Pros: 8 GB of RAM, quad Core CPU, Windows 10, 4 cell battery, low end price (check here).
Cons: 1 USB 3.0 port.
A few years back Asus, Acer and Toshiba used to rule the laptop space. However, as of late, there are a few more players in the game and one of the most competitive ones is Lenovo.
The company has crafted a reputation for itself by creating quality laptops that don't always follow the typical guidelines of design. Such is the case of Lenovo's latest introduction to the market; the Lenovo - G51-80M80020US. This new laptop, operating under Windows 10, stands out thanks to it's killer price and stellar specs.
Today, we take a moment to review the Lenovo G51-80M80020US and all it has to offer. Wanna come with?
What are people saying about this laptop? Find out here!
Lenovo G51-80M80020US Review of an Affordable Mid Range Laptop
Display and Design
Ok so it's no secret that Lenovo doesn't exactly pursue the most attractive designs when building its laptops. In fact, the company boosts a reputation for designing robust though not very appealing laptops. Fortunately for us, this isn't the case of the Lenovo G51-80M80020US. No, the latest laptop on Lenovo's lineup serves us well with a pretty contained weight of just 5.06 pounds and a very sleek overall figure (1 inch of thickness).
The keyboard, in this case, is your standard chiclet keyboard with a numeric pad (it's not backlit). It should be noted that the body of the laptop sports a brushed metal design which is both sober as well as aesthetically pleasing.
As for the screen, we're looking at a standard 15.6 inch LED screen with an HD resolution and a 16:9 aspect ratio. As some would say, nothing new under the sun here,
How well does it perform? Is it good for multitasking?
Getting on with our Lenovo G51-80M80020US review it's time to delve into the key aspects of the laptop and the most attractive ones at that. When it comes down to the processor, Lenovo's new laptop includes an AMD A8-7410 chip. This is a quad core processor that runs at a standard speed of 2.0 GHz, it's based on a 64 bit architecture and has 2 MB of cache.
If we where to compare this processor to its equivalent Intel version we would state that it performs as a 4th generation Intel Core i3. Currently we're living through the 6th generation of i3 CPU's. That said, a 4th generation i3 is nothing to be ignored. Especially when it's accompanied by an ample amount of RAM as is the case here with 8 GB id DDR3L RAM.
Basically what this means is that we're looking at a consumer oriented laptop that can handle heavy multitasking. Therefore if you're the kind of person who enjoys running several programs at a time and has several tabs open on your browser at any given time then this is your ideal amount of RAM so that the overall performance isn't hurt.
Can I play games of this laptop?
As you can imagine when you look at the price tag on this laptop this is not a gaming laptop. Far from it. The G51 80M80020US comes with a standard integrated AMD Radeon R5 graphics chip.
If we where to compare it to it's Intel version we would probably compare it to the Intel HD Graphics 4000. Again, not a graphics card intended for gaming but rather for "everyday usage". You could play games if you lower the level of details to the minimum but it's hardly recommended. Games like World of Warcraft will work well but those more intensive on the graphics side won't work very fluently.
However, stuff like watching movies on high definition, editing pics, preparing presentations and so forth should not present any sort of problems for the AMD Radeon R5 graphics card.
What's the battery life like? Can I store 1000 movies on this laptop?
Overall we're seeing that this notebook has a pretty good performance, especially when you consider the price point. That said, the battery life is pretty standard. With an integrated 4 cell battery, the G51 80M80020US should be capable of lasting between 4 and 5 hours without a charger nearby.
As for the storage, it has a 1 TB hard drive that runs at your standard 5400 rpm. If you substract from these 1000 GB (1 TB is actually 1024 GB but they round it down to 1000 GB) roughly 50 GB for Windows 10 and the basic programs and asume that your HD movies weigh an average of 750 MB you can store almost 1300 movies on this laptop.
The storage is within what's expected on this price bracket. However, if you really care about speed when it comes to storage then we would urge you to add (or swap) the existing HDD for an SSD. This would give you storage speeds up to 10 times faster. Right now you can get 250 GB for less than $80
so it's actually quite affordable and different from how it was a few years ago.
so it's actually quite affordable and different from how it was a few years ago. What does the connectivity look like?
We've already gone through all the key aspects that make this laptop a great deal amongst those looking to buy a quality performer at a bargain price. Now it's time to take a quick peek over the connectivity options.
To this point we've got 3 USB ports including 1 USB 3.0 port for fast data transfer, 1 HDMI port, a VGA port, a card reader and a microphone/headphone jack. Of course the G51-80M80020US also comes with your standard 802.11 b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, a DVD reader/writer and a webcam for all those nights skyping with your friends.
So? What's the verdict? Is it worth it?
Bottom line: after reviewing the Lenovo G51 80M80020US and examining its pros and cons (including its price) we can quickly come to the conclusion that this is a worthy laptop at the current price point.
Yes, we would've preffered a Core i5 CPU along with an Intel HD 5000 graphics card but the truth is that if that where the case the price would've been increased by over $100 and the performance would've gone up by 10-15% at best in most of our everyday uses.
For an average user this laptop is more than ready to take on most tasks be it streaming HD movies, editing the summer pics or working on an excel for class, this laptop offers a good performance at a good price.