greentechZONE Products for the week of November 5, 2007
Lenovo Says…
Lenovo Raises Energy-Efficiency Bar with Its Smallest, Quietest Desktop PC
Lenovo has reinvigorated the desktop PC space with the ThinkCentre A61e ultra small form factor desktop. As the company's smallest, quietest and most energy-efficient desktop yet, it has a footprint the size of an average telephone book, whisper quiet performance and choices of energy-efficient, 45-watt AMD Athlon X2 dual core and AMD Sempron single core processors, all at an affordable price tag starting at $399.
The ThinkCentre A61e desktop marks Lenovo's first product with EPEAT Gold status, the highest designation a product can achieve in the ranking. Operated by the Green Electronics Council, EPEAT ranks products on a variety of environmental attributes from energy efficiency to materials use to recyclability. Many organizations use this tool to help make purchasing decisions. Recognized for its environmental attributes, the ThinkCentre A61e desktop uses up to 90 percent reusable/recyclable materials as well as 90 percent recyclable packaging. It also can be powered by an optional solar panel.
The desktop surpasses the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Energy Star 4.0 criteria with its 85 percent efficient power supply. As the first desktop in the industry to run on energy-efficient AMD Athlon X2 dual core and AMD Sempron single core processors, it can help users save up to 50 percent in energy costs annually over previous models. For example:
- A user could save, on average, more than $20 a year in energy costs and the equivalent of the carbon dioxide emissions created by two round-trip plane flights from Boston to New York.
- A customer deploying as few as 50 desktops could expect to save more than $1,000 a year in energy costs alone. And it could help avoid more than 20,000 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions.
- A large enterprise deployment of 50,000 desktops could save more than $1 million in annual energy costs and cut more than 20 million pounds of carbon dioxide emissions.
"The importance of maximizing energy efficiency and being environmentally conscious is touching all aspects of our daily lives, from the light bulbs we use to light our homes to the hybrid cars we drive to the green technology we rely on to run our businesses," said, Peter Schrady, vice president and general manager, Emerging Products Business Unit, Lenovo. "Lenovo is committed to providing an extensive menu of environmentally-responsible, energy-efficient technology choices, and the ThinkCentre A61e desktop is our signature item. For the first time, a major PC vendor has combined small size and consistently quiet acoustics with a light weight, highly energy-efficient desktop offering at an affordable price."
As energy prices rise, finding ways to control these variable costs through more efficient technology becomes increasingly important.
"Lenovo and AMD have a shared commitment to providing customers the most secure, innovative and energy-efficient computing experience that can exceed their unique business needs," said Greg White, corporate vice president and general manager, Desktop Division, AMD . "The Lenovo ThinkCentre A61e desktop is an exciting milestone in our relationship as both companies continue to collaborate to raise the bar for PC design and energy efficiency."
A Smaller, More Nimble Desktop
According to IDC, the worldwide desktop market grew year-over-year by 4.2 percent in the second quarter of 2007 with Lenovo growing 20.4 percent in this period. IDC forecasts worldwide shipments of the ultra small form factor desktop to grow by 52 percent from 2005 to 2010.
Taking up 25 percent less space than previous models and weighing just eight pounds, the ThinkCentre A61e ultra small form factor desktop fits the shrinking real estate in today's work environment, making it an especially good fit for customers in education, medical and financial sectors. Not only smaller in size, the PC's typical single, low-speed fan keeps it running cool for ultimate reliability and keeping it consistently quiet whether in idle mode or stretched to the maximum for peak performance.
The ThinkCentre A61e desktop follows Lenovo's recent introduction of the ThinkCentre A61 desktop in tower form factor to equip enterprise users with leading technologies such as I/O port disablement for security, support for up to four monitors for data-intensive tasks and high energy efficiency by meeting the EPA Energy Star 4.0 criteria.
EN-Genius Says…
Whether or not you’ll forsake this compact, eco-friendly unit for a more watt-hungry, less recyclable, but oh-so-sexier gamer PC, you should take note of the many green design features that Lenovo’s ThinkCentre A61e packs because it provides a very clear look at the future of computers. Anyone involved with designing consumer products should take a close look at its innards to get a good idea the kinds of challenges they’ll be facing some time soon when they are called upon to perform the tricky balance between price, performance, and environmental footprint. Likewise, power supply designers should pay attention because the 85%+ efficiency that this computer’s supply delivers will soon be a baseline requirement for almost every application.
 Powered by either a single-core AMD Sempron LE 1150 processor or an Athlon 64 X2 dual core chip, energy conservation is one half of the design strategy that won the A61e its the EPEAT Gold rating, a new eco-standard for computer equipment. (For those unfamiliar with EPEAT, it’s a relatively new voluntary certification program that grades computers and peripherals on several important environmental criteria including energy efficiency, recyclability, and measures taken to ensure a long service life.)
Strict adherence to efficiency in both its operational, standby, and sleep modes has earned it the latest EnergyStar 4.0 rating. Surprisingly, power consumption does not vary that much between the single- and dual-core processors with the active idle power levels for the single-core Sempron measured at 48 W and 47 W for the dual-core Athalon. Likewise, standby power for both machines is around 3 W - 4W and maximum is 88 W and 90 W, respectively. These machines are so power-efficient that there are persistent rumors of an optional solar-powered version being available in the future.
Besides its very low power consumption, the A61e incorporates several other green design features that I expect will become much more commonplace over the next few years. Its small, 8-lb chassis is designed for quick, tool-less assembly and disassembly, a feature that reduces the labor costs associated with upgrades (memory, optical and hard drives) and repair to enable a long service life. Tool-less also makes recycling labor costs lower.
Lenovo was very careful to keep the overall mass of the computer (and its shipping box) as low as feasible in order to reduce both the materials its manufacturing process consumes and the energy required to ship it. The company’s motivation here was both eco- and business-based since a smaller size also means lower shipping costs at each stage of the manufacturing and sales process. They took this idea further by investing some deep research into customer requirements that allowed them to develop a limited number of machine configurations to simplify both sales and recycling logistics.
Just to clarify the green disassembly features are for the A61e ultra-small form factor package hat sits horizontally on or under your desk. There are a couple of other A series products that are offered in a more traditional vertical tower form factor that provide a bit more, performance, I/O and other features. Lenovo did not talk about these models with me but a quick look at the specs and photos on their home page leads me to believe that they use a more conventional chassis layout that’s not quite as easy to service or recycle, and probably are a bit more power-hungry.
Other folks have not been as impressed as I was: CNET’s review of the A61e was mixed, although the less eco-conscious tower models in the A series got better reviews. This is a fact that Lenovo blurs a little on its product page by way of some clever graphics that allows the unwary to infer that the A61e got the more favorable review. Nevertheless, Lenovo is to be congratulated on an excellent first attempt at an eco-computer.
The quick overview I got of the A61e gave me the impression that while it is certainly not a fire-breathing work station, it could easily handle the browsing, word processing and simple graphics and video tasks I ask of my laptop. If I were getting a machine like this, I’d go for a total green solution, and buy Lenovo’s new ThinkVision L193p 19-inch LCD display -- the market’s first EPEAT Gold rated monitor.
Despite any limitations, I’m sure it will provide a cost-effective, environmentally-conscious solution for most run-of-the-mill computing applications. I’d also suspect that the A61e is a test case that will pave the way for many more environmentally-designed computing products that offer more performance and even better value. It’s a good thing, too, because Lenovo now has at least some competition in the low-power PC arena with the Dell introduction of a specially-configured low-end Inspiron. Lenovo still maintains the lead for now because a closer look at the Dell announcement reveals their unit has EnergyStar 4.0 certification but does not appear to have any of the mechanical and materials innovations that gave the A61e its EPEAT credentials.
Pricing for a single-core A61e starts at $399 (with XP Pro, Sempron LE 1150, 512 M RAM, 80G HD, DVD ROM). A generously-configured dual-core system (1G RAM, a 512 M ATI Radeon 1200 graphics chip, and an 80G SATA drive), that includes a three-year warranty; an $30 optional mail-back recycling service and an upgraded keyboard/mouse combo comes in at a bit over $600.
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