Linx 10 review

Unless you are willing to spend almost three times the money on better specified, but far more expensive alternatives such as the Lenovo Yoga 2, there is little that competes with Linx's keenly priced Windows tablets.

Yes, there is the previously mentioned Schenker Element 10.1 that looks almost identical, but it's more expensive, lower-powered, and only available on the continent. Other than that, the Linx 10 is only really surrounded by budget Android tablets at the £160 (around $238, or AU$307) price point.

I was a little disappointed to find that the processor has been under-clocked, and can only assume that this was something to do with ensuring battery life remains at a reasonable level. Having used the higher-clocked 8-inch sibling, however, it simply doesn't make sense. Outside of benchmark scores, the Linx 10 did seemingly perform well, and multi-tasking felt like it was a little less taxing with the extra Gigabyte of RAM onboard.

With the extra 2.1-inches of screen real estate, I'd be looking for a screen with a higher resolution if I were laying down the cash myself, as frankly anything below 1080p on a 10-inch tablet looks overly pixelated next to the super high-res smartphones we are now all so used to. Despite this lack of pixels, the screen was bright and had good contrast, even if the colours weren't particularly vivid.

The USB 'on the go' cable included in the box is a thoughtful little addition – even if they do only cost mere pence on eBay these days. It means you can add much-needed extra storage from an additional hard drive, use a full-sized keyboard, printer, or any number of Windows-compatible peripherals.

We liked

Like its smaller sibling, the Linx 10 is a well-built tablet that offers a significant amount for a relatively small outlay of just £160 (around $238, or AU$307). It's the perfect tablet for kids to browse the web safely on (thanks to Windows' various parental controls), and get productive with the included Microsoft Office 365.

There is just about enough power to keep things running smoothly without any noticeable slowdown, thanks in part to the extra Gigabyte of RAM available in comparison to its rivals.

Plenty of connectivity comes as standard, with a mini-HDMI port, microSD card slot, and micro-USB socket with included USB 'on the go' cable all ready to offer up connectivity that rivals some laptops.

We disliked

Though it's difficult to be too harsh on what is essentially a fully-fledged 10-inch portable PC for £160 (around $238, or AU$307), there are some areas of the Linx 10 that felt like a bit of a let-down, especially when compared to the Linx 8, which is another £70 (around $104, or AU$135) cheaper.

The processor showed that it's not quite got the required grunt for any 3D applications, and I never once saw it reach the supposed maximum speed of 1.83GHz – even when running benchmarks.

In an ideal world I would have liked to see a higher resolution screen and most definitely more in the way of storage space, as the 32GB advertised storage capacity is anything but – only 17.4GB being available when you first turn on the Linx 10.

Final verdict

There may be a lack of overall grunt and the storage space is pretty pitiful, but for a casual web browser or producing documents, the Linx 10 feels like a great alternative to underwhelming netbooks that flooded the market only a few years ago.

For only £160 (around $238, or AU$307), you're getting a full Windows PC that can run modern Windows Store apps and legacy 32-bit applications, as long as they don't require too much space.

If you're thinking that the Linx 10 might tick some boxes for you, I'd highly recommend investing a little more in the 64GB version (if you can find it for sale), or alternatively buying a 64GB microSD card to add some much-needed additional storage.

Keep an eye out for a bargain, and you might be able to pick up the Linx 10 for less than £150 (around $223, or AU$288), which starts to become very tempting indeed, especially when you consider the relatively uninspiring Android-powered alternatives that fall into this price bracket.

• Online retailer Ebuyer generously provided us with this Linx 10 sample