Lenovo Ideapad 710S review: Ultra-light laptop, but at a price

Lenovo Ideapad 710S fills the core demand of being an ultra-portable and sleek laptop. This is one you can easily carry around in your bag without it feeling like a brick. It sports the latest Intel seventh generation core i5 processor, and here's our review.

The PC market has been in sharp decline for sometime as smartphones have become the primary screen for most users. The really light, powerful Windows 10 laptop that doesn’t cost a bomb for top-end specifications hasn’t happened for the market, like we’ve seen in the case of smartphones. But there’s still a significant user base for whom the right laptop matters, and they don’t mind spending to get this.

If I were to put together a list of must-have demands when picking a laptop, it would be an ultra-light form factor, long battery life, and at least 8GB RAM. Most ultrabooks in the market with such good specifications will cost Rs 80,000 and above. Lenovo’s Ideapad 710S is one such device. Here’s what we thought of it after the review.

Specifications: 13.3 FHD IPS AG (Slim) Display | Intel Core 7th generation i5-7200U processor | 8GB RAM + 256 GB SSD | Windows 10 Home OS | 2 USB 3.0 ports, 4 in 1 Card Reader (SD, SDHC, SDXC, MMC) | WiFi 2X2 AC + Bluetooth 4.0 |

Price on box: Rs 89,990

Lenovo Ideapad 710S Design, Display review

Lenovo Ideapad 710S fills the core demand of being an ultra-portable and sleek laptop. This is one you can easily carry around in your bag without feeling like you are lugging a brick. In terms of dimensions, this laptop is 307 x 214 x 13.9 mm, and only 0.5-inches in thickness when closed. It weighs around 1.1 kg. So yes, this is lighter than my Apple MacBook Air, which is a laptop I’m unlikely to give up But Lenovo Ideapad 710S makes for a sleek and stylish looking device. The gold colour option we got is certainly eye-catching, though some might consider it too bling. But the top cover has a plastisky feel to touch, despite the metal finish. Lenovo Ideapad 710S might not have a 360-degree hinge like the Yoga series, but you can lay the display flat at 180 degrees, in case this is what you can prefer to do.

The 13.3-inch Full HD display is one of the best you’ll get, and Lenovo has made this extra slim with thin bezels on the side to give a lot more space for viewing. Overall, the display on the Lenovo Ideapad 710S is bright, vivid, and with excellent viewing angles so you won’t be disappointed on this front.

Lenovo Ideapad 710S fills the core demand of being an ultra-portable and sleek laptop.

Lenovo Ideapad 710S Performance review

Lenovo Ideapad 710S comes with the Intel 7th generation core i5 processor, and 8GB RAM along with 256GB on board storage. It has two USB 3.0 ports, a 4-in-1 card reader, JBL speakers on board as well.When it comes to performance, the 8GB RAM should be sufficient for most daily tasks.  Multi-tasking is not such a problem on this laptop, but I should warn with Google Chrome there is a bit of a struggle at times.

In fact, there were instances when Google Chrome would freeze way too frequently on this laptop, which is not expected for something that costs close to Rs 90,000. Running games like Asphalt 8 from the Microsoft Store, opening Microsoft Word, multi-tasking via Microsoft Edge wasn’t such an issue on this laptop, and the computer is quick to respond to these tasks. There’s no noticeable lag when switching between apps.

Lenovo Ideapad 710S comes with the Intel 7th generation core i5 processor, and 8GB RAM along with 256GB on board storage.

For daily tasks like watching videos, preparing office documents, PPTs etc on Microsoft Office 365, this laptop is good enough. The sound itself is loud enough as well, and I didn’t feel the need for syncing a Bluetooth speaker when watching videos on this.

Lenovo Ideapad 710S Keyboard, Trackpad review

The keys on this laptop have a slight curved, rounded style at the bottom, which some might find odd. I used this to type out some articles, and I would say the travel is good on this keyboard. I didn’t face any issues getting used to the keyboard, which is always important for me when trying out a new laptop. I have a tendency of typing fast, which means a lot more typos and hitting the backspace when trying out a newer keyboard. Thankfully you get used to this one pretty quickly.

Lenovo Ideapad 710S makes for a sleek and stylish looking device, though the gold version can be a bit blingy.

The trackpad though tends to get confusing at times, and is sensitive to the lightest of touch. It took me some time to figure out, why my web browser would suddenly be at 200 per cent, even though I had barely moved the trackpad.

Lenovo Ideapad 710S Battery review

This laptop comes with 4 Cell Li-Polymer battery, and you can expect around 8-10 hours plus on this, which isn’t bad at all. This is with extensive tasks. Playing a two hour movie on loop at 1080p on this laptop got us around close to 5 and a half hours on this laptop. If your daily tasks including some web browsing, editing articles, etc, the laptop should easily last close to 10 hours. On the battery front, the Ideapad 710S fares quite well.

This laptop comes with 4 Cell Li-Polymer battery, and you can expect around 8-10 hours plus on this,

Lenovo Ideapad 710S Verdict

If you’re looking for an ultrabook, but have a budget of under Rs 90,000, Lenovo Ideapad 710S is a good option to consider. It’s retailing for under Rs 83,000 on the official Lenovo shop. The performance, portability and battery life of this laptop are all quite pretty good. However, for most users this will be an expensive offering. If you’re looking for a laptop under Rs 50,000 then you will have a tough time finding offerings that are sleek, and sport a minimum of 8GB RAM on board.

This is a stylish, premium laptop, and you should get this if you can’t do without portability. However, if your budget is flexible, you can always try and spend more for some higher specifications, or see if a better deal is possible within a similar budget. But the Lenovo Ideapad 710S shouldn’t give any cause for complaints.for sometime.