Lenovo introduces new budget laptops

27.05.2015
Lenovo is bringing three budget laptops to market in June, including one that can be equipped with Intel's RealSense 3D camera.

The Lenovo Z51 is a 15-inch Windows 8.1 notebook that's meant to be both a workstation and a home entertainment center, the company said Wednesday. The PC also has room to fit an optional RealSense camera, which can offer gesture controls like ones found in Microsoft's Kinect gaming device.

The Z51 has a 1080p display, and can be configured to have up to a fifth-generation Intel Core i7 processor, 16GB of RAM, and 1TB of HDD or SSHD (solid-state and hard drive combination) memory. It weighs 2.3 kilograms, and offers 4 hours of battery life. It can be upgraded to include an AMD R9-M375 graphics card.

The Z51 has a smaller sibling called the Z41 that has a 14-inch screen, but no support for Intel's RealSense camera. Both products will have a starting price at US$499.

But the Z51, when configured with the RealSense Camera, and equipped with a Core i5 processor and 8GB of RAM, will start at $599.

Consumers wanting an even cheaper alternative can look at Lenovo's ideapad 100, which the PC maker also introduced on Wednesday.

The ideapad 100, comes in both 14 and 15-inch display versions, and will start at $249. The affordable laptop runs an Intel BayTrail-M N3540 processor, which has four cores. It can have up to 128GB of SSD (solid-state drive) memory, runs Windows 8.1 and has a 1366 by 768 screen.

It has a battery life of 4 hours, and the 15-inch version weighs 2.3 kg, while the 14-inch version comes at 1.9 kg. The SSD memory can also be swapped for 500GB of HDD memory.

Michael Kan