Celeron CPU. Slow? Sure, depending on how you use it. But for your average stuff like Microsoft Office, Google Chrome, watching a DVD movie in VLC, that sort of thing, it was more than enough. Booted up in under a minute too!

 

[Awesomedude99]

Update: Original deal is dead, but prices are still pretty good: $269 for the Asus, $299 for the Lenovo

11.6" Asus for $249: (store & online)

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/11-6-tou...rive/2032043.p

11.6" Lenovo for $279: (online only)

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/ideapad-...rive/2452121.p

For $30 more, the Lenovo gives you a faster CPU (1.9ghz Pentium vs. 1.5ghz Celeron) and a larger hard drive (500gb vs. 320gb). Both have 10-finger multi-touch screens and both are $50 more on Amazon. Acer has a new Chromebook coming out shortly, the C720P, that offers a Haswell-based Touchscreen for $299, so if you'd rather have access to a full OS, this will save you some green. As I found on a previous Toshiba I had purchased, Pokki is a nice store app for desktop versions of mobile apps to use on touchscreen computers.

that lenovo laptop is real slow. it would be better if they were abit faster but price is still good....

 

[Kaido]

Lenovo is back down to $279.

 

[RossMAN]

Nice price on the Lenovo.

 

[Kaido]

Nice price on the Lenovo.

I ordered one for work, so I'll see how it fares. I'm on one of the Celeron Toshibas now, it's just fine with Win8 + cheap CPU. Not slow at all for all of the basics tasks!

 

[Kaido]

My Lenovo arrived. It's still $279:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/ideapad-...rive/2452121.p

Thoughts:

1. Surprisingly solid-feeling for the price. Feels like the old IBM Thinkpads - "solid".
2. Hefty. Not horribly heavy, but...hefty.
3. Screen: 1366x768 is very nice on an 11.6" screen. Screen is great, very sharp and does not look cheap or crappy like a lot of the other sub-$300 laptops do. Would like it to be a bit brighter. At max brightness, the whites do kind of blow out, not terribly though. Overall, a better screen than expected for the price. MUCH better, actually. Also, the touchscreen is surprisingly accurate - I've had no problems hitting the maximize/close buttons on windows in Desktop mode like I have with other touchscreen laptops.
4. There's an interesting gap between the screen & keyboard. The battery hump is in this space. Not bad, just weird. This way, the bottom of the laptop is kept flat, and when closed, the laptop is flat on top as well. pic
5. Not a big Windows 8 fan, but touch is GREAT. SO nice being able to touch what I'm pointing at after using computers for 20 years, haha. The shortcuts are excellent - swipe in from left side is basically like alt-tab, right side swipe in for the Charms (?) bar so you can hop back to the main Metro screen, etc.
6. Power plug is awesome - rectangle like a USB, but it can go either way due to the single-pin design inside. VERY sturdily plugged in, doesn't pop out like the round ones do.
7. VERY zippy. Navigating folder structures in Explorer is as fast as an SSD, which is weird for a HDD. Metro screen is perfectly responsive. Webpages scroll well, even stuff like CNN. 1080p Youtube videos play smoothly. I did see some lag occasionally when it was loading a bunch of pictures & images and I was trying to type in a different address while it was downloading a media-intensive webpage, but it was only for a second or two (maybe have just been IE, haven't installed Chrome yet).
8. Keyboard feels keep. It's chiclet style, but with cheap plastic keys. They feel kinda loose. However, the keyboard is big enough to type on - far better than your standard netbook. CTRL key is in the right place (to the left of the Function key).
9. Touchpad is good. Nice texture, good responsiveness to your finger, and very accurate input.
10. No noise yet, and only vaguely warm. Nice.

My only real complaint is the keyboard. It types fine, I just don't like the feel or sound (cheap plasticy noise & wobbly feel). I wish it had more of a Macbook-style chiclet keyboard. And I wish the screen was about 2 notches brighter and didn't have so much "whiteness" at max brightness. And maybe if it was lighter, that'd be cool. But overall minor stuff, especially for $279. Dang. Half the price of an iPad! :awe:

 

[OcFerris]

@Kaido, I usually just lurk but had to say thank you for your review! Very helpful.

 

[Kaido]

@Kaido, I usually just lurk but had to say thank you for your review! Very helpful.

You're welcome! I'm on the Lenovo right now, it's great! The 11" size is really nice. I went through a few netbooks and none of them really ever fit me, from the tiny keyboards to the horrible 1024x768 resolution that cut off access to program buttons - but I always really appreciated the compact size.

My last laptop was a 13" and that is my ideal size; I really want a Macbook Air (super thin + OSX), but I also want a Retina screen, which isn't out yet on the Air. But the touchscreen is extremely compelling on Windows 8, along with the edge-swipe shortcut system on the trackpad & touchscreen. It's just so intuitive - I point at screens all the time, so touching it just makes it perfect!

I still find it hard to believe that you can get this much functionality for $279. The TN screen kinda bugs me, but I can definitely live with it for the price, especially since it's my work rig. I would pay an extra $100 for an IPS screen on this thing. I'll see how the C720P touchscreen Chromebook compares (my future couch computer for home) in general later this month - weight, screen, etc.

It's a great grab & go size too.

 

[dafoomie]

@Kaido, I usually just lurk but had to say thank you for your review! Very helpful.

Agreed, I was waffling on it but I pulled the trigger based on the review (and the sale ends tomorrow). Thanks Kaido.

Thinking of adding an MSATA SSD, they claim it has a slot for one.

 

[dafoomie]

Of course, now that I went ahead and bought the Lenovo, Bestbuy's advertising a 1 day sale on the Asus for $199.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/11-6-to...32043&st=december-7-computing-deals&cp=1&lp=1

 

[RossMAN]

Of course, now that I went ahead and bought the Lenovo, Bestbuy's advertising a 1 day sale on the Asus for $199.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/11-6-tou...eals&cp=1&lp=1

Great deal and something I'm seriously considering as a travel laptop, however a few SD'ers are returning theirs.

How much of a speed increase would I notice after installing SSD?

 

[Kaido]

Of course, now that I went ahead and bought the Lenovo, Bestbuy's advertising a 1 day sale on the Asus for $199.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/11-6-tou...eals&cp=1&lp=1

I was just coming in to post that, $199 is HOT! :thumbsup:

 

[Kaido]

Great deal and something I'm seriously considering as a travel laptop, however a few SD'ers are returning theirs.

How much of a speed increase would I notice after installing SSD?

Reading through the negative comments:

http://slickdeals.net/forums/showpost.php?p=64313928&postcount=62

the build quality is extremely cheap, the LCD doesn't tilt more than 25 degrees back, trackpad is one of the worst out there, HDD is extremely slow (best to upgrade to an SSD if you buy this)

I agree about the LCD screen not tilting back very far. It is also extremely reflective like a mirror which makes it hard to see in a bright room - but keep in mind I am used to a ThinkPad with a matte screen. The glossy finish doesn't seem to bother many people. On the plus side, I found the touch screen to work very nicely which is great for Windows 8.

Build quality seemed fine for $250 and the trackpad worked fine for me. Keyboard was okay too. I returned mine at $250 because I didn't need it. For $200, I may buy it with my GCs and Craigslist it to turn my GCs into cash.

This isn't a bad laptop (speakers were decent, even) but it's a better deal at $200 than $250 obviously.

I think you have to keep in mind that this is a $200 laptop. It's not a $1,000 Macbook. It's a cheap laptop that has the bonus of being small & having a touchscreen. I do like my Lenovo so far; it has it's catches (TN screen, plasticy keys, etc.) but for under $300 it's amazing! I'm not a big fan of the short battery life tho, I got maybe 3 hours last night, so that's kind of meh in today's world of 6+ hours standard.

 

[dafoomie]

I was just coming in to post that, $199 is HOT! :thumbsup:

I think I'll keep the Lenovo anyway, it's not $80 better than the Asus, but at least I won't be unhappy with it. Better keyboard, better cpu, msata port for an ssd, ram not soldered to the board, better build quality, better battery, bigger/faster hard drive.

 

[Kaido]

I think I'll keep the Lenovo anyway, it's not $80 better than the Asus, but at least I won't be unhappy with it. Better keyboard, better cpu, msata port for an ssd, ram not soldered to the board, better build quality, better battery, bigger/faster hard drive.

Same, would rather have the extra power since it will be one of my main machines. It is surprisingly solid for a budget laptop!

 

[Towermax]

Update: $199 for the Asus, TODAY ONLY!

11.6" Asus for $249: (store & online)

Thanks, picked one up. This'll be great for travel.

 

[yottabit]

Of course, now that I went ahead and bought the Lenovo, Bestbuy's advertising a 1 day sale on the Asus for $199.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/11-6-tou...eals&cp=1&lp=1

I picked up one of the ASUS after comparing it against the Lenovo at Best Buy and I'm typing from it right now

For me it was all about the keyboard (I'll mostly be using this for OneNote/Excel on the go) and I was able to type much better on the ASUS. Lenovo had lots of keyboard flex in the center as well as somewhat mushy keys. It also had a really tiny backspace key (really annoying) and for some reason to access the F keys (F2, F3 etc) you have to hold down the Function key, whereas on every other laptop in the world they default to the F key and you hold the Function key to get the special functionality.

I definitely had to concentrate a little more typing on the Asus (the keys are smaller) but was able to type a lot faster after a few minutes on the Asus than on the Lenovo.

The Lenovo definitely has a slightly better screen and with the two side by side seems slightly better built. It's also slightly bigger, and now that I have the Asus at home the build quality seems perfectly fine and I don't regret it at all. The display is VERY shiny, it really is a mirror reflection like some have stated. You'll have to crank up screen brightness to full to use it. You also need to be very deliberate to get the touchpad to physically click and when it does the travel is awkwardly far. That being said I'm still pleasantly surprised by the keyboard, and the resolution of the screen on 11" is awesome. Also fun to play around with Win8 touch (for someone who hasn't before, and only frustratingly used Win8 on non-touch laptops)

Just wanted to give some quick preliminary feedback to let you know how I feel about my little Asus if it is really just a 1-day sale.

EDIT: I just averaged 95 WPM on TypeRacer, which is pretty ridiculous given this is an 11.6" notebook and I've only been using it for maybe 15 minutes. Definitely won't have any trouble with typing long term. For comparison on a good desktop keyboard I can do ~130 WPM but on a bad laptop keyboard I may be looking at 50-80. Unfortunately don't have too much to say about battery life yet.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Wow, if the Asus wasn't now in-store only I'd be very tempted - it even has HDMI.

 

[Kaido]

There's a similar Dell model (11.6" touchscreen yada yada yada) for $279 on Amazon today:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00FEE7D1Q