Thursday, June 19, 2014

Review of Lenovo IdeaPad Z500 15.6-Inch Laptop (Dark Chocolate)

Lenovo IdeaPad Z500 15.6-Inch Laptop
Customer Ratings: 3.5 stars
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Seems good (you know, as long as you ignore the Windows 8 start menu), but I've had problems with the laptop since I first got it 2 months ago. There are battery problems... which Lenovo knows about considering there is a firmware upgrade on the web site... but this did not fix my problems. My laptop won't boot unless it's plugged in. The battery is fine; I can unplug it after start-up and run on battery for a normal period. I guess the computer just isn't reading the battery correctly (tried a battery reset too which didn't fix it). Annoying, to say the least. I am currently in customer service purgatory (I just want a replacement, not a fix), so we'll see how that goes. My last two laptops I bought old refurbished Dells which ran wonderfully. Last time I buy a new one! Grumble grumble

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I upgraded from a HP Pavilion dv6500 (purchased at Best Buy) and have had the Lenovo about three months now. I have been very impressed with it. The case is light yet sturdy and I love th color. The touchpad is huge compared to my old laptop--so huge I still right-click on accident because I don't expect the buttons to be where they are. The screen is bright and the resolution is beautiful. The sound is decent, most people use a laptop with headphones but for the occasional times I use the speakers, they don't have that horrible tinny quality to them, which is nice. They don't get very loud, though. The wireless card has a great range--I can stream movies upstairs in my house where my PS3 won't get reception. It has good battery life; I don't run it without the cord very much but when I do it lasts much longer than my previous laptop. The gesture functions make it much easier to navigate without a mouse than it used to be. This machine will run games, as well. I played World of Warcraft on it and it was only slightly less impressive than my gaming rig. It runs very quiet, so quiet it is hard to believe it is on and much, much cooler than my previous laptop. My only complaint is that the keys leave marks on the screen. They are just dust/oils from my fingers but they leave nice little squares all over the screen. I'm going to buy a screen protector/glare reducer and see if that helps at all. The keys have not scratched the screen.

I use it to run scientific analysis software without a hiccup. I am extremely happy with the quality and performance of this laptop. The ease of access buttons (volume, airplane mode, projector screen toggle) all work like they are supposed to, which is refreshing. I love having a number pad for data entry.

Windows 8 took some getting used to but now that I understand it I don't have any problems with it; I think it is easier to find "buried" applications in Windows 8 than in previous versions of Windows. It still gets confused if a wireless connection is available when an ethernet cable is also plugged in so I tend to keep it on airplane mode so it won't randomly switch to wireless. That was also an issue with Windows 7 and I'm a little disappointed it wasn't resolved.

Lenovo does sell a touch screen version of the laptop and I can see limited utility for that function but I really don't feel that I am missing anything by not having it.

There is always going to be some bloatware on laptops but I am happy that most of it is diagnostic or easy to ignore. I haven't uninstalled very much of it as most of it doesn't interfere with anything I run. The stuff I have uninstalled has been easy to remove.

I have used this laptop every day at work since the day I got it and taken it home on weekends for occasional use. I've found it to be a great machine so far.

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Great quality and looking. this is the best laptop I had so far, much better than my previous laptop samsung series 9 ultrabook in my opinion larger screen, easy to type, maybe I was tired to deal with the problem of samsung laptop. Love this laptop

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The computer is ok but I could be in the middle of something important and the settings menu comes on the screen and then it goes to the desktop. Very irritating.

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Lenovo (formally IBM) tends to make pretty good laptops. I use mine for business and it does the job. Can't complain.

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