14 DAY TRIAL // Lenovo joins the stick-size-PC market a bit late. However, all this time is not entirely lost as Lenovo compared prices, components and available technology from its competitors and managed to launch one of the cheapest PC-on-a-stick products.
The company announced Tuesday the launching of Ideacentre Stick 300, a miniature PC on a stick that can fit wherever you want to carry it.
The Ideacenter has an Intel Atom Z3735F “Bay Trail” processor alongside 2GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage. It connects with a television or monitor via an HDMI cable and has a micro-USB 2.0 port for power, and a full-size USB together with a microSD card reader. Together with all that, it comes equipped with an 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi and a Bluetooth 4.0.
Measuring a mere 15 mm, it'll ship with Windows 8.1 and (unlike Microsoft's yet-unconfirmed OS upgrade eligibility) it will upgrade for free to Windows 10 on July 29.
Following the pack
But, when you look at it, it's remarkably similar, almost identical, to what Intel came up this spring. The Compute Stick from Intel packs the same Intel Atom CPU, the same amount of RAM and memory together with the same connectivity. Adding the fact that Microsoft jumped the cloning bandwagon with Splendo too, it's the price that'll settle the final victor. As both Intel's and Microsoft's PC-sticks came at around $140, Lenovo's Ideacentre 300 price of $129 is a slap in the face of its competition.
However, Intel, the initiator of this PC-on-a-stick trend is already preparing the next step out from this cloning madness, and according to PC World, will bring a much-upgraded stick PC equipped with a Core M CPU, 64GB of memory and 4GB or RAM.
It's only funny to see how competitors try to undercut Intel on hardware built and delivered by the same company by offering cheaper build quality and probably cutting away features to the bone (or metal). At such low prices, there's only so much you can get rid of for a lower price.
Ideacentre Stick 300 will come this fall and will have a starting price of $129.