Just a quick update:

Got back from Amsterdam today and found the Renaissance to be a delightful little hotel. I had FAXed a letter to the manager requesting a room facing the courtyard and a higher floor, and we got neither on check-in (3rd floor facing the street). We were tired and the front desk said they had no other rooms available (I'm only a silver so decided not to push it and it was 8am so they were letting us check in REALLY early to begin with - beggars can't be choosers), so we took it. There was a bit of construction noise on Friday morning, but pretty faint and didn't last long. Saturday and Sunday morning had no construction.

We found the location to be fine. As someone in this thread said, it's not necessarily the nicest part of Amsterdam, but being a small city, you can get anywhere you need to go with a short walk. In fact we found ourselves walking to the Marriott area (Leidsplein I think it is called) quite a bit for dinners and such, and walking was not a problem.

Our rate included breakfast which was served in the restaurant. It was full American with decent selections in the bufffet.

We also enjoyed the attached cafe (Koepelcafe or something like that) for a pint of Heineken as a night-cap.

All in all a good trip and a nice little hotel. For prosterity's sake I thought I would respond and give my two thumbs up .