HP EliteBook 6930p Notebook Review

Customer Ratings:

The company from which I purchased is not currently listing/offering this laptop. My order did not include Vista Business, but came with Vista Home Premium. It also had a bad/incomplete Installation Partition. However, the O/S did install enough to allow me to get onto the Internet, and download all the necessary drivers from the HP web site.

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Where do I begin? The unit has a faulty light sensor which causes the screen to be too dark. The way to fix is to update every single aspect of the BIOS and then hit the light sensor with your finger over and over until the screen will stay bright (NICE!). The touchpad buttons wear out very fast and just leave a gooey covering. The left click button wears out very fast and requires too much force to get it to work. The touchpad activates while you are typing and causes a lot of general chaos. The latches holding the lid close wear out very quickly leaving the lid to flap open constantly in transit. The little "night light" at the top for lighting the keyboard in the dark is less than useless.

Shall I go on......I could but you get the point. Stay away from this complete Turkey!!!

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dont have a product key to use the microsoft office 2010 and need it for all my documents. But great laptop

Reviews of ASUS K53E-A1 15.6-Inch Versatile Entertainment Laptop (Dark Brown)

Customer Ratings:

Those of us that build our own PC's know Asus as a top quality brand for hardware components. I purchased this laptop for work/light-duty everyday use. The new i3 processor is more then up to the task and I'm almost willing to bet it's probably a little bit faster and better processing power as my Core 2 Quad that I have in my desktop machine. The chicklet keyboard does take a little to get used to and the the fit and finish for the keyboard garnish could be better where it snaps into the chassis near the top of the computer. The speakers, for being altec lansing are a little lucklaster, but that may be to the fact that they are upwards firing speakers instead of being on-axis with your ears. For most average users to surf the web, check emails, etc., this is probably a good computer to go with to replace a bulky desktop unit and it is spec'ed up enough that one can have a longer service life with it without the hardware going obsolete.

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I'm not sure why I bought this laptop but I wish I never had. After owning this for 3 months, most of the keys stopped working on it. I sent it to Asus for warranty repair and got it back 6 weeks later and the spacebar barely works. Wouldn't you think they'd check it out after they replace the keyboard? It cost me $30 to ship this laptop and I refuse to pay another $30 again. I have to pound on the spacebar to get it to work. The spacebar of all keys. And a 6 week turnaround for repair? Never again will I buy an Asus product.

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I bought this from a local retailer and got the extended warranty. Sure glad I got the warranty because it has issues. It toggles from plug to unplug all the time without touching the cord. It has been back in for replacement of the plug-in part, which worked about 2 weeks and now it is doing the same thing. This past weekend the power cord overheated and the insulation melted off the cord. I smelled it burning and reached down to unplug it and got a little jolt (shock).

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This was never my first choice of laptop. I would never buy it again but I am having issues deciding on what to replace it with because it still runs. The USB ports barely recognize anything. The mouse pad spontaneously forgot how to do multi-touch. And the on keyboard volume control no longer works. Another issue I have encountered is that the memory is split between a C and D drive. This is highly inconvenient being that the computer does not recognize that it still has space to save things (it thinks that it is full when there is another 250GB in the D drive that was there when purchased) My brother has the same laptop and has had the same problems.

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I'm keeping this short and simple.

I got my laptop on Monday morning. It blue screened that evening. I did nothing out of the ordinary. I just worked on a project on Excel that was due the following morning. Lost it, as the computer would not start back up.

Got the second one Wednesday, and it froze 10 minutes after being turned on. Two bad computers in a row. Sorry, I'm in school, and I need my computer to work for longer than a day.

ASUS will need to do a lot to convince me to buy from them again.

Reviews of HP Pavilion Sleekbook 14-b124us 14" Touch Screen Laptop - 3rd

Customer Ratings:

This little thing is lightweight and fast! Seems to be working well, but what I didn't realize was that it does NOT have a CD drive? I have Office and Smart Draw Photo on CD and can not load them on here, so I had to order an additional external CD drive, still waiting for that to come to see if it works, since it doesn't specify Windows 8. My brother, an MCSE, was surprised that it didn't come with some version of Word on it, but it doesn't, you can either purchase Office 10 or use a trial version. All other files from my old laptop had to be brought over on a flash drive. Another issue you don't think about is the touch screen. It's quite staticy, worse than a normal screen, and if you have dogs, it becomes a dog hair magnet. The hair doesn't blow off and when you go to wipe it off, you end up scrolling to another screen. Kinda funny, but something to think about. All in all, great little computer for the price, but be sure to make provisions if anything you need is on CD, and be prepared to step up the vacuuming, lol!

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I bought this for my daughter for use in school and I have to say I really like this computer. The lap top is very fast, has great memory and a hard drive with enough space for everything you need along with sky drive as long as you have an MSN account. I thought the keyboard lit up on this but my mistake and it isn't a big deal. I have no idea why there are some people out there not liking Windows 8 but I have no problems with it and just have to learn how to get around on it. What also is good about this computer is that the battery can be replaced when it goes bad which is a negative for my Toshiba convertible which is a tablet/lap top. I highly recommend this computer and as usual HP makes another good product.

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love this laptop!! I don't know why I didn't buy it sooner! It's light, thin, fast and just the right size for a college student like me. The windows 8 at first is tricky but after a while you get the hang of it. Anyways shipping got here very fast got the package within 5 days and couldn't be happier!

Honest reviews on HP Pavilion Sleekbook 14-b124us 14" Touch Screen Laptop - 3rd

I absolutely love this laptop!! It is amazing!! Especially the touchscreen, the HD quality is soo good its so crisp and clear. Also I love the speakers on this, I can really hear the bass when I'm listening to music. & of course can't forget about the windows 8, it was complicated at first but once you learn how to use it..it's a breeze. I love this laptop!!!

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This is a great laptop. I have been using Mac for the past 5 years simply because it runs and windows always seemed to freeze up or cause problems. This computer is about $400 cheaper than a Mac and runs just as good if not better. I love it and I love Windows 8 as well.

Reviews of HP Pavilion DV7-7023CL 17.3" Notebook (AMD Quad-Core A8-4500M

Customer Ratings:

I'm still putting it through it's paces, but so far it is working flawlessly. It looks brand new. Far faster than my 4 year old 15" laptop. It has a big, beautiful screen, and a full size number pad along with enough ports to take care of most needs. After a weeks worth of researching, I bought it as it was the best "bang for the buck". I wasn't looking for the fastest, only the best deal I could find. I got it for $450 through another dealer. It came with a 8550mAh HP extended battery. It runs Starcraft II well on low settings. For a another $170 I could have gone with an refurbished Intel machine, but I wasn't interested in paying a premium for the Intel name. I have a desktop that takes care of the programs that need a speedier processor.

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I really wasn't expecting such a great looking and great operating laptop like this for the money I paid ($479.00) It can handle multiple tasks at a time, without missing a beat. It's nice to have a number keypad, just like a desktop keyboard. The sound is awesome if you like to listen to music or watch movies. The screen is huge and bright, and the brightness can be adjusted with the F1 and F2 keys. This laplop looks much more expensive than it is, and has a real expensive quality look and feel to it. Lots of ports, including an HDMI port to connect the laptop to my HDTV for Netflex or whatever. The built in integrated webcam gives a very good HD image, and also has a built in stereo mic. I guess the only con, is the weight of this laptop, but in my case, I don't have to lug it around much, so I can live with that. So if you're looking for a fast, efficient, great looking laptop for under $500.00, this is the machine to buy. Time will tell how long this laptop will last, but if it's anything like my desktop HP, it'll run great. Both my desktop and this laptop HP run so quietly...which is great, because I do a lot of studio recording work, and my condenser mics are extremely sensitive to any noise. The laptop arrived within 2 days from ordering, and the unit was very well packed. Set up was a breeze (and I'm technically challenged).

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Arrived in excellent condition. Big, sharp screen; AMD processors very responsive even when I have several tasks running. Wireless communications.excellent. Only (very slight) complaint is touch pad, which seems a bit quirky (I don't like touchpads so...)problem fixed with good wireless mouse. Very strong battery. Overall an enthusiastic recommensation,

Honest reviews on HP Pavilion DV7-7023CL 17.3" Notebook (AMD Quad-Core A8-4500M

I have had this computer since 2009 and I loved it for the last 4 years but once it began to fall apart

It progressed quickly. First the power cord slot got loose and the connection become iffy. I took it to my local PC repair shop and they tell me it has to be soldered and only HP can do that because it is such a sensitive area, they also said this is a common problem with HP laptops. Then the DVD burner quit working. Then the keys began to stick or break then the mouse pad became sensitive and sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. This was not a cheap laptop when first purchased and I expected it to hold up for more than 4 years. I am very disappointed that it seems to have gone into 'self-destruct" mode so soon. And I have not been that hard on it so that it should be falling apart. So if you want a good laptop and won't be troubled by the fact that it probably won't hold up for more than 4 years I would say go for it. Otherwise look for something that is made to last.

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Four 2.2 gHz cores and a 17.3 inch screen for just $500 is a nearly unbelievable deal. 6 gigs of memory isn't right, but I replaced them with 16 gigs and added another hard drive. Unlike some other HP laptops, this has a black keyboard, which makes the keys easier to see under low light. Whoever created their hard to see silver keyboard should be horsewhipped.

Refurb machines are an excellent deal, because some tech has actually looked at it and made sure it's working correctly.

I don't care for HP, who lies. When you look at their website, it says you can download a reinstallation disk set, but they won't let you do it. You can make exactly ONE set on your own, and are prevented from making any more. Of course, HP will be glad to sell you a set (more profit for HP), but I resent being lied to. Fortunately, I generally install Linux on my machines and frankly, I hope HP doesn't like it.

Buy ASUS G46VW-DS51-CA Republic of Gamer (ROG) (14.1-inch, I5-3230M

Customer Ratings:

I will touch on some pros and cons, although i'm not sure why i'm the first person to write a review on this particular model. Odd. If you're worried about the size, don't, this thing has the exact same amount of power and performance as it's big brothers. And you can actually get it cheaper elsewhere. The corners that Asus has cut are as follows.

-Many people are turned away by the "mat" type screen, and lower resolution because of it's size. But honestly this makes for maxed out performance on today's games because of it's limited resolution. Even though it's 720 don't let it fool you, it makes consoles look very bad, still out does them by a long shot.

-Another corner that has been cut (for price) is there is no optical drive, so you'd better be a "digital" gamer, or purchase yourself an external burner (like I did), to load older game discs. There is actually plenty of room on the right side of the unit for one to fit, but then again there is a lot under this hood, so it may have been to crammed.

-This laptop only has the standard 5400rpm HDD that 90% of laptops today come with. The bigger models seems to all have the 7200rpm drive. You'd think we would have surpassed these speeds now, or just have all laptops come with a Solid State drive. Which some do have both. This cuts cost as well. It doesn't slow down gaming all, but you may find windows 8, and surfing the web to not be as quick, even with the 2.5 I5 3rd gen processor. Slightly sluggish, but not a deal breaker.

-Terrible terrible Intel Centrino Wireless, which has been the cheapest adapter on the market for years. Ahteros and Broadcom definitely being the best. Why they continue to use this even in some of the more expensive models is beyond me. I've worked on countless laptops with this adapter in it, and they all have VERY weak signals, or drop a lot. So i already had a netgear adapter for my gaming desktop. So i decided to use it, which works great. No fluctuating speeds now.

So that's mostly the cons, now onto the pros.

-Metallic brushed finish now replaces the one rubberized material on the hand rests. Which use to peal off in small chunks. Although the top is still made of this material it's a lot tougher than before.

-No flex to be found on the keyboard. Although having a 14 inch takes some getting use to, for typing. And the backlit keyboard with 3 different brightness options is great.

-All 3.0 UBS ports, though i would have preferred 4, since I now have the adapter plugged into it. And use a small gaming mouse on the other. No big deal. Good fast transferring of files.

-GTX 660m 2 GB DDR5 is actually overkill for this little beast. But thats a BIG plus, runs everything on high smooth as silk.

Checkout NOTEBOOK CHECK . COM for more specs on it. It also has the Intel HD 4000 GPU, and when you left click it gives you the option of which one to use on each game.

-Awesome speakers, just right for movies, music, and extremely good for games. Actually has an HD surround sound to it. Very good panning.

-The overall fell is very sturdy, no it's not an ultrabook, but it is small and "semi" light. Much better for totting around than the big 17 inch beasts. Great to take anywhere, and game.

-Battery life is great, and depending on your tasks anywhere from 5 to 8 hours. Even though i'm not thrilled about the battery being built it.

So that's about it, with a 750gb hdd, the card, speakers, 8 gigs of ram, and all the other bells and whistles, this is the best portable gaming laptop on the market. I think Alienware is pretty decent, but a big overpriced, and it seems everyone goes for those. And Dell makes them now, so i'll pass.

On one last note I had a few quirks or odd experiences. At one point after bringing this out of sleep mode, it automatically just shut off. But never did it again. No idea why. Also sometimes the Nvidia card will deactivate itself randomly, but never during a game. Could be a windows 8 or driver issue. Nothing major (yet). So while it has it's flaws, to me the good definitely outweighs the bad. And Asus rated number 2 this year right under Mac Book for reliability. So hopefully that holds true. Get one while you can for a good price. It's really worth it considering some of the "other junk" in this price range. Later.

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I purchased this product last year at best buy. The next week it wouldn't turn on. I returned it to best buy and they informed me that the entire product was I quote "fried". They then kindly provided me with another laptop. I took it to my home and decided I would test its gaming performance. This is not a product that was ever meant to be unplugged the atrocious fps that I received while running games low settings was shocking. I then proceeded to plug it in and watch my fps increase by at least 65. The computer broke again a month later I brought it into best buy where they informed me that my ac adapter was not properly functioning and they had none in stock. I then contacted Asus who had me send in my laptop for quite a large fee. I received a new ac adapter and my problem was solved or so I thought 2 weeks later and now my laptop wont turn on I have no conception of what the problem could be this time but let me tell you this. This is by far the most flawed product i have ever purchased Asus customer support is awful and I now have to purchase a new laptop. I lost more money on this product than it was worth. It may look impressive but don't let that fool you its a cheap flawed over priced piece of hardware I wish I had never encountered.

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I'm not writing a full, review. I wrote a pages long review on best buys website. I just wanted to let people without a local best buy know that it's been on sale there for weeks for 799 and was originally only 999 when it was released months ago. This may or may not be the exact same model number, but it is the same system with the same specs.

Cheap HP ProBook 4440s 14" Business Notebook PC - C6Z34UT

Customer Ratings:

I am the director of IT for a small company in Wisconsin, and I needed a reliable business class machine that gives me all the tools that I need for administration and support of about 150 computers. I gave the chromebook a try because most of the tools that I use are web based (gmail, google docs, logmein, pixlr, wordpress, etc) but I learned quickly that the machine was not a good fit for what I needed.

I upgraded to this machine, and in the first week of use, it's been very reliable. The 14" screen and weight of under 5 lbs is nice for moving from place to place, as I do all the time. The VGA output is nice for using a desktop monitor / keyboard / mouse as a dual screen desktop machine.

The Core i3 w/ 4GB of ram, 500GB hard drive, and windows 7 Pro 64 bit is not my favorite operating system, but it's the most supported platform for all of the programs that we have out in our infrastructure of about 150 computers across 10 buildings.

The machine includes a creative suite for editing, which I haven't used yet, but the DVD burner is nice for making disks and 2 USB 3.0 and 2 USB 2.0 are nice for plugging in many devices.

I would recommend this machine as a good quality business machine to upgrade users or power users or administrators who have machines that are from the Pentium 4 / or Core 2 Duo Era that are still running XP.

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I purchased my first HP laptop in 2003 and it quit working last year, in 2012. While I did double the RAM twice and replace the hard drive, I was thoroughly impressed with how long it performed even after being bumped around traveling and exposed to the elements of my work environment. This new HP ProBook seems to have the same feel in regard to layout and the construction is quite nice, noticeably light. Combine that with the i3 processor, 4gb RAM, and Windows 7; I continue to be impressed. Go HP!

Discount HP ProBook 6570b C6Z48UT 15.6' LED Notebook - Intel - Core i5

Customer Ratings:

I am so glad I finally decided to buy an HP laptop. It's great laptop that I can use for work and also for my personal use. It's so simple to use. I love this computer!

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Discount HP Pavilion dv7-6178us Laptop Computer With 17.3" LED-Backlit

Customer Ratings:

This laptop is very fast has 8 hypertreads cores,stylish looking,tough built,has 2 usb 3.0 and 2 usb 2.0,battery is above average compare to toshiba,nice silver aluminum finish not a fingerprint magnet,crystal clear webcam,runs cool,picks up strong wifi signal,has two hard drives compartment so you can install two hard drive up to 2 terrabite of space,clear screen brilliant colors,has switchable graphics cards,my only complaint is the removable hard drive plastic cover is made cheaply that if you removed it ,its impossible to put it back with out damaging the pigs that holds it in place so it will be lose or wont even stay in its a worthless design flow,also the power cord adopter is huge twice the size of any standard size laptop adopter,other than this two issues this unit is very powerful performer....

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I've had mine (got a great deal on it from Office Depot, plus there is a mfg. rebate) a few weeks. I like the backward compatible USB3 ports (it has USB2 ports also -all I know is there are 4 USB ports). I like that the electrical connection is on the right side (my last HP laptop had it on the left side). It has a fingerprint reader but not sure that is a deal breaker...now that I've tried it, no; I could get by without that.

Only thing I'm not crazy about is that the screen isn't non-glare like my other HP laptop. Doesn't matter all that much...but I do have to move it around to beat the light. (It wasn't a deal breaker, either...so I went with it.) It was super easy to setup. The sound is very good. For the price I paid, I am thrilled. I don't think many more frills on it would really matter all that much. We don't rent Blu Ray movies (so the DVD/CD player is fine as-is). It has the connector needed for TV connection and it has WiFi. I don't see a card reader slot...but wouldn't know what to do with one anything. :) IF you can pick this up at $700 to $800, I believe you will be delighted with this baby. (You may see it listed as dv7-6b78us, but is same one (apparently).

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Over all is very good. It is not as fast as I thought it is going to be for i7!

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This is the good deal, because is strong laptop with very low price. It is in perfect condition, is as a new laptop.

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Very happy with the laptop. It came quickly and was everything they said it would be. We are very satisfied. This is a good notebook for the money.

Lenovo B575-1450A5U - IdeaPad Laptop / AMD E-Series Processor Review

Customer Ratings:

I picked up this laptop at my local Best Buy for $299. I read the reviews on the Best Buy site before purchasing this laptop, and the majority of them that had complaints had complaints of encountering blue screens of death within a short amount of time of purchasing the laptop. Others had issues with the sensitivity of the touch pad, but overall there were positive reviews.

While I was removing some of the unwanted software like the Best Buy app, I encountered a blue screen of death. This was because when I restarted to complete the uninstall of some of the programs, it did NOT install the windows updates. Once these were installed, I haven't had a problem since. So once you get your computer, make sure you shut down to install updates, and then commence removing the bloatware.

Pros: Nice screen size, has good enough specs to run several mildly heavy programs at the same time, HDMI port, excellent keyboard (it doesn't have the traditional bracketed keys, but the more embedded buttons like the Mac Books, plus a num pad), solid design, runs very quiet and cool (extremely cool. With it sitting on my lap it does not even get warm.), good battery life if you use the energy management for it, fingerprint reader, facial recognition, and built in webcam.

Cons: Touch pad is a little sensitive, but I came from using a Thinkpad where I used the touch point mouse. It may just be because I need to get used to it. External mouses are always a compromise.

Overall a very good computer for the price.

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I bought this because my wife and I are both in school, and one laptop is not enough. I was looking for something to run MS Office and a web browser. This was by far the most feature laden machine in its price range. It has fingerprint lock, webcam, 4GB RAM, and a dual-core processor. Once I got it home, I was pleasantly surprised to see there was no bloatware other than the BestBuy app, so I did not have near as many programs to uninstall as usual. They advertise fast boot ups, and mine boots in about 45 seconds, much faster than my Toshiba. I picked this up from BestBuy for $299 and would gladly make the purchase again.

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this is the first time I've used finger recognition for security and the idea is great and easy to implement but when you come to use it it takes a lot of time to process your swipe. It is much faster to just type in your password. I loved that you could project your screen to your HDTV through HDMI for such a low price. The touch pad was awful and responded differently almost every time. This touchpad was the most frustrating touchpad I've see tried. Forgive my typos as these are by the webOS spellchecker from my typing on their Bluetooth keyboard hooked up to their touchpad.

Honest reviews on Lenovo B575-1450A5U - IdeaPad Laptop / AMD E-Series Processor

bought on budget and the laptop surprised.

it is sturdy and feels more expensive. Is not the fastest machine, but it is definitely the one to buy right now.

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I recently had to buy 2 budget laptops for business use (see also my review for the

Gateway NV51B15U) and decided on the Lenovo because it's dirt cheap AND has decent specs.

Windows Experience Index: Processor (3.8), Memory (4.9), Graphics (4.1), Gaming Graphics (5.5-faster than my i3 Toshiba!), Hard disk (6.9)

Pros:

-AMD E-processor is fast enough even for basic 3-D gaming;

-Has HDMI and 4GB RAM, which many budget laptops lack;

-Build quality is solid for a budget notebook;

-Lenovo has above average customer service.

Cons:

-This is a generic rant My 2001 Powerbook was 1-inch thin and 5.5 lbs. Ten years later and PC makers still can't give me a skinny 15-inch laptop for under $1,000?!!

-No other cons.

Discount Lenovo IdeaPad S405 14" Slim Notebook (AMD A6-4455M 2.10GHz CPU

Customer Ratings:
List Price: $699.00
Sale Price: $459.95
Today's Bonus: 34% Off

Having owned HP/Compaq notebooks for business (G6, CQ61, CQ62, NX series) for over seven years, I took the plunge out of HP into Lenovo and am very happy I did. Firstly, this notebook is a "budget" notebook, not a ThinkPad or Macbook Air, and should be compared with other budgets in its price range. It is ultra thin and very light. The 14-inch screen and the near-centered trackpad are best for my uses. Heat dissipation is excellent (no, it will not burn your legs while resting on your lap) and the unit is very quite. The keys are contoured to fit the fingers and require little pressure. The unit lacks a DVD drive but this is a direction taken by manufacturers to reduce weight and cost, and prepares the user for "Cloud" computing.

Aesthetically, upon receiving the unit, I immediately compared it to my Macbook Pro of 2009: sleek, slim and thin but at (what seemed) half the weight. The screen detail and color fidelity are very good for a budget model. The sound quality is satisfactory (as in most notebooks), and whatever narrowness in frequency range exists, it is partially compensated for by a "Dolby Advanced Audio" 10-band equalizer. The single USB 3.0 port speeds data to and from my HP Pocket drive (with USB 3.0) at blazing speeds (unit has two USB 2.0 ports also); wireless sensitivity is above average; trackpad fluidity is close to a Macbook's (smooth!); 4GB of installed memory can be expanded to 8GB; and the HDMI port and 500GB hard drive are essential assets. (Note: A 500GB hard drive model will have 400GB available due to Lenovo using disk space as a "recovery partition".)

I did not order a discontinued Lenovo Win 7 unit but leaped into Win 8 in December 2012 "culture shock!!!" But . . . this is the future for the PC world and even we "old timers" must grow with the times. Win 8 is a "work-in-progress" for sure, and in order to adjust at a more relaxed pace to this OS, as well as get up-to-speed and "productive", I suggest downloading "Classic Start Menu" or "Start 8". These utilities will bring back the "Start" button and menu familiar to users of Win 7, Vista, XP, etc., but remove none of the features of Win 8.

All in all, this Lenovo unit is well worth the money. Again, this is a budget notebook and is not a ThinkPad or Macbook Air, but to me it is top of the line of any budget notebook I've owned.

Smooth, sleek, fast, compact, light . . . and very cool!

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I've had this computer for 2 weeks now. In that time I have come to realize just how sweet this little thing is. Obviously it is not a powerhouse for video editing or gaming, but for the normal online activities it is very good. I do keep the power setting on high, which seems to improve the speed of my web surfing. Windows 8 seemed daunting for the first couple hours, but it is so easy to customize and it boots up at such fantastic speeds. If you just need a competent little laptop that is inexpensive and has a great keyboard, but it now.

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This is a good little computer. It's very slim and light. However, the graphics aren't great: everything has a bluish tint. Also, the mouse pad is just ridiculous. Most anywhere you click it, a menu pops up. You have to be very intentional about clicking it very near the bottom if you want to click and highlight text, for example. I would totally recommend this computer for any day-to-day activities, but I would also recommend getting a mouse. I haven't been using a mouse (I'll get one over the weekend), and frankly it's driving me quite nuts. But everything else is great--fast processor, lots of RAM, lots of memory...Windows 8 is fun, no complaints!

Honest reviews on Lenovo IdeaPad S405 14" Slim Notebook (AMD A6-4455M 2.10GHz CPU

Bought this computer as my work laptop from Bestbuy for about $300. A sleek 14" inch LED display, built-in DOLBY Advanced Audio, though mediocre and low-performance graphics card may put some people off, this Ideapad s405 delivers above-budget entertainment and regular computing experience. Two USB 2.0 ports ,one USB 3.0 port, HDMI and Ethernet wired connection port come in standard these days.

Its display can be optimized for prolonged computer usage without much eye strains, ASUS and Gateway displays were aggravating my eye strains, so I decided the switch to Lenovo. Once I go Lenov, I won't go back.

Flat and small keyboard doesn't work all that well for my hands, given I'm 5"7, though I can't complain. Keyboard features spill-Resistance. I always remember the horrendous spill damage that virtually killed my old Macbook pro screen. Touchpad has a smart touch senser, it helps with my aimless web browsing and getting rid of misuse of clicking.

I have a spare wireless keyboard with a Lenovo mouse. System performance is rated at 4.4 for its lousy graphics performance. Lacking an optical drive makes it a superb lightweight business-tailored, on the go laptop.I can definitely see myself carrying this machine working on the go and writing articles at cafes more.

Battery life:5 hours, standard 4GB memory, I think with its specs and the price I paid for, I'm beyond content with it.Battery life really won't matter, so long its disk data processing speed is acceptable.

Slight overheating issues, I find my laps burning upon resting on my laps. My mistake.

Overall at least I'll rate it a 6 on a 0-10 scale.

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Though a netbook, the screen is big enough to get the job done. However, the touchpad's awkward built-in button complicating navigating the already dreadful Windows 8 UI.

Best Samsung ATIV Book 2 NP270E5E-K01US 15.6-Inch Laptop Deals

Customer Ratings:
List Price: $449.99
Sale Price: $394.99
Today's Bonus: 12% Off

Got this computer for my daughter going away to college. It didn't work properly since we got it. My IT department had it for a week and couldn't fix the problems with it. Finally returned it. Amazon gave me a full refund.

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I like it, very fast but I dislike Windows 8. I can't wait for the update because it took a while before I could get used to this new OS

Best Deals for Samsung ATIV Book 2 NP270E5E-K01US 15.6-Inch Laptop

By the time being the laptop is great. I need a big screen and it is big enough for me. But I don't like Windows 8 nor the fact that you have to do all the dirty work yourself, I mean, basic configuration. It is not difficult for me but it takes time.

Honest reviews on Samsung ATIV Book 2 NP270E5E-K01US 15.6-Inch Laptop

This laptop runs great excecpt that the Driver constantly crashes. I did research in an attempt to fix this problem and I found that this type of laptop isn't even designed for windows 8. So that was a bust. If it wasn't for the driver issues I would have loved it. I returned the laptop after one week.

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Good basic laptop ,had problem it was missing the power supply it took forever for samsung to replace it horrible horrible customer service will never buy samsung product

Best Sony VAIO VPC-Z216GX/L 13.1-Inch Laptop (Blue) Deals

Customer Ratings:

I was getting tired of having a desktop and a notebook and wanted something powerful and light. Even though many options are available nowadays, none come close to Z2 in performing all jobs well.

At the office I have the dock, USB hub, and 3 monitors (2 connected to the dock and for the 3rd one I need to connect a HDMI cable). All I need to do is to connect 2 cables and I am set.

Pros:

Fast: The machine is fast to boot and to resume (my previous Dell Lattitude was a nightmare), handles all my programs as fast as my quadcore desktop (including video and photoshop). Disclaimer: I do not play games. The noise cancelling headphones are great (light and it works).

Light: My arthrits thank me daily.

Battery: I got the slice battery, but I have not needed yet. I am getting at least 5-6 hours from the main battery.

Backlight: is much less intrusive than Dell.

Display: reflections are very well controlled.

Attention: it calls much less attention than other thin & lights (it does not "look" as thin or light)

Cons:

Noise: I was afraid of the reviews stating that the fan makes the sound of an airplane taking off. It is true, but in my use it never happened with my usual work, including watching/streaming movies. It did happen once while I was making/burning a movie using an USB 3.0 BluRay burner (not the dock). The dock fan/drive is somewhat noticeable.

Speakers: Useless. My Ipad have better speakers. I carry a mini usb soundbar.

Graphics: I have not been able to convince the laptop to recognize my touchscreens as separate units yet (if I touch the 2nd or the 3rd monitor, it thinks I touched the first monitor). I think is fixable, I just haven't had the time (took me while to convince the Dell also)

Price: I am sure Sony is making a hefty profit at my expense. ASUS UX31 is a proof it did not have to be that expensive. I only bought this as it was the most painless 3 monitor option at work.

Overall I am much happier than expected. I hope this helps.

Daniel

Update: A year later...

I stand for almost everything above except for the following problems:

1) Drivers: for some reason, time to time one of the drivers stop working and I have reinstall the driver. Usually the problem is the driver for the SD card reader, touchpad or USB ports.

2) Keyboard Backlight is too weak and too slow to turn on

3) The USB 3.0 port stop working and I can't get it to work again. It still works to connect to the dock and I can still get USB 3.0 from the docking station but when I am on the road I am down to 1 USB 2.0 port and no usb 3.0.

4) When disconnecting the docking station, it is important to OK the message on the center of the screen first then the on the left top otherwise it will crash on next boot and it takes several reboots to start working again.

5) the built-in speakers are horrible. As my portable clip-on speakers use USB, I run out of ports on the road.

6) the volume out to the headphones are also weak depending on your source (like Amazon prime) and headphones. I use a small (chocolate mint size) amplifier but then the noise cancelation is gone.

Would I buy again? Yes, as I like to have 3 monitors to work, Vaio Z2 is still the best solution to use just 1 machine as desktop and laptop. But I am downgrading it to 4 stars.

I hope yours work better than mine .

Daniel

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The Sony Vaio Z2 is easily the best laptop I have ever owned and purchased. I have owned various laptops in the past 12 years (Dell, Asus, Alienware, Samsung, Apple, toshiba, NEC, Sony TX), and the Vaio Z2 blows everything away. Having a good grasp of current hardware and an enthusiast in building custom computers (Liquid cooling to subzero cooling included), I was looking for a laptop that would fit what I was looking for. Giving up last year, I ended up buying and trying the asus bamboo which I felt was at best a mediocre machine.

However, when I first saw the Vaio Z2 in ads in Hong Kong, the design immediately caught my attention. I quickly researched the specs when I got back to my hotel room and found it to be the exact laptop I was looking for Light and slim, powerful, adaptable, strong battery (14hours with the sheet battery), tough design, USB3. I quickly purchased one in Singapore and have not looked back since. I simply loved the laptop.

There are however cons as well. The Keyboard keys are very responsive but feels low (this is unavoidable from a design perspective). The trackpad and mouse was at first originally horrible, however with the latest vaio update, it is now responsive and easier to use. The exorbitant price is painful. I believe for the price we should have received the sheet battery, bluray burner, more SSD space, and windows ultimate instead of premium.

The powerdock is a good and bad thing for me. On one hand having to carry another brick is annoying when I travel. On the other hand, if you think of it as an ultra portable laptop with a high end mobile GPU, it sits far better than any other laptop out there. Also the powerdock allows for great future possibilities. Being able to upgrade the powerdock in the future is very viable. However it is unknown yet as to whether sony will use this feature or not.

With all that said. I still believe that the Sony Vaio Z2 has brought the laptop technology up another notch and will be the high end laptop manufacturers will have to contend with in my books. The only reason I took 1 star off this laptop is due to the uncertainty of whether sony will continue to support the powerdock in the future. If they do so by coming up with better powerdock and GPUs for the Z2, I will correct this review and give it a full 5 star.

I hope this review has helped. In conclusion, grabbing a Sony Vaio Z2 is a great choice if you have the cash to spare.

Summary -

Pros+:

Amazing HD screen

RAID0 SSD

Vaio update support is up to date for now

Fast CPU (not under volted like the most laptops)

Design

Powerdock

lightweight

Battery (4hours 14hours w/ sheet battery)

Noise canceling in-ear phones

Portability and adaptability

Cons-:

low level Keyboard

Original trackpad firmware

Fan can be loud on full load

Speakers

powerdock (if not supported in future)

Best Deals for Sony VAIO VPC-Z216GX/L 13.1-Inch Laptop (Blue)

I'll keep this short.

Pros:

VERY light chassis that almost feels "hollow"

Incredibly powerful enough to drive GTA4 at 1080p and high res

PMD highly useful, and looks great on desk

Screen with beautiful colors and great resolution

Battery life enough to support more than 5 hours of normal usage under a balanced scheme and 7 under power saver mode

Altogether nice-looking

Cons:

Overall build quality is fine but sort of fragile, doesn't seem like it could withstand a fall

Keyboard far too shallow to provide enough travel for intense typing or gaming

Trackpad too small and the response is sort of awkward.

Speaker quality is plain bad.

PMD makes configurations and driver installation far more difficult than it needs to be.

Overall:

Great for business, rips through most any software you'll ever need portable, decodes tak files at an impossibly fast speed, but if you want this for gaming I would advise a separate mouse and keyboard.

Honest reviews on Sony VAIO VPC-Z216GX/L 13.1-Inch Laptop (Blue)

The laptop is beautiful, it's a Z and it shows, you wouldn't have to be a genius to notice it's quality, it really is a sight. Let me also say the resolution & clarity of the screen at an astounding 1920x1080 on a 13.1 inch screen is amazing all by itself. Some people say they can't read the small print. Well, you can always adjust the zoom. However, if you get the lower resolution you can't adjust up, so if you want the capability of watching a full 1080p video on your blu-ray than this can do it. The peformance of the processor is quite good for a dual core processor, you won't find a competitor that utilizes a quad core in a notebook that weighs only 2.5 pounds and is only a 1/2 thick. It's just to much chip to allow for cooling, so the dual core i7 is mainstream, but if you look close, this one has a much faster i7 than many. That's because this is not an ultra low voltage processor. Somehow they found a way to cool this upgrade even in it's ultra thin chasis. Now, you may have heard that many reviews complain of the fan running loud and sometimes to constant, well, I personally don't see what the big fuss is about a small fan running inside of your laptop, first of all I didn't find it annoying or overly loud. Second, I'd rather have it this way than the alternative, what I don't like is a machine that seems as though the fan isn't working or maybe set on the wrong calibration. The look and feel of this laptop is second to none, it's awesome in every aspect.

Now, the flip side, the portability comes at a price. The speakers are almost non tolerable, easy fix, I recommend a $30 single capsule speaker, Amazon carries the x-mini which works just fine. The next sacrifice you'll make by choosing this machine is the shortage of USB ports, for some this is not a deal breaker. You must utilize the included power media dock to have 3 USB ports, otherwise you'll only have 2. Next, you'll need to plug in the power media dock via one of your USB ports and one other dedicated port to plug in the power media dock. Next you'll have to plug in the power media dock to the wall to power it on. Now you have as many wires as a full blown desktop. The power media dock houses both the blu-ray player and the upgraded Radeon 1 gig graphics card. This means that when the power media dock is not plugged in, your only using the standard Intel 3000 graphics which is onboard your laptop. If you need to load a program off of a dvd/cd, you have to plug in the power media dock. I don't think this is much of an issue since the macbook air is the same way. However the graphics I think may be a little bigger issue. When you open the box the new Z comes in, you'll find an a/c adapter for the laptop, then as you dig more, you'll find even a larger a/c adapter for the power media dock, it's quite large. Now, the biggest issue in my opinion, the keyboard. To say it's a minor adjustment would be an understatement. The keyboard has only a 1mm keystroke as opposed to the Sony Vaio S model which has a 2mm keystroke. The first thing is the backlit keyboard, don't expect the keys to light up as much on the Z as it does on the S model, the reason? Well, the keys are so short of space underneath on the Z that there was simply no room to allow light under the key, the S model on the other hand does. So, this means you'll only be getting light from the letter character itself, not the lower edge of each key. For some, not a big deal, for me, I want the extra light. The oil from your fingers will eventually wear the keys and soil them, before you know it the most commonly used keys are barely visible at night.

In summary, I would like to see a new Z model that is a little thicker, with longer keystrokes, built in high performance switchable graphics and blu ray slot loading as well. Keep the material and workmanship the same, same 1920x1080 display, drastically improve the speakers and provide full backlit keyboard including the bottom edge just like the S model and throw in 2 year warranty instead of one for the Z model, and last but certainly not least, Sony needs to realize the value of promoting a warranty that is openly & honestly as well as easily transferable to multiple owners for the duration of the warranty. Dell does this and it makes a big difference. If I decide to sell, which I have a habit of doing, I want the easy warranty transfer which protects my investment when I sell. It's a win win for all. Now, back to the good again, this laptop looks great on your desk, it's a conversation piece for sure, you'll be the envy of the office. The laptop is truly a piece of art, nice. It's so thin and well made. Just needs a few tweaks. If Sony improved their customer support and listened to their customers, this may have already been changed, remember, there are often more important things in life besides making your scheduled tee time.

Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for Sony VAIO VPC-Z216GX/L 13.1-Inch Laptop (Blue)

This machine is great. It is everything I want. Great resolution, it is 1920x1080 (VPC-Z216). So the res. is better than Amazon says.

Boots up at 15 seconds. Good keyboard layout. Feels like a premium computer.

The machine is amazingly thin and light weighted. Also you got extreme power from the processor and SSDs. Go for it, I truly recommend it.

Amazon has written wrong specs. Check them out at:

Discount Toshiba Satellite C655D-S5509 Laptop Computer with 15.6-inch HD

Customer Ratings:
List Price: $699.99
Sale Price: $509.99
Today's Bonus: 27% Off

Purchased for just under $300 at a local retailer. Bought to perform (primarily) web-based tasks (skype, radio, blog, surf, etc...).

System works fine full-featured with decent CPU and memory. Minor complaints for mouse buttons (feels like I need a hammer to assist with clicking (not really but takes some effort to left/right click)) and the amount of Toshiba (junk) software pre-installed (which was easy enough to remove, along with Office 2010 Starter).

Overall, worked out of the box and easy enough to customize generally very happy (especially considering the price).

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Widows 8 blows unless you have a touch screen and they are taking advantage of all of us who don't want that windows 8 crap and raising the price

Best Deals for Toshiba Satellite C655D-S5509 Laptop Computer with 15.6-inch HD

I needed a new laptop as my old one was in its final death throes. I had had a Toshiba Satellite and got a mileage out of it, and so this seemed a natural choice, especially for the price.

The machine has basically everything I need for writing, internet surfing, and playing movies and music. Other than the speakers being too quiet for my tastes, my one major gripe, and it's enough to ding a star, is that the mousepad is ludicrously over-sensitive. I'll be typing and without fail the base of one of my thumbs will graze the pad and so move the cursor so I start typing in a completely different location. It's really annoying, and there don't seem to be any settings I can change to deal with it.

So that's annoying, but it's something I've learned to work around. Other than that this is a solid all around laptop, well worth the price.

Honest reviews on Toshiba Satellite C655D-S5509 Laptop Computer with 15.6-inch HD

I am a fairly technical person. Bought the laptop due to great price and my wife only needs to do simple non intensive stuff for her schoolwork (as a teacher)powerpoints, word-processing, youtube videos that she downloads to imbed in powerpoints to make her lessons more interestingvery basic stuff.

The amount of configuration changes required to make this machine work is ridiculous23 years working with and on computers and this has been the most frustrating out of the box item ever purchased. I'm returning it tomorrow.