Sony VAIO SE1 Series VPCSE13FX/S 15.5-Inch Laptop (Platinum Silver)

I've had this laptop for about a week now and I couldn't be happier with it.

Pros:

1. Gorgeous 15.5" LCD screen. It's got great resolution, brilliant colors, and it's very bright. The 15.5" screen may not be huge, but there is so much workspace because the resolution is so impressive. Great viewing angles as well.

2. Light but sturdy chasis. The chasis may be metal (which gives it a very modern look), but it's still so light you can pick up the laptop with one hand with relative ease.

3. Great battery life. As with most manufacturers Sony exaggerated a bit when they said you get 6 hrs on this machine, but it does come close. If you're on 50% screen brightness and you're only doing browsing the web you will get about 5 hours.

4. Great performance. The laptop comes with a 2nd generation i5 2.4GHz processor, which is significantly faster than the i3. Everything about the laptop is quick, including the boot-up, which takes well under a minute.

5. Doesn't pick up fingerprints. The finish on this laptop is matte, which means it resists fingerprints really well. The only truly glossy part of this laptop is the VAIO logo on the front.

6. Speed/stamina option. Sony includes a button that allows you to switch between using the Radeon graphics card (speed) and the less powerful, integrated Intel graphics (stamina). I thought this was pretty pointless at first but if you're not working with graphics intensive stuff and you're trying to conserve battery life, switching to the Intel graphics actually adds up to an 1 hour.

7. Relatively quiet. For people who are concerned about the fan noise, don't be. It's really not that noticeable, even when I'm gaming. Oddly enough, my roommate has the 13.3" version of this laptop and the fan on that is extremely loud at times.

Cons:

1. The touchpad takes a little time to get used to.

2. The speakers are pretty weak and barely have any bass.

3. The headphone jack is towards the back, which is annoying if your headphone cord isn't that long.

4. It's pretty easy for stuff like dust to get under the keys. Unfortunately it's a lot harder to clean...

Bottom line: The price might a setback but if you are looking for a laptop that balances performance, battery life, reliability, and aesthetics, this laptop is definitely worth it.

Keep in mind also, that at the time of me writing this, Amazon is offering a free $50 gift card and free sheet battery (which attaches to the bottom of the laptop, doubles the battery life, and retails for $130). $930 $50 $130 = $750.

For those of you who are searching for a new laptop and don't really know what you want yet: the other laptop I had considered was the Toshiba Portege. It's similar to this laptop in many ways but it is cheaper by $100 or so. There are a few minor drawbacks, like a weaker graphics card (Intel integrated graphics), no backlit keys, and a non-HD screen. Depending on what you want that may be a better option.

The Sony Vaio VPCSE13FX is a decent laptop with a brilliant display and one really, really bad design defect. Let's just get that part out of the way.

See that shiny "VAIO" logo on the back of the display? Yeah, it's a plastic inlay. Why should you care? Because the aluminum around the back of the display is ABSURDLY thin and completely without structural support, meaning that nice little plastic Vaio logo presses into the LCD guts whenever your laptop experiences pressure of any kind (eg, in a backpack or messenger bag). I noticed pressure marks on the display outlining the exact shape of the plastic logo within a MONTH of purchasing this thing, and try as I might to mitigate the effect, it just kept getting worse. If you plan to use this laptop for travel, you need to be exceptionally careful. I worked in IT for years, so I know laptops can be fragile, but this is absurd. Sony should have just painted the Vaio logo on, because this is one of the worst design decisions on a laptop that I can think of. It's just flat-out moronic it's a laptop you basically can't travel with without ruining.

You'll hate it all that much more because the display is just so gorgeous. Really, the colors are vibrant, it gets nice and bright, and the 1080p resolution makes it ideal for photo editing, movie-watching, and multitasking. It really is awesome.

As far as build quality goes, I'm disappointed with the amount of flex in the chassis, but you have to realize you're getting a 15.5" laptop that is really, really light here without having to get some horrible ULV i3 processor. It's all aluminum, so it dissipates heat pretty well, too (much better than plastic-bodied laptops).

The keyboard is OK. I like the chiclet keys, but the action isn't quite as precise as what I was used to on a Macbook. The spacebar also creaks occasionally, so that's upsetting. Then again, I have used laptops with far worse keyboards than this, so I'd definitely say it's passable. Also, the backlit keys are awesome. For the nerds out there: the positioning of the CTRL key is not at all ideal, but I'm slowly getting used to it (it's tiny!).

The bloatware isn't too bad, but Sony doesn't provide you a restore CD should you decide to put on a fresh copy of Windows, so BYO media if you're planning on doing a clean OS install.

Battery life is... well, it's a Windows laptop that isn't an Ultrabook. In "Stamina" mode, it gets around 4-5 hours of continuous use. If you buy this guy in a retail store, you may be able to get a Sony extended sheet battery for free, and that'll get you to around 8-9 hours of total battery life. Definitely glad I got it, so maybe find this thing in a retail location and price match to Amazon or whoever's cheapest.

The speakers are terrible. Just really, really bad. The headphone jack also puts out really terrible sound but maybe the amp on mine is defective or something. This is not a device you'll want to use for sound editing, let's say that much.

The Wi-Fi is a pain sometimes, it uses an Intel chipset that is notoriously temperamental about which networks it will play nice with, but if you go tweaking around in the settings (especially changing it to a higher transmit power) you should be able to get it working on most setups. I've not found one that it simply doesn't work on.

USB 3.0 is a nice feature, not that I've ever used it. The SD card slot is great, as well reads quick and is placed in a good location.

The power adapter seems unlikely to break in the event you trip over the cord, because it sits in there pretty loosely, but I'm not about to test that theory.

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Very happy with this purchase. It's bigger than I originally wanted....was searching for 13.3 inch laptop. However, most 13.3 in screens I've seen in person have a VERY poor viewing angle....move the screen slightly up or down and the screen either fades or the color washes out. This may not bother some, but is very annoying to me when viewing photos or watching videos.

The screen on this model is much better than any laptop I viewed in the stores.

True 1080p. Brilliant colors and excellent viewing angles from either horizontal or vertical.

I like the keyboard layout. It feels more like a desktop keyboard with the dedicated number pad.

There have been many complaints about the loud fan when doing heavy graphics or gaming, but Sony just released a new BIOS that remedies this.

You can still hear the fan spin up, but not as loud as other laptops. Also, it is very thin, and there is not much room in the chassis...you WANT the fan to do its job to prevent overheating. If the sound of the fan is too distracting, you should opt for a larger laptop with a thicker case.

Overall I think it's in the top 5 in the price range.

Battery life could be better, but it is only a 4 cell. With the sheet battery I can get around 7-8 hours while surfing, email, etc with a brighter setting on the screen in Stamina mode.

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I have had this for two weeks now and feel I finally have found a keeper. (I am picky with laptops -have bought and returned two other laptops this year before settling on this one as my fullsize option.)

The overriding pro here is the incredible screen/display -a combination of the high resolution as well as the perfectly tuned contrast, make this supremely comfortable to stare at for hours. It's even qualitatively better than other high-end Sony Vaio laptops (at a BestBuy, I was originally impressed by the 16.4" high-end/high-resolution Vaio F, but later went to another local retailer and saw that this 15.5" blew that other Vaio away). On a scale of 1-10 I'd rate the average laptop screen as a 3 (you know, that "digital" glowing look, sometimes with the cross-lattices), some HP laptops as a 6 or 7, the Vaio F as a 7, most Samsung laptop screens as a 7-8, IPS screens (at least the ones I've seen) as an 8, and this Vaio S as a 10. My eyes hurt easily when doing work (no matter how much I fiddle with Cleartype, contrast and gamma settings), and this has been a revelation.

Other positives: an excellent backlit keyboard, good keys and trackpad; included Bluetooth; very light weight for a 15.5"; a clean, good-looking minimalist look (reminiscent of the black slab in 2001: A Space Odyssey); and acceptable battery life even with just the base battery. As a bonus, Amazon is also throwing in the sheet battery -which I think is a good idea (i.e., you choose the tradeoff between more battery life and more weight/thickness). The Speed/Stamina physical switch also turns out to be useful -much more convenient than fiddling with settings -and it really works, not just a gimmick. The i5 processor and discrete Radeon 6470M graphics work great. I'm not a "gamer" but tried a recent game (Skyrim) just for kicks and this handled the 1080p (highest resolution) setting with aplomb.

The rumored fan noise was also a concern of mine (I returned an MSI notebook this year mainly because of the excessively loud fan). I needn't have worried. The fan is always running (it is never 100% silent) but during everyday tasks, the fan is very quiet and not overbearing at all -you have to listen for it and it sounds like a smooth airstream (and NOT like a "wind tunnel" effect nor a pitchy whine, both of which I despise). When running demanding programs/processes,the fan will increase in intensity but again, I don't find it bothersome.

There are two negatives: one is the utterly middling sound/speaker quality. It gets the job done in a pinch, but most cell phone speakers sound better, to give you a basis of comparison. It is weak and there is no midrange, bass, or even high-end (I'm not sure what's left). I'm okay with this because these days, there are excellent ultra-tiny/portable speaker options (I use the Satechi IPOP which can be charged via USB) that punch way above their grade (not to mention the option of headphones). However, if one is categorically against having to bring an extra speaker along, then this will be a problem. Secondly, the hard drive is slow and especially can't compare to an SSD. That said, it's fine for what it is, it's quiet (no clicking noises!), and can be replaced with an SSD in the future if I ever wanted.

I don't dock off any stars (i.e. each star is "worth" 20% of the rating) for these two issues because 1) in the case of the hard drive, it can be upgraded to an SSD in the future if desired, and 2) they're not deal-breakers for me; the overall experience remains high. Hence 5 stars.

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****THE GOOD****

1) Sleek, stylish and very light. The internal batteries will last you 3+ hours with surfing/browsing and Word Processor. If you use the Sheet battery, you'll get maybe 7+ hours.

2) Not a lot of bloatware. I did a fresh install all the same.

****THE BAD****

Speakers are *very* poor quality. Sounds lack bass and any definition. You might as well listen to music via cups and strings. They are that bad.

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Toshiba - Satellite 15.6" Laptop - 3rd Gen Intel® CoreTM i5-3210 processor - 6GB Memory - 750GB Ha

This is a Consumer reports recommended laptop. I give this a five star. it has the 2nd to best Intel proccersor out there and Toshiba is one of the best laptop brands out there.

The laptop is fast, the speakers are fantastic and Win8 is great when you get used to it.

I would buy this laptop again without a thought.

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I bought this laptop as a replacement of my business laptop. If I lose a laptop I risk business.

Since I've owned this computer, 2 months, it has crashed twice. The recovery software saves my internet explorer but not the software, which must be reloaded after a crash. The primary problem isn't the faulty crash recovery.

It's the keyboard. I must type very slowly, for me, because it skips when I use keys on my right hand. I've seen the cursor jump to a paragraph above, typically. This is frustrating; I keep typing and have to stop, erase and start over.

Ending on a positive note, the Toshiba comes up fast --seconds. This is much faster than with Win-7 on my mainline HP. The keystroking on the HP is far superior. Toshiba, if you're listening, please fix the keyboard. You've got a good laptop here but for that.

If this review was helpful, please add your vote.

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Seller was excellent but Toshiba touch pad difficult to adjust to as lacks click-able buttons for control and Microsoft needs to stop pushing unpolished software to the customer aka Windows 8 as not build for systems that do not have touch screens. Overall good product and great experience. Thank you.

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Lenovo IdeaPad U310 4375 - 13.3" - Core i5 3317U

I am definitely satisfied with the purchase, good price, excellent computer.

it just has one issue when connecting to wifi, it seams to have low "antenna" capacity, though it works fine when the wifi signal is good.

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Apple iBook Laptop 12.1" M8758LL/A (800-MHz PowerPC G3, 128 MB RAM, 30 GB Hard Drive, CD-ROM Drive)

As a writer for LowEndMac ( I know my Mac. I've had this comptuer for a few months now and absolutely love it! While it's not my main computer, I use it to take to class and around campus. Paired with an AirPort card it's awesome. For the price, this provides every I'd ever need. The small size is great to take around campus or anywhere, and everyone thinks it's so cute!

First thing I should mention: I bought this laptop at a spectacular sale price. I paid $729 for this machine with 640mb of RAM (maxed out) and an Airport card with it. I highly recommend that you do max it out. I played with the 128mb version of this in Compusa and I noticed it to be significantly slower. When maxed out, this machine will run significantly faster than my 1.67Ghz Windows XP desktop in any task you will throw at it. On top of that, the Mac OS is far superior to anything ever put out by Microsoft. It's stable, easy to use, it just works. I have OS X Panther on this and I highly recommend it. I could never live without Expose, Apples far superior answer to the PC bar at the bottom. For those who are not familiar with it, this new feature in Panther will allow you to push F9 on the keyboard and show every window that is open. It will show exactly what is happening in that window at the moment, meaning that if I were to have a video running on it, the video would play on the tiny window as I look for the window I want. I click the window and it goes back to normal, only with that window on top. VERY USEFUL.

Besides that, this machine is very well designed. The ports are on the side, no more reaching behind to plug it in. Its got a thick layer of plastic casing, yet is just over an inch thick. The 12 inch screen is amoung the clearest I've ever seen, and is suprisingly easy to use. The speakers are just okay, but you don't buy a laptop for speakers anyway. The snow colored design is absolutly beautiful, and is a nice plus. The screen is on a solid bar, not one of those flimsy PC hinges. This is the most solidly built, yet lightest, thinnest, most compact laptops I've ever owned or used. I have had several PC laptops before this one, and this is, by far, the best machine I have ever owned.

By the way, the battery life on this machine is, to sum it up in one word, unbelievable. I can get about 4 hours of battery life while watching VIDEOS on this, surfing the web I can get upwards of four and a half or more! The low power consumption of the G3 processor makes this an ultra-portable machine.

For those who are considering switching. Don't be discouraged by the OS right away. It is something you will need to get used to, but after a few days you will never know how you ever lived without it. I now go back to my PC and just absolutly despise it every second I use it. I have now gotten used to the Mac and enjoy it more than I ever did with my PC. You know what they say, once you've gone Mac, you don't ever go back.

Well, to sum it up, this machine is perfect. I have yet to come across any sort of flaw whatsoever. Mac has thought this thing through, their attention to detail is amazing. Everything down to the little hook that comes out just as you close the lid to lock it shut has been designed perfectly. This isn't something that has just been scrapped together by Dell or something, this is a powerful piece of computing genius that has been designed for people out to make the intelligent choice for their computing needs. If you're stupid, go the ways of the PC world and conform to the ways of Bill Gates If you're smart, buy a Mac, you won't regret it. I guarantee!

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My girlfriend and I bought this computer for college for her and we both use it. Excellent Purchase

ProGreat battery life (we've gotten 7-8 house using wireless and www/word/email

Pretty sturdy, not as much as my clamshell ibook but better than other laptops I've seen

Great display, clear and bright

Fast ENOUGH...

ConHave had to repair it once for the display that stopped working, although the local repair center fixed it in 3 days and was covered under warranty

Would recommend that you buy applecare extended though.

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You won't only get what all windows based laptops have but a whole lot more of good stuff such as software and some fantastic applications that will blow your mind off. I can't live without my ibook . . . and I mean it.

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Samsung Series 3 NP355E5C-A02US 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black)

I bought this as a cheap beat up laptop. Turns out it's among the best I've ever owned. A half year into it, after using it 6 10 hours most days, it has yet to give me even a single problem. Not one crash, not one malfunction. The only wear came on the keyboard, where the letter paint has come away a bit. Not bad though.

Some other reviewers have claimed that this computer is slow. I'm not going to doubt them, but that has not been my experience whatsoever. The computer is as fast as any other that I have used and I run multiple programs (like Photoshop, Word and Firefox with plenty of tabs open) all at once. A friend purchased a Sony Vaio at the same time and has had nothing but problems, including with speed.

I recommend this computer.

This item was as described, one of my favorite laptops. Well made, great function, great quality for the price, thanks!

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My son loves this computer. It's sharp, fast, and plays his games perfectly. The only flaw would be that the bottom is light so when it lifts the whole computer when you open it must keep weight on the bottom while lifting screen so can't do it one-handed. My son keeps it in his room, plugged in, at all times, so I can't speak to the battery life. But, overall, it's a great computer at this price and we love it.

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Out of the box it comes with so much "bloat" that it's a challenge to weed through to the worthwhile pieces of software. The product is nice, hardware is more than decent, but for some reason, it hangs up from time to time. I haven't added any additional software yet, and I'm on 100Mbps fiber for Internet. Just sometimes when watching online videos or surfing the net it slows. It's not an extreme problem but it can be frustrating. I won't fault it for the issues I have with Windows 8.

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I ordered this as a Christmas gift for my husband. It is a slow computer! We have tried everything and it just does not have the speed of the other laptops in our family. And Windows 8 yuck! I don't want it on mine!

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Dell Latitude E6330

I got a decked out E6330 from work. It's a light and very fast computer with long battery life and I like to use it. But, I was totally shocked when I saw the price. I also personally own a 9 month old 13" macbook pro and a two year old Lenovo T400. Externally the Dell is no where near the build quality of either of those machines, not even close. The screen colors look pasty in comparison and the keyboard feels rubbery and is not very nice to the touch. When I type on the Lenovo I get a really satisfying snap to the keyboard. When I put my hands on the macbook the texture and smoothness of the track pad make it a joy to touch.

When I saw the order sheet for the Dell it talked about the Tri-Metal chassis which made me think the case would be really nice, but it's maybe just average. It also gets surprisingly hot just sitting on my desk doing nothing. The fan kicks in and out in an extreme fashion instead of just calming winding up and down. My Macbook almost never gets warm to the touch unless it is really chugging, and I almost never notice the fan. The Dells lid hinges are very stiff and if the laptop is sitting on a desk and I try to lift the lid the whole laptop lifts up and sometimes the lid gives way after it's tilted up and the the bottom part of the machine slams back down onto the desk. The first time I saw this happen I was shocked. I've handled probably a hundred macbooks at my previous job and they never did that even once!

I really don't know why so many IT departments who have to force you into windows buy from Dell instead of at least getting you a Lenovo or Asus.

Like the other reviewer, my Dell Latitude E6330 was provided by my employer to replace a five-year-old Dell laptop that was pretty sluggish. This new machine zips along, processing Photoshop or Word without hesitation. The start up and shut down are so much faster, I feel like I gain 20 minutes of working time a day. Most days I connect it to a monitor and keyboard via a docking station, so I don't deal with smaller screen size or bit clunky keyboard except on teleworking days. Even then, this PC is passable, though, I agree, the color rendering is not quite true and for real nitty gritty production I prefer my Apple.

Still for a basic workhorse this machine works fine and its processing speed is a plus. The screen holds itself up and swivels with no problem for different viewing perspectives. The battery life makes it easier to be untethered and haul the laptop to a back porch or around the house. I use it on a lap desk and have not noticed excess heat on mine.

The list price is a bit shocking and I have feeling mine was part of a group buy for a lower cost. The short and long of it is that I would not pay the sticker price for this laptop, but if you still need a laptop for work, give this one some latitude if you can get one for a more reasonable cost.

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Probook 4530S 15.6" I3-2310M

This is a great laptop. I gave this as a gift to my brother in law and he only has good thing to say about it, in fact he's considering to buy one for his wife. Would definitely recommend.

The title and technical specifications says core i3 processor, but the image of the computer says core i5.

The link from computer shopper that brought me to the product page indicated it was for a core i5.

If you are looking for a core i5, I'd avoid this one.

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HP Pavilion dv6-3150us 15.6-Inch Laptop PC - Up to 4.5 Hours of Battery Life (Argento)

I previously had a refurbished HP that I purchased in 2001 and it finally passed away 2 years ago, and for the two years since I used a Dell laptop that I acquired through a Masters program, the Dell lasted a total of four years. My HP laptop lasted about 7 years total. Thats durability!

I was very impressed with my previous HP laptop and after doing my research purchased this HP dv6 3150. My main reason was because I wanted my laptop to boot up and process other things very quickly, and the Intel I-5 processor gets things done very quickly. I like the large screen, and am looking to purchase one for my mom for christmas. When I bought this, I didnt pay too much attention to the other perks, I was just focused on the screen size and I-5 processor. This laptop comes with a backlight, so if I'm working in dim light, I can turn the backlight on and my keys light up. And I didnt know that it also came with the finger print identifier, so when I log on, I can log on using either a password, or just swipe my finger. I think my mom will get a real kick out of that when she gets hers.

As of this date, I havent tested out the web cam features just yet.

My reason for purchasing this laptop is for home use. I plan on taking classes next semester and I know that creating powerpoints and other documents isnt going to be a problem. It's a great laptop and I'm very happy with my purchase.

I've been looking all for for a laptop with reasonable specs. I wanted a 15" screen, 4GB memory, an i5 processor, and 4+ hour battery life for under $800.00. I really thought this HP was going to be the solution. On paper it looks great. Unfortionaitely after unpackaging it and using it for a while I was really dissapointed. The touchpad on it is really hard to use out of the box. I was able to update the drivers and Synpatic software which enabled me to adjust the zone size and sensitivity but it's still hard to use. The keyboard is also poorly laid out. HP in their infinite wisdom decided to put any extra colum of keys on the left hand side. This doesn't look like a big deal in the pictures but in practice it's very annoying because every time I put my hands on the keyboard I'm hitting the wrong keys. The screen was comparable to other laptops in this price range / resolution but that isn't necessarily a plus. It's fine for web browsing and productivity apps but I wouldn't want to use it for serious Photoshop work or gaming.

On the plus side the laptop seems to be reponsive and doesn't come with to much bloatware. After running for a while the fans will kick into high occasionally but the laptop doesn't get very warm. I also appreciated the smooth lines and relatively thin look. The battery life was approximately 4.5 hours as specified with Wifi turned on.

If it wasn't for the keyboard and mouse problems I'd have given it 4 stars and kept it. As is though I've decided to return it and look elsewhere.

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I must first admit that I am not a techie and bought this for home use.

But I love this laptop. The screen is crystal clear and I love the slimness of the product. I did not buy it for the fingerprint reader but have found that I really enjoy storing all my internet passwords so I do not have to fumble for them each time I log on. The fingerprint reader was simple to set up and use. I use a wireless mouse much of the time so did not find the mouse pad a problem, but even when I use the mouse pad I did not experience the stiffness that other users complained about. The keyboard set up is a little unusual with extra keys on the side, but it only took me minutes to get used to the lay out and I rarely misstype.

The best thing about this laptop is the speed. The Intel i5 processor is lightning fast and worth every cent.

I cannot find a thing that I don't like about this laptop! Would buy again in a heartbeat.

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I have had it for a day and even though I normally do not post reviews I just wanted to share with potential buyers. Reason being that all the concerns I had from the few negative reviews on HP pavil dv6 laptops have all been alleviated :

1. keyboard layout extra keys on the left.

The extra keys on the left have not caused me too much confusion. Some keys may appear to be slightly misaligned but I think it is no different from most laptop keyboards where compromises have been made for space. I got used to the keyboard pretty quickly and I have only had it for a day.

2. keyboard layout function keys on the top changed

The F1 -F12 keys can be changed back to traditional usage in the bios. Just turn off "action keys".

3. touchpad buttons Yes, they are a bit stiff but I do not use them that often since I tap the touchpad for left click. I also read from one reviewer that they loosen up after a few weeks, so I am counting on that happening too.

4. Initially the sound was not working. I rebooted to fix that but it was echoing a lot I then realized I *may* have accidentally turned on microphone recording causing horrible echo feedback. I turned off the microphone and everything is fine.

Overall I am quite pleased with the laptop. It is fast and of reasonable weight. I also needed the keyboard light which works well.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

UPDATE on 2/26 (after 3 weeks) :

Still works well. The battery power is not as good as advertised but good enough for my mostly home usage. If you do mostly web browsing with no video then I can see it maybe getting close to advertised. I have not tested this. I am programmer and developing software on this laptop significantly reduces the battery time.

The touchpad buttons have loosened up slightly, I expect it to get better. It helps a lot if you click towards the middle of the touchpad.

Overall, I am yet to see a laptop I would trade this for at the same price. The more I compare this with equally priced and more expensive VAIO i5 laptops, I realize how good the build quality is on this laptop.

I am also pleasantly surprised with how much I am liking Windows 7. (I run Linux on my desktop!)

AM

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I purchased laptop + push2tv bundle. Haven't bought a computer in retail for a long time always was buying custom configured. But, the specs and WiDi addition was a great selling point.

Computer has few nice options wireless display, fingerprint reader, lighted keyboard, quick access buttons. The only thing that I had to add was bluetooth adapter. Watching movies from internet on HDTV was a blast awesome picture when using HDMI (a/v connection is not even worth trying if you can use HDMI).

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Lenovo ThinkPad T420 14" Laptop (2.4 GHz Intel Core i5-2430M Processor, 4 GB RAM, 320 GB Hard Drive

The Fn key and Ctrl key on the lower left of the keyboard are switched and is a huge inconvenience. It is stupid to see Lenovo mess around with the universal design of computer keyboard. I work with programmers and system engineers and we all HATE this bad design and will not buy it again.

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Acer Aspire One A0722-0369 11.6" 2G 320GB Amd C-60

This is an excellent netbook and I am very pleased with the overall look and performance! I like the overall design for starters. It was easy to use, had all the right features including decent resolution and sound, and it is so lightweight I wonder if it's in the carrier case sometimes. If you're a serious gamer this may not be for you; but if you mainly do social networking, music downloads, blogging, journaling and internet browsing this is a great choice. It was easy to watch movies on as well and mine came with Nook (amongst other things), which I have as yet to use. It also worked well with my paranormal investigation equipment and a programmer friend described it as a 'dream' to connect up to a network.I highly recommend this netbook.

I bought this amazing little computer for WiFi Internet use and for storing and playing back videos downloaded through the Amazon.com Unbox software. The display was great, and it played videos flawlessly; to me a miracle at the price point. Here I had everything my laptop has only without the DVD drive.

The problem is that the display developed a blue line down the middle that was there all the time. I researched and found that display problems seem to happen a lot with the Aspire One series of machines. Since I was within the return window, I deinstalled everything, wiped the data clean, and returned it. That was a lot of work for very little use. I'm thankful for the return policy, but not for all the wasted time commissioning and decommissioning this machine. It takes time to do that correctly.

I think Acer should have tested the display more before putting the machine into production. That said, I'm very open to buying a future version of this little miracle computer.

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It is hard to find anything substantial to complain about here. The two downsides I see are that the display is glossy and difficult to read in bright light (like most laptops) and that the construction appears relatively cheap.

Nevertheless, this is exactly what I wanted and expected, a more or less disposable small laptop that would run Ubuntu well enough. Never even booted up Windows. I installed the Ubuntu 12.04 beta. Everything works: wifi, standby mode, encrypted lvm. 2GB of RAM seems to be plenty for my use.

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I actually really like this netbook. It's the perfect netbook for someone like me who just needs it to do some online bill pay, Facebook, and general web surfing. I am also using it to save pictures, and so far so good. If you are a student, or someone who will get more than 6+ hours a day out of it, then I would go for a higher model. But this Acer has really impressed me.

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Bought this as a straight upgrade from my Asus 1001p which was 3 yrs old and having problems charging because of the plug port. Once you uninstall the bloatware that comes prepackaged with everything these days and optimize windows 7 to run better on your netbook (search google) it works very well. Obviously I'm not gonna do any video editing or play the latest games on it but for surfing the web, watching videos, listening to music, school work and all the basics its great. As a plus the charger port is bigger and sturdier than that on my old asus.

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HP Pavilion dv7t QE Laptop PC, Intel i7-2670QM 2.2GHz, 17.3" Display, 8GB, 750GB HDD, 1GB 7470M Gra

This came close to being a 5 star purchase. It's a fast quad core system with 8G of memory, bought here for $999. The graphics are not top notch (and that drags the Windows Experience Index down to 5.4), but for my purposes it's fine. I needed 4 fast cores, and this delivers.

The keyboard, though, is frustrating beyond belief. It's about full size, and the touch is ok, but some genius at HP decided on three massive blunders:

1) the up and down arrow keys are half size, and difficult to hit, unless perhaps you're a six year old girl with unusually small hands. I'm an adult male with large hands.

2) The function keys, F1 through F12, are a mainstay in many, many software applications. F5 is the "do it" key in a wealth of software refresh in most browsers, compile and run in many IDEs. F3 is "search again" in many tools. F1 is often Help. I use them all the time.

For some reason, HP decided to make those keys half-height, and do double duty. If you want F3, you have to type Function-F3. The F3 key, by itself, brightens the display. I have no idea why the manufacturer thought that brightening the display was a more common operation than searching for something; I only know that after fifteen years of using function keys as the quick way to get work done, I don't like having them buried under a bunch of keys to adjust brightness and volume.

3) The insert key has been given the same treatment as the F keys. The key combination for Insert is Function-PrintScreen. And it's also half-height. As someone who for years has used control-insert, shift-insert and shift-delete to move text around, it's unusable. I'm forcing my fingers to learn control-C, V and X instead, and I don't like it.

For a laptop that's clearly aimed at power users you don't need 4 cores and 8G of memory for most users the decision to cripple power user shortcuts is a very odd one. The simple solution is to plug in a USB keyboard with a key layout that you like, but that's not a great solution for a portable laptop.

Otherwise a fine machine. Not much bloatware, over 600G of disk free when you get it, adequate USB, decent screen.

This is so nice to get my hands on! The finger printer reader makes it so I dont have to remember any passwords anymore! The graphics are great, and the widi is very easy to set up (with not stutter). And did I say it was fast? WOW! The only complaint I had about it was that the graphics card was toast on arrival but was taken care of by HP and got a 5 yr warranty for my troubles.

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It is a product that meets my professional needs. The technical requirements are sufficient, for my main dedication "data processing of small databases (Exercise Physiology Statistics). In addition, the built-in sound system is excellent yield is.

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This laptop is everything they say it is and more...I got it 3 weeks ago and love it....the only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is because of the Wifi.....I am 21 feet from my rounter and could not keep a connection for more then 20 minutes at a time....so I bought a cheap wifi booster for 30 dollars (plug and play booster)....its been a few days and everything is perfect...no lost connections .. if your a wifi junkie beware, this may not be the laptop for you....aside from the wifi this laptop is fun, its fast (really fast) and it looks great...I love the fingerprint password thing and all the little extras...the "quick start" button is pretty cool....its like an extra power switch that you can push and be online in about 35-40 seconds.. ( I don't need it, but it works and its nice to know I can if I wanted to be)....for under a 1000 dollars its a great laptop....

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It's a very good laptop. Quality of images are excellent. It does what it supposed to do. I realy like the HP products. It was delivered within few days. Set up was easy.

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Sony VAIO VPC-EA31FX/BJ 14-Inch Laptop (Black)

I was confused on weather to get a toshiba or a vaio. im glad i got the vaio. its great, it starts up in less than a minute, even though its new i hope it always starts up that fast :) i dont have much on it, i only use it to skype, and browse the web.

battery life is great you get around four hours. :)

Works great, nice style, bright screen, good keyboard, everything seems to function pretty well. Light weight. Nice to have a blu ray. Pretty fast. I would recommend this computer.

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X75A-XH51 17.3" LED Notebook - Intel Core i5 2.50 GHz - Black (Open Box)

Good build quality, large screen, and nice simple design. In my experience Asus products have been both solid and reliable and this should be no difference. I have purchased about 10 or 15 of these over the last few months and have not had any issues at all.

Light weighted and sleek great for home use or travel. I wanted a keyboard easy to type on--this one fits the requirement. Fast too.

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Samsung Series 3 NP300E5C-A08US 15.6-Inch Laptop (Blue Silver)

This is a 2 part review. 2nd part is in response to the reviewer who gave this laptop a low rating for a 100 MHz typo.

Runs as I expected and looks stylish. My wife can take this to work and people seem to look at it quite a bit.

Has Samsung included apps for the general public to make everything easier. Samsung easy Migration works much better than the Easy Transfer from Windows.

Pro's

* Fast and smooth.

* Stylish Blue tint.

* Clear screen with typical resolution.

* Lighter than expected which is a plus for her.

* Samsung apps seem to be fluid

Con's

* 2.5 instead of 2.6 GHz (minor typo)

* Bloatware. Personally I hate Norton products because they are so intrusive and it takes more than just the uninstall to remove.

This was purchased to replace my wifes aging Lenovo G530 with a 2 Ghz T6400 C2D. Mostly she uses her laptop for facebook, shopping, minor games, and documents. She also uses her company VPN and Quickbooks but that is almost the extent of her laptop useage.

Being that she does so little, this is more than enough machine for her. However I bought it because she was looking at a few games and her previous machine could not play much of anything. For example she likes the Sims 3, and a few puzzle games.

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I am a Systems Engineer for a Fortune 500 company and I get to play with a lot of different toys. Laptops, Desktops, Servers, etc. and 10 years ago I could scarcely notice the difference in a 1.4 Ghz AMD Thunderbird or a 2 GHz Willamette Pentium 4. And that was a 600 Mhz difference. Even people who can Max out a CPU with Video editing or CAD Design can not notice a 100 Mhz difference. If they can I want that talent.

When a review is written, it should use the following (or similar) standards;

1. Brief Opening Description telling what drew you to this particular product.

2. List of PRO's(if any) ie. Weight, size, color, or it makes your bed. Whatever you think is a Pro List it.

3. List of CON's (if ANY) ie. Weight, size, color, or it doesnt make your bed. OR as in this case, The description has a typo like, "The description states this is a 2.6 Ghz Intel i5-3210 but in reality it is a 2.5 Ghz Intel i5-3210 if this will make any difference."

4. Last would be your conclusion ie. What you think about it, any advice for readers, what you could not get it to do, and so on.

You dont give a negative product review based on a 100 Mhz typo. That is not fair to the product, the Manufacture, or potential purchasers. Many people rely on the reviews and while most people cannot tell the difference in 100 Mhz, if they see a laptop that is 2.6 Ghz for 5 dollars cheaper that doesnt have a negative review then they will go there. But is it the best laptop for them? Who knows but they did not see a serious review for the other one so they passed.

Conclusion: This laptop is well worth the money. Samsung usually builds quality and their support is good if needed. I use some of their various products and like most things there are bad ones here and there but so far this is not one.

I'm starting physical therapy assistant school this month, and as such, I wanted a laptop to take to school with me. Here are some of the pros and cons as I have seen:

Pros:

Sleek, thin form factor Nice lines, curves, and countours. This laptop looks quite stylish and very professional.

Fast processor With an i5 @ 2.5GHz, you will be able to surf facebook and write reports like never before. Joking aside, this processor is more than fast enough for normal usage.

Integrated camera It's nothing special, but it works.

Build quality It felt a little "plasticy" at first, but over time I have come to appreciate the materials and feel that the build quality is actually quite good, especially considering the price I paid ($500 -it was on sale).

RAM 4GB is plenty for most people. In my opinion, any more RAM would be virtually pointless on this machine. The only reason I can think of that you would need more is for intensive video editing, but without a dedicated GPU, this laptop isn't really designed for such purposes anyways. Whatever games can be played on this laptop will be just fine with 4GB of RAM.

Intel HD 4000 integrated graphics I am actually quite impressed with the HD 4000 integrated graphics. Don't expect to max out Battlefield 3 (or even play on low settings with a comfortable framerate), but, benchmarks have shown that many modern games are playable on low settings with 25-30 FPS. Older games should run even better.

Sound For a $500 laptop, I feel that the speakers are perfectly adequate. If you want better sound, get some headphones.

Keyboard I can type about 80WPM average, so a good keyboard is very important to me. It seems that when you are buying a laptop, you're making a sacrifice as far as the keyboard goes no matter which laptop you buy (since a traditional desktop keyboard is much thicker and has much more tactile feedback), but the chicklet keyboard in this laptop works quite well and I can type with relative ease.

If you reformat the laptop to install Windows 7, make sure you install the latest touchpad drivers from Samsung so that can get "Palm Tracking", the feature that will disable the touchpad temporarily after any key is pressed (more on that later).

Cons:

Personally, I am not crazy about the finish on the top of the laptop. It can look a little "oily" in certain lighting conditions. I feel that it would look much better if it were a flat surface and did not have all of the ridges. That said, it's certainly not terrible, and I can live with it. Some people seem to really like the way it looks, so it's just personal preference. However, given the fact that this is one of my only "cons", please do not let this deter you from purchasing this laptop.

The laptop's screen does not open up nearly as far as I initially thought it should. However, I am finding that I usually do not open the laptop's screen up all the way anyways, so it is more of a non-issue. My old Inspiron 9300 could open a full 180 degrees -why you would ever need that much is beyond me, but going from that, to this, was a bit of a shock at first. I would imagine that most people wouldn't even notice and that the angle that it CAN open up to is perfectly adequate.

Bloatware. There are a lot of additional programs and features installed which I feel are completely unnecessary and seem to be shells over built-in Windows functions. However, this was not as much of an issue for me since I reformatted and installed Windows 7, only installing the drivers and software that I wanted.

Speaking of bloatware, Samsung's "Easy Settings" is somewhat of a necessary evil because it's required in order for the Fn keys to work (such as the brightness and sound Fn key shortcuts).

In and of itself, Easy Settings isn't all that bad, but one "feature" of Easy Settings that I particularly despise is how it splashes a giant caps lock notification onto your screen whenever the caps lock is enabled or disabled. Why couldn't they make it much smaller and/or make it appear at one of the corners of the screen? Why not make it an option to enable or disable notifications such as this? Alas, I do not know. It seems like many software devs just make the assumption that their consumers want it "as simple as possible" and do not think that providing options is a good thing. And for many people, this may be a complete non-issue, but for me, it's an annoyance. Especially if I'm playing a game in which I use caps lock.

I'm still looking into a way to disable the caps lock notification while keeping Easy Settings (so that I can use the function keys), but one surefire way to disable the notification is to simply uninstall Easy Settings. Many options can still be easily accessed by simply hitting win+X, so it's not really a deal-breaker if I can't use the Fn key shortcuts.

The internal microphone is terrible. I picks up the clicks and clacks of the keyboard and mouse buttons very well, but I have to basically yell for my voice to be heard at all. Even putting my mouth right up to the mic hole doesn't seem to make a big difference.

However, I since I have reformatted and reinstalled Windows 7, I have not yet installed the Realtek sound driver, so it's possible that that may fix my issue. I will update this review after I have downloaded and installed the driver with results. If the mic is no better, I would say that unless having a good integrated mic is a big deal to you, don't let this bother you. If you use a mic that much, it would be better to get a cheap external mic anyways.

Additional Notes:

As I mentioned above, the elan touchpad driver installed on this laptop features Palm Tracking. Whenever you hit a key on the keyboard, Palm Tracking automatically disables the touchpad so that you don't accidentally jump the cursor and start typing somewhere else or lose focus on the current window. In general, this is a fantastic feature and allows you to rest your hands on the laptop while typing, but there are a few circumstances when I would want to disable it (i.e. gaming).

Sadly, the most recent driver does not allow Palm Tracking to be disabled in the GUI menu. However, there is a solution. I have made a couple of .reg files which, when ran, either enable or disable Palm Tracking. For the .reg files and full instructions on how to use them, please download from mediafire, here:If that link gets deleted, simply type this in your address bar: mediafire(dotcom)(forward slash)?1d5gyop026rcfux

Obviously, replace what is in the parentheses with .com and / respectively. Delete the actual parentheses from the URL as well.

After you download Palm Tracking.zip, simply extract the Palm Tracking folder to any place of your liking and open up Readme.txt to understand how to use the files.

~~~~

In conclusion, this is a fantastic laptop for the price and the issues I have expressed here are minor annoyances at worst which most normal users would probably not even notice anyways. So, If you like the looks of this laptop and you don't plan on heavy gaming, this laptop should more then exceed your needs and expectations. So far, I'm really liking it. I will update this post with any more information as it becomes relevant.

~~UPDATE 1/8/12~~

After reading some troubling information about how Easy Settings can negatively affect DPC latency, I have decided to completely uninstall it altogether. Easy Settings was just bad news from the start. It has low-level processes than can increase the DPC latency, it splashes giant notifications on your screen whenever certain buttons are pressed (caps lock), and it messes with the power options and the actual behavior of the computer itself in strange ways.

For example, with Easy Settings, my computer will resume from sleep when the lid is opened (it won't do this without Easy Settings for some reason). However, Easy Settings also changes the "Shut Down" button to "Sleep" in the start menu, and it disables the pulsing blue LED during sleep mode, making me think that the computer was completely off when it was not.

So in the end, I think that completely removing Easy Settings altogether is definitely the right move. Although I lose Fn key functionaily (the sound Fn keys still work though), and although the computer no longer resumes from sleep when the lid is raised (I have to hit the power button to wake it up), I would rather live with this things than be subjected to the jacked-up bloatware party going on under the hood. No thanks, Easy Settings.

I have also determined the the mic just plain sucks. Maybe it's just the nature of the beast with built-in mics, but I have a feeling that everyone's mic is probably similar to mine.

That said, I did figure out what I have found to be the best possible settings for clarity and volume. The Realtek sound driver is absolutely essential to making the mic sound at least halfway decent because of a couple enhancements it features.

So, here's what I did to fix the mic:

1. Hit win+R

2. Type this: "control mmsys.cpl sounds" or copy and paste (without quotes)

3. Hit enters

4. Choose the "Recording" tab at the top of the Sound menu

5. Double-click "Microphone" (Realtek high definition audio)

6. Click the "Levels" tab

7. Completely max out both the Microphone and Microphone Boost sliders

8. Click the "Enhancements" tab

9. The following should be selected:

-Immediate mode

-DC Offset CAncellation

-Noise Suppression (NS)

-Acoustic Echo Cancellation (AEC)

10. Finally, click "Ok" to apply the changes

You should find that doing these things should clean up your mic a lot. If you already have the Realtek driver installed, the enhancements may already be selected by default, but you may still need to turn up the sliders in order for your voice to be heard by others. Also, you can play with Noise Suppression vs. Far Field Pickup (only one can be enabled at a time) -I've found the NS is a little softer but more clear, while FFP is louder, but a little more muddled and unclear. Personally, I go with NS.

The bottom line is that the mic is junk and it is probably not located in the ideal position anyways. If it were me, I probably would've put it next to the camera so that it actually faces the user and is farther away from the keyboard so as to reduce the bone-jarring clicks and clacks that happen while typing. But, alas, I am not an engineer, and no one asks me these questions.

Despite all of these things, I still feel that this is a great laptop for the money. It's just a little disappointing to see prevalence of such terrible software and questionable design choices this far into the life of the laptop in general. I'm sure Samsung probably isn't alone in this, but sometimes it makes you wonder what their engineers/designers were thinking when they designed the product.

Ultimately, I feel that a score of 4/5 stars is perhaps a little generous, but mostly accurate. If this laptop came without all of the bloatware installed, I would give it 5/5 stars hands down, even with the crappy built-in mic. But, I just can't so easily excuse such terrible software which seems completely superfluous and actually harmful to the system. It doesn't make sense to me.

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So far so good...I needed a better processor with higher RAM and memory, plus something that allowed me to work from home when necessary. This laptop can run several programs, including Microsoft Office, simultaneously and at a good processing speed. The keyboard is very comfortable to use; and setting it up was easy. Very happy with this!

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Have had this laptop for about a week now. Overall I am very happy with it. Had never owned a samsung laptop beofre but due to quality of their over products decided to go for it. I had picked out a slightly different model on another site but it sold out. Did a bit of looking and found this one.

This is a great buy for the $. Love the I5 cpu, wish the HD was 7200prm or SSD but for less than $800 it would be hard to find that. The screen is quite nice and bright, does a great job with different media. Onboard graphics can be pretty bad sometimes but I have to say that its not the case here. The other thing I found quite surprising was just how light it is. For a 15.6 laptop i have to say its quite light and really portable.

If your looking for a decent laptop that you use for school, media, surfing and want to be able to travel easy with it this could be for you.

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I've been using this notebook for 2 weeks and so far I'm am pretty impressed. Added 4GB more RAM for good measure. Clearly some corners were cut to keep it under $500 but I'm very happy with the product overall.

PROS

-Fast

-Lightweight

-Great picture

-Sound is loud/decent quality for the $. I'd use external speakers though if I really wanted nice sound.

CONS

-Case feels budget plastic feels like it might not hold up to much of a beating.

-Keys on keyboard have a very shallow action. I'm getting used to this now but at first it felt awkward to type on.

-Screw holding RAM door on was very easily stripped. Was able to remove with a screw extractor.

Update: 33 days after purchase I thought the Backspace and both Enter keys failed and was about to ship it to Fort Worth, TX for warranty repair. But before returning the product I decided to re-install factory software to verify it wasn't a "logic" issue. Keys are all fine now and I'm back to loving this computer.

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Samsung Series 5 NP530U3C-A01US 13.3-Inch Ultrabook (Light Titan)

This is my first Samsung computer and my first Ultrabook... I do a lot of traveling and I've been using a 10.1" Asus Netbook for the last two years. I've loved the battery life and accepted the speed and small screen as being the sacrifice that I had to make to get 8 hours on a battery charge. This Series 5 has a 13.3" screen that is very readable in most every situation with the possible exception of direct sunlight. The 1.7Ghz Core I5 processor is blazing fast for a portable computer and even rivals a lot of desktop systems. All of this comes with an actual battery life of over 8 hours!!!

I really considered not getting this computer when I read the review that talked about the screen shaking, I don't know if they got a bad unit or if they are sensitive to movement but I've used this computer on my lap, on an airplane and in a car and I can't say that my screen has ever moved enough to even get my attention much less bother me. I can't imagine another computer being any better match to what I need, a small, lightweight, long battery life computer with substantial processing power.

My only complaint so far has been Samsung Customer Service. I need to use this computer with a VGA projector and no one at Samsung could even tell me what adapter I needed to convert the monitor port to a VGA output. I ended up buying a HDMI to VGA converter to be safe. Their lack of knowledge about a basic function had me questioning my choice but the computer is so good I'm still going to give it five stars.

It just arrived earlier today, and after working with it for the better part of the afternoon and evening, I can say that it's very, very nice: compact, with a nice screen, and extremely speedy. (And by the way, I've seen absolutely no indication of screen-wobbling, which is something another reviewer mentioned.) There are, however, a couple of minor issues that prompted me to take it down a notch, from 5 stars to 4. Actually, if I could have given it 4.5 stars, I would have, but since I have to choose between 4 and 5, I'll go with 4.

One of the issues is fan noise. I must admit to being extremely sensitive to the noise of laptop fans, and for the past several years I've been spoiled given that I've had a Dell Mini 10, which is a now-discontinued fanless netbook. Being fanless, and since I had installed an SSD in it, it was completely silent. The netbook, however, finally gave out on me, and so after some research, I ordered the Samsung NP530 as a replacement, both for on-the-road use on my job, and carrying around room-to-room in my house. From reviews I had read, it was supposed to be one of the quietest ultrabooks, and I think that's probably true. However, I can now say that, when running at load, the fan does become fairly loud. On the other hand, when it's idling, the fan is inaudible unless you put your ear right up to it. The other piece of good news is that, even when it's under load and the fan is going full tilt, it's loud but not as high-pitched as some laptop fans, which makes it less annoying. Bottom line: when it comes to noise, the NP530 is about as good as I can expect from a laptop (other than a fanless model), and it's something I can live with, especially since everything else about the unit is so nice. For those of you who are less sensitive to fan noise than I am, you probably won't even notice it.

The other issue isn't so much a problem as a quirk. I ordered it intending to replace the 500GB HDD with a 128GB SSD that I happened to have lying around. The actual install was easy. Just remove one screw on the underbelly and the drive, along with RAM, are immediately accessible. Make sure, however, that you have a good, small-size phillips-head screwdriver, because the screws that attach the drive to the bracket are on rather tight, and my small set of jeweler tools didn't deliver enough torque to unloosen them. I had to use a larger-handled screwdriver with a small head that, thankfully, I bought last year for another purpose and still had lying around. Anyway, aside from that, the install was easy, and my SSD fit perfectly in the bay. (There was no need to use one of the new super-slim SSDs that are required for some ultrabooks; my standard SSD fit perfectly.)

Now, however, we get to the quirky part. After I installed the SSD, I did a clean install of Win 7. This could be probably avoided by using cloning software to image the drive that the NP530 shipped with. However, I wanted to install a copy of Win 7 Pro (rather than Home Premium) since I happen to have an extra Pro license on hand. Also, I dislike the bloatware that most OEM's install on new systems. I can't say for sure whether Samsung installed much bloatware because I didn't experiment much with the unit before replacing the drive and doing the reinstall.

In any event, when I tried to do a clean install of Win 7 Pro, I was stymied by the fact that the NP530 simply would not boot to my USB DVD drive, so there was no way for me to install Windows other than by installing it from within the existing Win 7 installation (which often causes problems). After several hours of troubleshooting and reviewing information available online, I figured out that the culprit was a special BIOS setting, apparently unique to Samsung ultrabooks, called "Fast BIOS Mode." This mode causes the BIOS to completely skip over USB devices when booting, no matter what boot priority they're set to. This is apparently to speed up the boot process, but when I figured this out and disabled Fast BIOS mode, I saw no appreciable difference in boot speed. My USB DVD drive was, however, finally recognized when booting, after which the installation went smoothly. I will say that I have an older USB DVD drive, so maybe those of you with newer ones won't have this problem.

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I purchased this machine and have been using it for a few days. This thing is blazing fast! My desktop is a Core 2 Duo at 3.00GHZ and this machine is as fast as or faster than it! And to the poster above that complained about the "wobbly" screen, he must have had a lemon; mine works perfectly. I cannot think of a single negative about this computer. Its very thin, light, and fast. The screen looks great. It boots up very quick, it wakes up from sleep mode very fast. About the only negative is the battery is not user-replaceable. So, when it dies you'll have to send it back to get changed. But they did put a battery life extender technology in it, so it only charges the battery to 80%, not 100%. This greatly enhances battery life. this is also what major car manufacturers do as well, they only run their batteries from 20-80% capacity so that they last up to 10 years.

The only reason why I'm giving it 4 and not 5 stars is it comes with Win 7 Home Premium and not Professional, and the battery is not user-replaceable.

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Well I ordered this laptop last night, with next day air, Saturday delivery; Today (Saturday) it arrived at about 10AM. Good Work UPS/Amazon.

First impressions:

Let me preface this by saying that I've owned A LOT of laptops. I've probably had 20 laptops in the last 7 years. The worst of these was probably an eMachines laptop (made by gateway I think), back in 2006; The best was by far a late 2011 Macbook Pro 15". So the scale is 1-10, 1 being the eMachines, 10 being the Macbook Pro.

Another point I'll make is that this is the first Ultrabook I've owned. I recently owned a Lenovo Thinkpad X220, which is kind of the same class of laptops, but not quite.

Having owned it for all of 6 hours, I'd probably give this laptop a 6-6.5 out of 10. The most obvious thing it has going for it is the zippy Third Generation Intel Core i5. Overall, for a laptop this small, thin, and light, its a really quick machine. For $200 more you can buy the model with a 128GB SSD, something I think is a must in all computers now (an SSD). I opted for this one because its $800, and I can buy a better 128GB SSD, and another 4GB stick of RAM for about ~$125 and ~$20 respectively. I happened to already have both of these lying around, and installation was easy enough. There's one screw that holds on a panel on the back, then it just pops off like the back cover on a Samsung android phone.

Biggest problem, and pretty much deal breaker for me: The hinge for the screen. It's wobbly. The screen shakes when you move, when it opens. Just poor build quality.

UPDATE: I'm changing it from 3 stars to 4 because I suppose its unfair to say that this one detail makes it a 3 star product. For me, I can't deal with it, and I'm going to return it. But for most people, this is such a standard problem that they wouldn't even notice it or be bothered. Even as I type this with the laptop on my lap, the screen is wobbling with every keystroke...it's driving me NUTS!

Another thing I personally don't like is the keyboard. I always use mechanical keyboards on my desktops, like the dasKeyboard, so I'd say every laptop's keyboard is complete garbage...but coming from a Lenovo Thinkpad, with that awesome old school IBM laptop keyboard, to these flat, silent, chiclet style keys...kind of drab. I also feel like backlit keys are a standard thing now. Maybe because the last few laptops I bought are >$1000.

The touchpad is great. Obviously still nowhere near as good as a Macbook touchpad, but by far the best PC touchpad I've ever used.

Aside from the screen hinge...great laptop. Great price for a new Core i5 Ivy Bridge Ultrabook. This was my first Samsung laptop, and it'll probably be my last without trying it out in the store first.

Want Samsung Series 5 NP530U3C-A01US 13.3-Inch Ultrabook (Light Titan) Discount?

Sleek, lightweight, battery lasting 5-6 hr; easy to use, soft keys easy to type on. Beautiful matte finish doesn't show fingerprints. Would buy it again in a heartbeat.

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