Samsung N140 Netbook review

Wednesday, 16 December 2009 19:27 Written by Joe Diedericks

Samsung is mostly known for their mobile phones and not for their laptop and netbook products. I am however very impressed with their N140 Netbook offering.

When the Asus Eee PC came out, it was a nice gadget to have. I entered every competition available to win one. It didn’t offer much if you have to compare it to the new generation of Netbooks. It had:

512Mb Ram
4Gb of storage at most – and
The screen was very small

I upgraded my iBurst Wireless contract this month and one of the bundles I could choose from had the Samsung N140 included with a Wireless USB Modem. Obviously I was skeptical about a product that looks like a laptop but is about half the size. After doing a sufficient amount of research I finally decided to go for my first Netbook and hoped it would be all it was hyped up to be.

I am impressed. Let’s first have a look at the specs.

Intel Atom 1.6 GHz processor
160Gb Hard drive
1Gb Ram
10.1” LED display
Wireless connectivity
Bluetooth
3 USB Ports of which one is dedicated to charge USB devices like you cellphone
Networking port
Build in digital camera
Audio input jacks
Multi memory card reader

People might question the fact that it doesn’t have a DVD writer and it doesn’t bother me as much anymore. With the increased storage capabilities of USB flash drives it has become easier to copy disks to it and then transfer the program to a Netbook. The specs of the Samsung N140, is pretty much on par with most entry level desktop PCs. It is a little power pack on its own.

Exterior

The external casing is a pearly white plastic which looks great but I fear that soon it will start to show that it is a work horse and scratches will start to show. One of the first things I will be doing in the new year is to get a skin to protect it.

The screen

10.1” does seem very small but it is actually very easy to work on. My screen resolution is set to 1024x768 and working on that is not as hard on my eyes as working on my 21” LCD.

The color is brilliant and when you work on it outdoors you can still have a perfect view of what is happening on the screen without having to hold your hand above it to create a shadow.

Keyboard and mouse pad

The keys are similar to that you would find on a normal laptop. Firm yet responsive to touch. I have finally come to term with my Samsung Pleomax keyboard that was destroyed by my son spilling water on it and now I am pulled back to those days where I could simply glide my fingers across the board and letters would appear seamlessly on the screen.

The touch mouse pad is also very responsive and can be set according to sensitivity. The left and right buttons are a bit too delicate to my liking and I can see that somewhere in the future they might end up having to be replaced.

Audio

The N140 is does have two onboard speakers which resides at the front on the Netbook but slightly below it.
This machine wasn’t build as an entertainment centre, so do not expect it to serve as one. Nevertheless when you are using a pair of eyes phones it does produce a fairly satisfactory performance.

Built-in Camera

The built-in camera which can be found at the top of the screen is 1.3MP and is great for video communication via Skype or GTalk.

Samsung have included software pre-installed on the Netbook for you to record your own Vlogs (Video Blogs). From the software interface you can email it or upload it to YouTube. What I liked about this offering is that the built-in microphone which sits to the left of the mouse pad is pretty impressive when it comes to the sound quality.

Fast movements will however result in some delay on the recording but that is to be expected from a 1.3MP. I would have liked an option to set the frame rate myself to overcome this.

Speed and performance

Windows XP came pre-installed and I was actually looking forward to a Windows 7 operating system. After I stopped sulking about that I actually started to enjoy the little N140.

It loads programs very fast and I haven’t had anything hang yet.

I loaded Aptana Studio which is an IDE for PHP and Java development. On my work and home PC it tend to take longer to load whilst on the N140 is react in record time. I also tweaked the OS interface to look like Windows 7 and added a docking bar to it. Normally these graphical interface changes slows down a machine a bit, so far I haven’t noticed it affecting the performance.

Who needs a Samsung N140?

Who doesn’t? You can pick one up at most retailers for between R 2 999 – 3 999 and it is simply worth the money.
It is small and compact, meaning that you can carry it around in your back pack or hands without it weighing you down. If you are a blogger like me then this is a must have. Journalists would love it. Simply sit down where you are, type your story and send it off.

IT technicians who are working in the field would also find the N140 useful as you can install all you diagnostics tools on it and have full access to testing and solving problems. If you need to get connected then you simply connect to the net and work online.

Let’s be honest. Netbooks are here to stay and I expect them to grow from strength to strength. The Samsung N140 isn’t the strongest one on the market but it is redefining the entry level and it is affordable.

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