Samsung N148 Plus Netbook Unboxing Review & Features

Thanks to Intel Legends Team under the Brand – My India App Story which ran a contest and we won a Netbook for the post on Epic Browser Usage. The first impressions were very good on the Samsung N148 Plus Netbook. The device looks like the HP Mini series laptops, but after using that earlier, I can say Samsung has launched something lot better in terms of design, performance and the price value. The netbook is power packed with features that one would need with such portable devices to carry on with the work on-the-go.

Let’s review the different aspects of the Samsung N148 Plus –
Display and Screen – The 10.1-inch LED display with the anti-reflective property, doesn’t feel hard on the eyes for long hours, and the brightness is quite good. This being an LED display, the view from side too doesn’t reduce the graphic quality.

Design overview – The N148 plus has a standard netbook-sized keyboard, and a touchpad with the left/right touchpad buttons, and on the left of it, there are various status indicators. There is a camera in the front, just above the screen and for the video conferencing, there is a Microphone beside the touchpad, which can be optionally used when not using an external mic. The various indicators are for the caps lock, hard disk drive, wireless LAN, Charge status and the power status of the netbook. There is also a slot for various SD cards. The standard glossy black color on the back of the netbook shines well, but would need the protection against scratches.

The right side bar beside the keyboard has a switch to turn on/off the Wireless LAN, and there are two USB ports, a monitor port and a port to plug in the security lock. The left side bar has the jack to connect the power adapter, a jack to connect the ethernet cable, a USB port and the jacks for audio phones.

Battery – The box came with the netbook and the battery separated, indicating that the Lithium-ion battery is removable, and can be changed. The complete 100% charge on full usage could run the netbook for more than 8 hours, and that’s what is claimed by Samsung. The 6-cell battery could get charged back to 100% in just less than 90 minutes.

Keyboard – The keyboard though constricted due to the size of the netbook, provides many functions through the hotkeys by holding down the function key. Many functions like turning the LCD on/off, Wireless LAN on/off, Bluetooth on/off, disabling and enabling the touchpad, adjusting the brightness and volume etc. can be done by multiple key usage.

Touchpad – The touchpad is very responsive, and multiple touch also worked, during scrolling the webage up and down using two fingers at a time etc. The pad is tiny, but plain enough which won’t reduce the response when used with moisture around.

Internal specifications – The Samsung N148 plus came with the basic DOS initially, but with the USB Windows 7 installation, it took pretty less time for everything to be setup. The netbook comes with 250GB hard drive, and 1GB RAM but there is a separate slot in the bottom for the memory, so expanding the RAM is possible. The CPU is Intel Atom Processor N450 @ 1.66Ghz, and there is Intel Graphics Media Accelerator too. The sound is of HD quality and with SRS 3D sound effect.

Connectivity of the N148 plus is just like the other netbooks, with the Wired Ethernet LAN 10/100 LAN, WiFi 802.11 bgn, Bluetooth 3.0 technology.

Final words –
The Samsung N148 Plus netbook is a pretty impressive device with all the features packed in for a good performance, and it is a portable one at 10.1-inches. With all those specs talked above, it is a reasonable one at INR 15000. Though you would need to cash in some extra amount if you want to increase the RAM, that won’t cost you a lot. Compared to the HP Mini series laptops at INR 18000+ the Samsung N148 plus is a better one to opt for. We had installed Windows 7 using USB Pen Drive.

Unboxing Video :