This festive season think of gifting a laptop rather than a mid-range smartphone to your nearest one because a portable computer will come to good use for a very long time. Realme understands the power of marketing on these lines, thus turning in the company’s first laptop in India — Realme Book Slim, which has two variants.
The review unit that we have is powered by 11th Gen Intel Core i3-1115G4 processor with 8GB RAM, which is fair enough for everyday use while pricing is well under 50K. Exciting? Even a couple of years ago, getting a laptop with premium looks came at a price. No longer. There is the Realme Book Slim and also the Mi NoteBook Ultra, which was unveiled a few days ago. Both the companies are growing their smartphone base and at the same time targeting their phone customers with other products.
Crisp video and audio
Personally, I feel that the real value of this product can be felt if you also use something like Realme GT Master Edition phone, which allows the PC Connect feature (Realme GT Master Explorer Edition and GT editions will soon support this function via OTA soon). I believe that we are simply looking at the tip of Realme’s success story, which will be understood at length once 5G roll out begins.
Coming back to the laptop, the biggest distinguishing feature is the screen and colour. The Real Blue version looks as stunning as its high-quality aluminum body. Only 14.9mm thick and weighing 1.38kg, it truly is a portable device. But the real winner is the screen. It’s a 14-inch IPS display with 3:2 aspect ratio unlike most devices in the market. It means, the screen appears taller and allows more real estate for productivity tools, like Microsoft 365 or Photoshop. This is a fantastic 2K full vision display with 2160×1440 resolution, ensuring pictures and videos appear crisp. Even long hours of viewing won’t give you a headache. While watching films there will be black strips above and below because of the aspect ratio but after two minutes of viewing, you will forget about it. Doing justice to the screen is the fantastic Harman two-speaker set up that’s loud, clear and well-balanced, unlike the Mi NoteBook Ultra.
Work-worthy processor
The keyboard too doesn’t disappoint. It’s a 14-inch laptop, so what you have is a compact zero-flex keyboard complemented by a large trackpad and a biggish palm rest. There is a satisfying click to the keys and if you are in a silent room, you will hardly hear the keyboard.
In way of ports, the company has kept it simple: On the i3 version you get two USB-C ports, one USB-A 3.1 port and a 3.5mm headphone and microphone jack combo, meaning you can do the basic stuff. In case you want to extend the life of the product, opt for the i5 version which also has a Thunderbolt 4 port.
Speaking of versions of the laptop, we didn’t find any lags as such on the i3 version, which handles all the basic workload — photo editing to light video editing, multiple browser tabs, Microsoft suite and so on. Gaming needs to be restricted to simple titles and anyway, the i3 and the i5 versions are not meant for this particular endeavour.
Thermals on the laptop too are quite good and we didn’t hear the fan firing up too much. The Realme Book comes with a 65W fast charger that gets you to a 50 per cent charge in just 30 minutes.
Having said all of these, one needs to remember that before buying a laptop just because it costs less think of the options — like MacBook Air — which come with a lot of productivity apps that you don’t need to pay for. Ask yourself what are the apps you would need to pay for while using a Windows laptop.
Should you get it?
The tall screen allows more area for productivity, which wins Realme a brownie point. And so does the excellent charging speed and around eight hours of screen time (though the company suggests it can be more). Realme Book Slim gets the fundamentals right –—excellent build quality, display, performance, and battery life. The company is truly aiming at the big leagues.
At a glance
The keyboard on Realme Book Slim is silent and has excellent key travel The Telegraph
Device: Realme Book Slim
Price: Rs 46,999 (i3 version with 8GB+256GB)
High notes
• Tall screen ratio offers more screen estate for productivity apps
• Very good audio quality
• One of the best keyboards in its price segment
• Excellent display
Muffled notes
• Port options limited
• Realme should offer more room for future upgrades