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JOI Book SK3000 Review

Charles TYK

Introduction

This is the JOI Book SK3000, the first laptop in Malaysia to run on an ARM platform. While Windows laptop running on the ARM platform isn’t something new, it is the future, the recent launch of Apple’s M1 chip has consolidated this statement. A brief introduction about JOI, which is a homegrown brand founded by a local ICT company, SNS Network (M) Sdn Bhd from Ipoh. The company introduced its first device in 2013, which also means it has more than 7 years of experience in making products. So, how’s the product? We’ll find out in this review!

JOI Book SK3000 Specs

Design

The laptop looks heavily inspired by a trillion-dollar company, but that’s a good thing. It is only less than 15mm thin and 1.05kg light, despite using premium material — the top and bottom panels are made of aluminum.

There aren’t much in terms of I/O ports, the left side has the USB-C port, which is being used for charging and data transferring. Unfortunately, it doesn’t support Thunderbolt 3 (Thunderbolt is the brand name of a hardware interface developed by Intel). The right side of the laptop has a 3.5mm audio jack.

The black piece is made of plastic, which houses all the antennas for signal transmission. There’s a cutout area that lets you unwind a screw so that you can insert a MicroSD card and Nano-SIM card. The JOI Book SK3000 actually supports 4G LTE connectivity, ensuring you to be always-connected.

Display

It sports a 12.5-inch Full HD IPS display with thin bezels and it has a glossy finish. Compared to matte finish screens, a glossy screen has more vivid color and contrast. Colors appear more intense and saturated, while blacks appear deeper. The 2MP webcam is located below the screen, which is a little bit strange.

Keyboard and Touchpad

The JOI Book SK3000 has a nice keyboard and touchpad. It has a standard 13-inch laptop keyboard layout and the keys are very tactile and responsive. It has a long rectangular touchpad, which also supports Windows 10 Precision driver.

Performance

Here comes the main concern of the product — the performance. The JOI Book SK3000 is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon Mobile Compute Platform with 4GB RAM and 128GB UFS 3.1 storage. It is a mobile computing platform engineered to support always-on, always-connected experiences in sleek and innovative form factors with new architectures for enhanced multi-day battery-life and performance, connectivity, immersive entertainment, and artificial intelligence (AI).

The question is — can a Snapdragon processor get your job done? Well, the answer is Yes and No. It actually works well with Microsoft Edge and other apps that can be downloaded from Microsoft Store such as Spotify, Microsoft Office, Netflix, etc. If the app is optimized for the ARM architecture, it’ll work well. Google Chrome won’t perform as well as Microsoft Edge since it uses more RAM, just like many other laptops.

Software

The laptop runs on Windows 10 Pro, which supports BitLocker device encryption and Windows Information Protection (WIP). If your device is lost or stolen, BitLocker and BitLocker To Go put everything on lockdown, so no one else can access your systems or data. WIP helps to protect against potential data leakage without otherwise interfering with the employee experience. WIP also helps to protect enterprise apps and data against accidental data leaks on enterprise-owned devices and personal devices that employees bring to work, without requiring changes to your environment or other apps.

Battery Life

The laptop packs a 4,200mAh battery with a tiny 30W charger included. It supports both USB-PD and USB-PD PPS charging standards. I tried charging the laptop with the UGREEN 65W GaN PD charger and it works well. In terms of battery life, the advantage of a mobile compute processor comes into play, I was able to get around 10 hours of battery life!

Final Words

Retailing at RM2,199, the JOI Book SK3000 is a great laptop for students. It doesn’t cost much and comes with a durable build together with the support of 4G LTE connectivity and long-lasting battery life. It is also thin and light, so you can carry it anywhere. If you are interested in getting one, you can find it here.

Yay

Nay

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