Samsung N100 is simple and accessible to everyone, compact and lightweight. By default, the device comes with a very clear and simple operating environment. Every user can understand it. It has convenient tools for working with mail and the Internet, communicating on the network, listening to music and viewing photos / videos. All programs are Russified and adapted to the small screen of the netbook.
The N100 has a standard hardware base - the Intel Atom platform and the MeeGo operating system, which was developed specifically for mobile devices. It has a clear and simple interface, it is supported by both netbooks and other portable devices (tablets, smartphones) and home multimedia devices, computers, embedded systems. This system has almost everything a novice user needs. It is possible to install many additional freeware that Linux develops.
Although, I suspect that most potential netbook buyers will not want to learn a new environment and will install the familiar Windows instead. In this case, I do not recommend that you buy Samsung N100, since without the MeeGo system it will turn into an ordinary inexpensive model with limited functionality.
If you look at the hardware components of the N100, you will notice that they differ from most 10 "netbooks with the Intel platform. Here they used a special Atom N435 processor with a clock speed of 1.33 GHz. It is not in the official Intel catalog, because it is released very rarely , only for such special projects.Operating system MeeGo undemanding to computing resources and this allowed Samsung developers to lower power consumption and processor performance.
The Samsung netbook has only one low-capacity battery with a battery life of only 3-4 hours. We also reduced the number of USB ports to two, removed the second speaker and built-in microphone. You will need to connect a headset to use the webcam. Such savings in a netbook is justified by the fact that the manufacturer tried to reduce the functionality to minimize the price of the device to "budget" status.
In other respects, the N100 is similar to a regular Atom netbook. Such devices have one DDR3 memory slot, a standard 2.5 "hard drive with a capacity of 250 GB, an analog monitor output, wired and wireless network controllers.
There are many budget netbooks on the market for under $ 300. Among them, the most popular are the inexpensive models eMachines 350, Acer Aspire One D255, HP Compaq CQ10, MSI U135DX, Lenovo IdeaPad S10-3, a whole family of ASUS PX series netbooks - 1005PX, 1001PX, and 1011PX. In terms of technical parameters, we would like to compare our model with the ASUS Eee PC 1005PX, which is the most affordable among netbooks. ASUS has the following main advantages: the usual set of ports, a larger battery and a similar price.
The manufacturer does not hide that the new N100 model is an exact copy of the popular N150 netbook. There are some differences between them in the keyboard, the design of the lid (glossy plastic has been replaced), and some elements. The netbook has a "youth" style: a thin black case with rounded corners. It is surrounded on three sides by a noticeable dark red edging located in a depression.
The back of the case was raised and made thicker, because the battery does not protrude from below, but is located at an angle to it. The puffy lid has pointed edges. It is made of matte plastic and the display has a small glossy frame. The design of the netbook is very neat, primarily due to such high-quality plastic. The material is smooth in the interior and rough on the bottom. The build quality can also be called very high, which has always been characteristic of the products of the Korean manufacturer.I also liked the design of the device: the hard cover was attached on an excellent hinge, and the light and strong body resists twisting and bending. The netbook also has a very comfortable sidewall shape. It is lightweight, has a compact charger and is therefore one of the lightest in its class. The main drawback of the device is a small and not quite comfortable wrist area. This had to be done due to the unusual location of the battery. The hard drive bay is also missing. So in a netbook, you can only replace the RAM on your own.
Netbook N100 has a matte LCD screen with a standard resolution for this type of device - 1024x600. The manufacturer of this matrix is not known to me. The screen has such parameters: usual contrast, small color gamut, not quite accurate gamma setting (it was slightly underestimated to visually improve contrast). Small viewing angles are especially uncomfortable. The main standout parameter of this display is brightness, which is slightly above average, but has too coarse adjustment.
The quality of the sound reproduced by the built-in speaker did not please: it has low power and a narrow frequency range. Although, for budget netbooks, this is quite normal.
The N100 has inherited a good keyboard from the N150. It is not island: the keys are flatter, and their convex shape is more practical than those of the thin keys of Acer netbooks.
The mechanism of the keys is quite tight, with a clear stroke and a soft click. I liked their contrasting designation very much (the Cyrillic font is painted in a dark pink color). The keyboard has a standard layout, there are separate End and Home buttons. Although their location between the cursor keys is not very convenient. Some designations have been changed to adapt to MeeGo. For example, instead of Windows, the button between Alt and Fn was marked with the usual home page icon. There is a settings icon on the F1 key, because in MeeGo, the Fn + F1 key combination brings up the system settings panel.
The touchpad of the netbook is too small, but, despite this, it works very confidently. On Windows, it supports multitouch (MeeGo does not have a driver for this feature). The keys have medium depth and no click.
The N100 netbook has no USB port on the left. It is equipped with only two ports on the right, which is not very convenient, because the VGA port is located there. When an external screen is connected, it is difficult to insert USB devices.
The power outlet and audio ports are on the left. There is a card reader under the leading edge, to access which you need to lift the netbook. In general, this placement of connectors is far from ideal.
As I said, the Samsung netbook has a lower processor frequency. It makes the already slower Atom processor even slower. The PCMark test was carried out, the results of which showed that the performance of the Samsung N100 is worse than the ASUS 1005PX by about 13-16%. It is clear that the processor of this model will become the “weakest link”, which will limit the speed in many tasks. However, most netbooks on the Intel platform have this property. If you are in need of better performance, then I advise you to take a closer look at devices based on the AMD platform.
I have already discussed the battery capacity of the N100 netbook. Now I will tell you about the results of the tests carried out. The first one was carried out in Windows 7. This is MobileMark 2007 in Productivity mode, the result of which was 4 hours of work without recharging the battery. At the same time, the power consumption of the netbook was only 5.7 W, which is noticeably less than that of competitive 10 "netbooks. Switching our model to the document reading mode, we get the result of 5.5 hours. During active use of Wi-Fi to access the Internet (a new page was loaded in the browser every minute) the device lasted only 4.5 hours without recharging.
You cannot run the MobileMark test with the MeeGo operating system, but you can do your own internet access test. The battery life turned out to be 45 minutes less (20%).It turns out that this operating system needs fewer resources than Windows 7, but it cannot efficiently manage the power consumption of a netbook.
The N100 lacks the main problem of the N150 netbook - the strong bottom heating. The maximum heating temperature of the wrist zone is moderately warm (33-34 °), the bottom is 40 °. I would like to note that the Windows operating system copes much better with the power consumption of the processor than MeeGo, which significantly heats the netbook even without heavy loads. The noise level during operation in both systems remains low, without launching capacious programs the netbook is completely inaudible.
In our store Samsung N100 is provided without OS. This is a huge plus, because the user will be able to install the one that he likes the most. Almost every customer knows about Windows 7, but few people know about MeeGo. Therefore, I decided in this review to describe all the features of this operating system. This will make it easier for you to make your choice. I will only describe the interface and basic programs of MeeGo.
The MeeGo operating system starts on a Samsung netbook much faster than Windows 7. It takes 28 seconds between the appearance of the password field and the power on. The main programs are very fast and there are no big delays. The interface of this system is focused on using only one window: each of the applications is launched "full screen" on separate desktops - in the so-called "zone". You can switch between them with the Alt + Tab keyboard shortcut. After clicking on them, thumbnails of windows appear with characteristic animation. This is because the small size and low resolution of the netbook screen make dragging and dropping windows awkward. The interface elements have very large sizes. They are much larger than in Windows, which will be a gift for people with low vision.
When you press the Home key, which is located in place of the Win key, a custom panel with widget icons appears. The following widgets are installed by default: "Myzone" - this is the start page of frequently launched programs and files; "Applications" - installed programs, which are divided into groups (Internet, media, games, office, standard, etc.); "Zones" - open applications; "Status" - the functionality of social networks (Twitter, Facebook); "People" - a special messenger Empathy; "Internet" - launches the Chromium browser and bookmarks; "Data" - video and music player; "Devices" - control panel for main settings and connected drives. It is immediately evident that the netbook is configured for quick access to the necessary tasks that are usually assigned to this type of mobile computer.
There are also many free programs in the MeeGo operating system. Some are good and some are not. They often duplicate each other. LibreOffice is slightly inferior to Microsoft Office. There is a Banshee player, a couple of photo viewers, some logic games, and an Evolution organizer. Chromium is installed as a browser. All programs do not have any flaws, which allows you to easily learn a new operating system, which is much more complex than standard Windows.
The new budget Samsung N100 netbook has a pleasant appearance, a neat universal design, a small body thickness and practical materials. In its price class, all this looks very good, which captivates most users. But do not forget that to reduce the cost of the model, manufacturers have reduced several important functions and installed a cheap screen, so sometimes it is not very convenient to use this netbook.
By using a special version of the processor, the developers have achieved lower than usual power consumption, but reduced the battery life without recharging. The MeeGo operating system looks much more interesting than Windows 7. But it is a very controversial solution, since it is not without its shortcomings.MeeGo does not have programs familiar to Windows users, is difficult to customize or update, and there are some limitations in the pre-installed IDE. But which operating system is better to install on this model is up to you.
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