Lenovo ThinkPad Edge 13 Notebook

The Lenovo 'Edge' series is meant for small business users. The first thing

that strikes you is its deviation from the standard 'ThinkPad' design. Edge 13

comes in two colors: red and black with a glossy finish and an aluminium band

that gives it a neat look. Though some people might like glossy finish, it is

bound to attract dust and finger impressions. The keyboard layout of the Edge 13

is very different from the ThinkPad. It's cleaner, and quite a few unnecessary

keys have been removed. The laptop comes with both a touchpad and the classic

TrackPoint. Another very interesting feature of this laptop is that you can

charge your iPhone, iPod, or even other devices through its USB port, even when

the laptop is powered off. The only caveat here is that the laptop must be

connected to an electrical outlet through its power adapter. Otherwise, the

charging doesn't work. This notebook is powered by Intel's ultra low voltage

processor U7300. We missed having an optical drive in the laptop.

We tested the laptop for its graphics, battery and overall performance. In

graphics it scored 906 3D Marks, which is very high when compared with MSI U210.

The overall performance measured using PCMark is 3430 PCMarks, which is again

very high. Finally, a battery backup of 5 hrs 24 minutes means it's an excellent

choice for highly mobile professionals.

Bottomline: The notebook comes with a refreshingly new design and does

well in tests, making it ideal for business users. The high price however, could

be a put-off.