MALIBAL Review (Clevo/Lotus W110ER)

[WCFire]

Hey guys,

So I've been really into the 11" W110ER lately. Since this machine only has one hard drive bay and it was to be my main rig, I really wanted a large SSD. I priced out a W110ER at several resellers but couldn't find a great deal on a W110ER + >256GB SSD. Many of them came with prohibitively expensive Intel drives without flexibility for other options. I'm not as comfortable with hardware as others, so I would have preferred to have a machine pre-built and ready to go for me at delivery, but since I was trying to save as much money as possible, I decided I would order one without a hard drive and OS and then perform the installations myself.

However, after speaking with MALIBAL, who normally doesn't carry this model, they were willing to special order a W110ER for me and because of my SSD price concerns, they custom ordered a Crucial M4 512GB SSD as well and we threw in an OS. This would have saved me the trouble of installing the SSD and OS myself. They offered me this build at a great price too. In the end, it was priced cheaper than if I would have done the whole thing myself! If this had been the previous build I was considering, this final price would have been equivalent to me spending under $1 per GB on the SSD.

So if anyone is looking at the W110ER, I'd recommend considering MALIBAL as an option. You can request it by opening a sales ticket on their website. The rep I spoke with was friendly, helpful, and enthusiastic. I'm told that I will be the first owner of a MALIBAL Lotus W110ER

For anyone curious, the price for the computer was $1420 with the i7-3610QM, IC Diamond 7, 8GB 1800MHZ RAM, Windows OS, and a 512GB Crucial SSD.

[Epsilon748]

That seemed expensive, at least until I looked up how much a 512GB drive cost. At more than $1/GB, it's easily more than 1/3 the cost of your machine.

Anyway,looks like you've got a pretty nice ultraportable there. I might end up ordering a W110er to replace my x220 by the end of the summer if the dual core Ivy Bridge CPU's come out.

[jaug1337]

Great, congratulations The W110ER seems like something for me too

[WCFire]

That seemed expensive, at least until I looked up how much a 512GB drive cost. At more than $1/GB, it's easily more than 1/3 the cost of your machine.

Yeah, I'm surprised I ended up going the 512GB route. It was rather extravagant of me, but I could justify it better since there is only one hard drive bay in this thing and I was trying to keep it as convenient of a machine as possible, being a 11" and all. I'm hoping I can keep using the SSD even after this machine goes. If you take the going price of a Crucial M4 512GB to be $600 though, subtract $600 from $1420 and you get the rest of the machine for $820 with all the upgrades and extras I got.

[IKAS V]

Considering the size of SSD you got it really is a great deal, congrats bro
Still waiting for mine

[awakeN]

The rep I spoke with was friendly, helpful, and enthusiastic.

Sounds like they fired the other one.

[hizzaah]

I imagine they didn't speak on here.. And no, they didn't fire the other one (assuming you mean username MALIBAL) as he was the owner of the company..

That's a super deal OP! Congrats!

[awakeN]

I imagine they didn't speak on here.. And no, they didn't fire the other one (assuming you mean username MALIBAL) as he was the owner of the company..

That's a super deal OP! Congrats!

Oh I was talking about a CSR from a while ago, there were many complaints about him on these forums lol

[hizzaah]

Oh, never mind then lol

[WCFire]

I know what you mean, awakeN. I heard about those complaints, so I expected a similar experience going in. That's why I was surprised to see that they were as helpful and friendly as they were. They've answered my emails at all times of the day within minutes, even around midnight.