Performance
With prices starting at £430, the ThinkPad Edge 11 isn't the cheapest ultra-portable on the market. But the right combination of performance, portability and ThinkPad features should have plenty of appeal.
At the time of writing, only a limited number of ThinkPad Edge 11 configurations are available to UK consumers. Our review sample, equipped with a dual-core AMD processor and 4GB of memory, isn't one of them and is currently only available on the continent priced at €630 (approximately £530).
We've tested a similar specification before in Dell's Inspiron M101z, but came away disappointed with battery life. Can the ThinkPad Edge 11's higher-capacity battery and slower hard drive provide a better mix of performance and longevity? And how does it compare to a dual-core Intel Atom + NVIDIA ION 2 combination?
All the answers are further down the page, but first here's a detailed look at the key specifications of our five comparison notebooks, as well as a brief rundown of the benchmarks we use.
| Comparison systems | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Laptop | Acer Aspire One D260 | MSI Wind U160 | Dell Inspiron M101z | Lenovo ThinkPad Edge 11 | ASUS Eee PC 1215N |
| Processor | Intel Atom N450 (1.66GHz, 512KB L2 cache, single-core) | Intel Atom N450 (1.66GHz, 512KB L2 cache, single-core) | AMD Athlon II Neo K325 (1.30GHz, 2MB L2 cache, dual-core) | AMD Athlon II Neo K325 (1.30GHz, 2MB L2 cache, dual-core) | Intel Atom D525 (1.8GHz, 1MB L2 cache, dual-core) |
| Memory | 1GB DDR2 | 1GB DDR2 | 4GB DDR3 | 4GB DDR3 | 2GB DDR3 |
| Graphics | Intel GMA 3150 | Intel GMA 3150 | AMD Mobility Radeon HD 4225 | AMD Mobility Radeon HD 4225 | Intel GMA 3150 + NVIDIA ION 2 |
| Graphics driver | Intel 8.14.10.2117 | Intel 8.14.10.2117 | AMD Catalyst 10.7 | AMD Catalyst 10.11 | Intel 8.14.10.2117 + NVIDIA Verde 260.89 |
| Display | 10.1in - 1,024x600 | 10in - 1,024x600 | 11.6in - 1,366x768 | 11.6in - 1,366x768 | 12.1in - 1,366x768 |
| Battery | 6 cell, 49Whr | 6 cell, 65Whr | 6 cell, 56Whr | 6 cell, 57Whr | 6 cell, 56Whr |
| Weight | 1,202g (including battery) | 1,237g (including battery) | 1,572g (including battery) | 1,513g (including battery) | 1,523g (including battery) |
| Wireless | Atheros AR5B95 WiFi (802.11bgn) | Ralink 1T1R (802.11bgn) | Broadcom WLAN Half-Mini Card (802.11bgn) and Bluetooth | ThinkPad 1x1 WLAN Half-Mini Card (802.11bgn) and Bluetooth | Broadcom WiFi (802.11bgn) and Bluetooth |
| Disk drive | Western Digital Scorpio Blue 160GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | Seagate Momentus 250GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | Seagate Momentus 320GB HDD, 7,200RPM, 16MB cache | Hitachi Travelstar 320GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache | Seagate Momentus 250GB HDD, 5,400RPM, 8MB cache |
| Optical drive | None | None | None | None | None |
| Operating System | Microsoft Windows 7 Starter, 32-bit | Microsoft Windows 7 Starter, 32-bit | Microsoft Windows 7 Home premium, 64-bit | Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium, 64-bit | Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium, 32-bit |
| Approx. price as configured | £250 | £300 | £500 | £530* | £430 |
| Benchmarks | |||||
| Geekbench 2.1.6 | A cross-platform benchmark used to measure memory and processor performance. Run using high-performance mode. | ||||
| Cinebench 11.5 | Using Cinebench's multi-CPU render, this cross-platform benchmark stresses as many cores as possible. Run using high-performance mode. | ||||
| 3DMark06 | A PC benchmark used to test the DirectX 9 performance of a system's graphics card. Run using high-performance mode. | ||||
| Power consumption | Using balanced power settings, we record mains power draw whilst playing back a 720p movie trailer. | ||||
| Battery test | In order to measure battery life, we run the notebook on balanced power settings and loop a 720p movie trailer, measuring the time taken to hibernate. | ||||
| *Estimated pricing, listed specification not yet available in the UK | |||||
CPU and GPU performance
The combination of a dual-core Athlon Neo processor and 4GB of memory is a potent little mix. We've seen Core i5 processors score over 3,000 in the Geekbench test, but for a mid-range 11.6in notebook, AMD's 1.3GHz chip is an ideal fit.
Cinebench confirms that the performance on offer is clearly a step up from Intel's Atom. In this benchmark, AMD's dual-core 1.3GHz Athlon Neo K325 processor scores 26 per cent higher than Intel's dual-core 1.8GHz Atom D525.
AMD's Mobility Radeon HD 4225 graphics are also a vast improvement over the Intel GMA 3150 chip found in most netbooks, but not quite up to speed with the NVIDIA ION 2 chip found in ASUS's Eee PC 1215N.
In real-world terms, today's modern games are barely playable at a low resolution, but the ThinkPad Edge 11 has enough graphics power to handle 720p HD video playback with ease. We did run into occasional stuttering with a few 1080p Flash clips, but full-HD Quicktime files weren't a problem.
Power consumption and battery life
Our 11.6in notebook, based on AMD's Nile platform, is about as energy efficient as a 12in machine sporting a dual-core Intel Atom processor with NVIDIA ION 2 graphics. What's interesting is that Lenovo's implementation is slightly more efficient than the Dell Inspiron M101z.
That improved efficiency, coupled with a fractionally stronger battery, provides the ThinkPad Edge 11 with a respectable run time of three hours and 54 minutes during our looped video playback test.
Lenovo's own product pages suggest that an Edge 11 equipped with an Intel Core i3 processor will provide roughly 15 per cent better battery life, but the AMD configuration offers a fair return for a notebook that offers a decent mix of low-power CPU and GPU performance.
It's worth noting, also, that the above graph doesn't represent a best-case scenario. When using the notebook for the occasional bit of light web surfing, we were able to keep the ThinkPad Edge 11 chugging along for four hours and 49 minutes.
