Lenovo 3000 C100

When Lenovo took over IBM's PC business, there was some hand-wringing about what would happen to the beloved ThinkPad. Would users' favorite features, such as the best-in-class keyboard, eraser-head TrackPoint, and robust support package, be cannibalized in favor of a lower price? Today, just more than eight months after the purchase was completed, ThinkPads--with some wide-screen modifications--are still going strong, and Lenovo has co-opted some of the ThinkPad's key strengths into the new Lenovo 3000 line of budget systems for small business. While the new series' design looks distinctly different from Lenovo's current laptops, the first model in the series, the midsize C100, reads like that of a pared-down ThinkPad, with low- to midrange components and a suite of utilities based on Lenovo's ThinkVantage technologies. The Lenovo 3000 C100's price is similarly pared down; the least expensive C100 configuration costs a very budget-friendly $599.

Upside: The Lenovo 3000 C100 offers component options that range from bargain bin to midrange: Celeron or Pentium M processors (sorry, no Core Duo here); 5,400rpm hard drives from 40GB to 100GB; 256MB to 1GB of swift 533MHz RAM; and optical drives, including CD-ROMs and DVD burners. In addition to a ThinkPad keyboard, the C100's silver-and-black case incorporates pretty much every feature a business user will need, including four-pin FireWire and four USB 2.0 ports, a 3-in-1 flash card reader, 802.11a/b/g Wi-Fi and Ethernet connections, and optional Bluetooth. The laptop is backed by the same service and support as ThinkPads, and it will feature the new Lenovo Care suite of utilities (based on the company's ThinkVantage technologies) that streamline maintenance tasks, provide automatic updates, and offer one-button system recovery.

Downside: The C100's $599 price tag is certainly appealing, but that's for a fairly limp configuration consisting of a low-end Celeron processor, 256MB of RAM, a 40GB hard drive, and a DVD/CD-RW drive. A more midrange configuration (1.73GHz Pentium M, 512MB of RAM, an 80GB hard drive, and a DVD burner) will cost $999--about the same as competitive systems from Dell and HP. Also, the system's 15-inch standard-aspect XGA display strikes us as rather dated; we'd prefer higher-resolution or wide-screen displays.

Outlook: The midsize laptop category is crowded with budget offerings, but Lenovo may stand out based on the ThinkPad's reputation for service and support. We're curious, though, whether this low-cost line will poach existing ThinkPad customers or if it will bring a new group of customers, those who previously couldn't afford ThinkPads, into the fold. We're also eager to see how this low-cost system's performance and battery life stand up on CNET Labs mobile benchmarks. Our review unit is on its way, so keep an eye on this space for the full story on the Lenovo 3000 C100.