One of the topmost and focal name in the budget laptop section should definitely be the Ideapad series from Lenovo, the maker and producer of the famed Legion, Yoga and ThinkPad series. But with competitors like the Acer Aspire E 15 and Dell Vostro 14 to know whether it was able to outperform its contenders read on.
Check out the latest price for the Lenovo Ideapad 310 80ST001MUS
Specs:
- CPU – AMD A10-9600P Quad-Core, 3.2 GHz
- GPU – AMD Radeon R5
- Memory – 8 GB DDR4
- Screen – 15.6-inch HD (1,366 x 768)
- Storage – 1 TB SATA HDD
- OS – Windows 10
Benefits:
- Performance – If you take a look at the specs sheet you’d know that it’s an AMD configured laptop. It includes an AMD A10-9600P processor, 8 GB of RAM and 1 TB hard disk drive. The powerful hardware is capable enough to take on your everyday tasks like the net surfing or media consumption. It can even handle multitasking to some extent (even though AMD is notoriously infamous for being unable to handle multitasking as efficiently as Intel does). Although many are complaining about the really slow 5400 rpm hard disk drive as it really comes in the way of the performance. If you really want to step up the performance you better opt for a rather snappy SSD. Another important aspect (a good one) of an AMD APU (Accelerated Processing Unit, CPU + GPU) is that the integrated AMD Radeon R5 GPU is relatively much stronger than an Intel counterpart. Although by no means it can take the position of a dedicated graphics card it can and does handle some less demanding titles like League of Legends, Defense of the Ancients (DotA) and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive much more efficiently. So it can tackle your casual gaming needs quite positively.
- Design – The solid build quality is another one of the biggest plus points of this ultrabook. The chassis is made of plastic though, not metal. But that doesn’t mean that it has any issues regarding the sturdiness of the laptop. The chassis feels fairly stable. Opening the lid leads to the excellent keyboard and a slightly small trackpad. The keys feel great while typing having an adequate amount of travel distance and actuation. Some do complain about the oddly positioned right shift key though. The otherwise good trackpad includes left and right keys which feel slightly stiff.
Downsides:
- Display – The 15.6 inch TN display is not really one of the chart-toppers. It, in fact, is a bit of a lacklustre when it comes to the moment to perform. With an average luminance of 185 nits, the brightness is not really up to the marks as it lags behind the category average of 200 nits. Lower display brightness implies potential trouble working in a well-lit environment. The contrast ratio is not very good either at 450:1 meaning the blacks won’t feel as deep as it should. Now comes the colours. The panel shows roughly 55% coverage of the sRGB colour space with a delta E value sitting around 2.3. The ‘not so impressive’ numbers suggest a poor display capable only of recreating that many colours properly. And on top of all, it’s a TN (twisted nematic) panel which means that the visibility angle would be very short.
- Battery – The battery backup is one of the biggest weak points in this ultraportable laptop due to the tiny battery pack. It could run only as long as 4 and a half hour under normal workload (such as surfing the internet or watching videos). The timespan clearly lags behind the category average as well as its competitors.
Verdict:
The Lenovo Ideapad 310 is a good starter’s laptop. It looks gorgeous, feels solid and performs strongly. This otherwise excellent ultralight laptop suffers slightly due to its subpar display and poor battery backup. So if you are not very finicky about them and simply want it as your regular PC backup then it can be a good choice.
Check out the latest price for the Lenovo Ideapad 310 80ST001MUS