The Lenovo IdeaPad Y530 is a popular choice for a laptop to call your own or give it to a loved one as it is not very expensive. Lenovo asserts that the Y530 is a very good product and will not put a hole through your wallet. We shall see as we will be discussing the Y530 features and capabilities.

We will also determine the Lenovo IdeaPad Y530’s advantages and disadvantages. Plus, we will be giving our opinions on why the IdeaPad Y530 is a popular purchase.

Specifications:

CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo processor P7350 (2GHz, 3MB L2 Cache, 1066MHz FSB)

Mempry: 2GB DDR2 System Memory (2 x 1GB, supports up to 4GB)

Hard Drive: 250GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive

Display: 15.4″ WXGA Glossy Widescreen Display (1280 x 800)

Optical Drive: Slot-loading dual-layer DVD±RW drive

Videp Card: NVIDIA GeForce 9300M with 256MB VRAM

Operating System: Windows Vista Home Premium

Wireless: 802.11g/n

Bluetooth: Bluetooth 2.0+EDR

Battery: 6-cell

With this package, you can get a multi-media laptop with several features: surround speakers with subwoofer, a frameless display, and touch-sensitive media controls.

The Y50 has an all-black shell. As one closely views the surface, it has a pattern that is visually appealing as well as providing a better grip. Consistency is apparent in its overall design.

Other people might be bothered by the orange-colored media buttons that contrast with the black surface. But we think that the orange buttons break the monotony of the all-black look. The Y530 is a bit thicker than other laptops being sold, but surprisingly, it is not heavy.

We now glance at the Y530’s underside. Its bottom is accessible whenever you want to upgrade some components. Inside, one can see the processor, wireless card, the hard drive and RAM. Yet, it seems like there were no security stickers.

While the IdeaPad boasts of a frameless screen, its display area does have some problems. Image distortion is a common problem with the Y530. The colors are accurate at a fixed angle. Move it around, your screen gets distorted. Even the screen “fades out” during certain times.

Another irritating display problem is glare. Even with a low amount of light, one can see his or her own reflection. This is very distracting especially if you are trying to watch a movie with a very dark scene. You can see yourself. Aside from the inferior viewing angle and glare problems, the Y530 also has a problem with DVD playback. The 1280 x 800 resolution lacks the 16:9 aspect ratio for one to enjoy his favorite DVD movie or television episode.

The Y530 trails behind other notebooks in terms of graphics cards. The Y530’s integrated graphics card enables one to sufficiently browse the Internet or work on some documents. The integrated graphics card, however, is not at all ideal for gaming.

The IdeaPad Y530’s documentation makes the laptop sufficiently user friendly. However, the software bundle is not substantial. All one gets is the Windows operating system and the CyberLink software.

Lenovo, though, is proud of the Dolby Home Theater audio system built into the Y530. This assures the listener of quality surround sound. It boasts of four speakers, so music lovers would want to have a first crack at this gadget.

To finish this review, it seems like some features were sacrificed to lower the price of the Y530. However, if this gadget will just be used for the average computer work like documents or children’s homework, then the Lenovo IdeaPad is an excellent choice.

For more quality laptop reviews aside from this one about Lenovo IdeaPad Y530 (40512AU), please visit Laptops Reviewed for IdeaPad Y530 review and everything related to netbooks and laptops.

Lenovo Ideapad Y530 FAQ:

Question: Lenovo laptop ideapad Y530 any good for college?
I need a laptop for college with 3gb or higher and 250gb + hard drive, and it has to be able to run the data intensive AUTO CAD and CAD programs. Is a lenovo laptop good for this, are they reliable?

Answer: The lenovo y530 doesn’t have that great of a graphics card – nvidia 9300, so it won’t run autocad/cad programs well. Choose a more powerful laptop like the lenovo w700. Lenovo laptops are known for their reliability and excellent build quality.

Question: How to PC restore Lenovo y530?
How can I do a complete PC restore for the Lenovo ideapad y530? I want it to go back to factory settings.

Answer: Press the One Key Recovery button. It is the one just above the power button with the arch/arrow on it. Provided you did not reformat the drive you will be able to restore the original factory image.

Question: Dell Studio or Lenovo Ideapad?
I’m looking at buying a new computer, and I’ve mostly narrowed it down to the Dell Studio 15 or Lenovo Ideapad Y530. The Dell looks way better in my opinion, but looks aren’t everything, so has anyone had either of these computers? What do I need to know reliability-wise?

Answer: Go Lenovo. Dell makes some excellent computers (particularly their business class), but they have been known to have reliability issues. Lenovo, on the other hand, have some of the best product support, best warranties and best built products on the market. Lenovo tops the chart in reliability. I would like to point out that all laptops are subject to component failure over time. What makes the difference is how they treat you when things go wrong. Lenovo is again one of the best at that after purchase support.

Question: Taking video/pictures with Lenovo ideapad?
I got a lenovo ideapad y530 and everything is great, until I ran into this roadblock:

it has a built in camera to recognize faces (“your face is your password”), but I can’t seem to find how to take an actual picture from the laptop. It almost seems as if the answer is right in front of my nose, but I cannot find a button or icon ANYWHERE that will let me take a picture/video.

Answer: Use the EasyCapture utility. There should be an icon on the desktop, or though the Start menu.

Question: Buying a Lenovo Ideapad that I haven’t seen in person?
So I am considering buying the Lenovo Ideapad Y530 for about $660 from the Lenovo website (which has a better deal than anyone else online). The only thing is that I cannot find any store that would have one on display for me to see! It looks pretty good, but should I trust buying a laptop that I’ve never even seen? Does anyone know of a store that sells it??

Answer: If it is the true website, not a fake, it should be OK. Just make sure the specs are what you want, and that they have a return policy, just in case.

Question: Is Lenovo a good laptop brand?
I am planning to purchase the Lenovo IdeaPad Y530.

Answer: I believe that the IdeaPad Y530 is a good buy. Lenovo of course bought out the IBM line of computers. IBM is a very respectable brand of computers and I would highly recommend that over any other brand.

Question: Normal operating temp for Lenovo Ideapad laptop?
What is normal for a Y530 ideapad? Intel Centrino core 2 duo @2ghz, 4 gb ram, 320 gb hd. I lost the hard drive in my last laptop due to overheating (even though I used a chillpad) and I don’t want it to happen again. I use speedfan to monitor the temp, and it runs right around 45 celsius while just surfing the web or using MS office but as soon as I load a flash video or play a game the temp rises to 65 or higher (I shut it down at 70 to avoid losing another hard drive). Is this due to integrated graphics? The chillpad has no effect on this laptop. After 65 I can hear the secondary fan kick on really loud which scares me. I shelled out more $$$ than I planned to and got this laptop cuz I was told the thinkpad / ideapads last forever so I want to make sure that happens.

Answer: There is only one fan in there. It can operate at different levels and that is normal. For all hard drives it is a question more of when they will fail rather than if. Backup your data regularly.

Are you looking at the drive temperature? It sounds more like you are looking at the CPU core temperatures. The CPU is on the opposite side of the machine to the hard drive and will have very little heating effect on the drive.

Question: Integrated graphics card question?
Is the integrated graphics card on the Lenovo Ideapad y530 40156BU (Intel Integrated Graphics X4500) better than the integrated graphics card on the laptop I am currently using, compaq presario f572us(NVIDIA GeForce Go 6150)? I know both are bad, but which one is better. Also, how much can you set the video memory to be on the lenovo y530? On my current compaq it is 278mb. I know that in general, the lenovo y530 is much better, but I need to know about gaming on both computers.

Answer: The GMA 4500M is considerably faster than the old GeForce Go 6150. concerning the graphics memory: if you’re using Windows Vista the graphics memory will be allocated automatically depending on the size of the main memory. if the main memory is 2GB, the graphics ram can go up to 512MB (maximum can be up to 1759MB with 4GB main memory) what is sufficient for almost all games.