Lenovo Ideapad 3 14" Full HD IPS Laptop Intel Core i5-1135G7 8GB RAM 256GB SSD Windows 10 S Platinum Grey - 81X7004FUK

Product Information

Then I shrunk the windows partition to make room to install Linux. I use Fedora, but any modern Linux should work. No surprises. Hardware drivers were all in the default repos. (The machine has an Intel WiFi 6 card and Realtek audio.) When weighing up the Lenovo IdeaPad 3 you have to take the price into account first and foremost, and then consider everything else: while we think the screen and the battery life could be improved, the laptop scores highly in terms of overall usability, the typing experience, the connectivity options you get, and the Intel Core processor fitted inside. If you're shopping for a budget laptop then it's worth getting this on your shortlist. Also consider Lenovo says its IdeaPad laptops are made for “thin and light” portable use. But it hasn’t followed this up with a particularly large battery. Consider plugging in a mouse for home use, but all you right-handers will have to do so on the “wrong” side of the laptop because the Lenovo IdeaPad 3’s USB ports are all on the left. There is the usual trio: one USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0s, but I’d expect to see the slower one on the right hand-side of the Lenovo IdeaPad 3.

Lenovo IdeaPad 3 Laptop - 15.6in FHD, Intel Core i5 - Very Lenovo IdeaPad 3 Laptop - 15.6in FHD, Intel Core i5 - Very

And talking of lists, be sure to take a look at T3's best lightweight laptops guide if you want a portable PC that doesn't weigh much. SD-card reader: Transfer multimedia files like photos from your camera or mobile devices, a great feature for photographers. To boot from a USB, hold F12 when booting and select your USB device from the text menu. To enter the bios, press F2 (or possibly DEL) when booting. After initial setup and the million Windows updates to install, I used the Lenovo assistant app to update the system bios. For whatever reason, bios update aren't available through the normal Windows Update mechanism.

Lenovo IdeaPad 3, core i5 11th Generation, 15-inch, 4GB, 1TB specs:

There are just a few other points to mention. The Lenovo IdeaPad 3’s speakers are, you may gave guessed, pretty poor. They have the thin, bass-free sound typical of your average budget laptop. The Lenovo IdeaPad 3 is not a great laptop for movie-watching or basic gaming. While this laptop can technically play Skyrim – more on that later – the limited colour reproduction does not remotely show that fantasy world at its best. The Lenovo IdeaPad 3 has an Intel Core-series processor, one more powerful than the typical Windows 10 S laptop. So why is Windows 10 S even here? The laptop has limited RAM and storage, and the restricted software is a heads-up of who it’s meant for. Build quality is fair, if no better than the norm. The keyboard surround will flex a little under the pressure of hard typing, if not enough to ruin the experience, and the inside of the IdeaPad 3 looks a little too much of a mish-mash.

Lenovo Ideapad 3 Core i5 10th Gen 1035G1 - (8 GB/1 TB HDD Lenovo Ideapad 3 Core i5 10th Gen 1035G1 - (8 GB/1 TB HDD

The Dell's AMD Athlon Silver is the lightest-hitting processor in the group. The Lenovo outran that system but was far from impressive—it took 36 minutes to process the Handbrake video clip, when most midrange laptops take around 15 minutes and the fastest need only seven or eight. This laptop uses a standard cylindrical plug to charge, which is obvious when you remember there aren’t even any USB-Cs here. A charge takes around two hours, and it goes from flat to 30% in 30 minutes. Should you buy the Lenovo IdeaPad 3? It runs Windows 10 S, which means you’re restricted to Windows Store apps unless you switch it to full Windows 10. You can do this for free in a matter of seconds, although will see some performance compromises. PCMark 10 and 8 are holistic performance suites developed by the PC benchmark specialists at UL. The PCMark 10 test we run simulates different real-world productivity and content-creation workflows. We use it to assess overall system performance for office-centric tasks such as word processing, spreadsheet work, web browsing, and videoconferencing. PCMark 8, meanwhile, has a storage subtest that we use to assess the speed of the system's boot drive. Both yield a proprietary numeric score; higher numbers are better. (See more about how we test laptops.) measures relative graphics muscle by rendering sequences of highly detailed, gaming-style 3D graphics that emphasize particles and lighting. We run two different 3DMark subtests, Sky Diver and Fire Strike. Both are DirectX 11 benchmarks, but Sky Diver is more suited to laptops and midrange PCs, while Fire Strike is more demanding and lets high-end PCs and gaming rigs strut their stuff.

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We also run a custom Adobe Photoshop image-editing benchmark. Using an early 2018 release of the Creative Cloud version of Photoshop, we apply a series of 10 complex filters and effects to a standard JPEG test image. We time each operation and add up the total (lower times are better). The Photoshop test stresses the CPU, storage subsystem, and RAM, but it can also take advantage of most GPUs to speed up the process of applying filters. TN screens almost always offer dramatically worse image quality than an IPS LCD, the type used by almost all pricier laptops and the majority of phones and tables. The Lenovo IdeaPad 3’s colour saturation is very weak, contrast is low and the effects of the panel’s contrast shift are obvious. It's fair to say that the Lenovo IdeaPad 3 looks like what it is: a budget laptop. But at the same time it's a well-built portable computer, which at 1.6 kilograms (that's 3.5 lbs) isn't at all difficult to lug around the office or the house. Unless you need something really compact or a lot of screen real estate, this laptop hits the sweet spot between giving you lots of display to look at without sacrificing too much in the way of mobility. Despite the low price, we'd expect it to last you a good few years. There is a setting in the bios to make them function keys work normally (out of the box you need to press FN-F1 to get F1, etc. Otherwise you get the multimedia shortcut (volume mute in this example). I'm replacing a heavy, 9yr-old, flakey 17" HP, 900p. So I'm thrilled with how much lighter, cooler, and quieter this Lenovo is.

Lenovo IdeaPad 3 Laptop - 15.6in FHD, Intel Core i5 - Very

The Lenovo IdeaPad 3’s matte finish means it can actually be used outdoors on a sunny day reasonably comfortably. Watching a cached Netflix movie won’t be much fun, but text editing look OK, thanks to the very high contrast involved. Yes, it’ll look dim, but you can make the text out. Core i5 11th generation processor: When it comes to doing day to day tasks like browsing, video conferencing, this mid-range processor (1135G7) does not disappoint. How about Photoshop? It will run OK for the basics, but 4GB RAM is not enough if you want to start working on big layered images. Photoshop is a RAM hog, and when it runs out you will start to see significant slow-down and potentially some crashes. The screen is comfortably the worst part of the Lenovo IdeaPad 3. I don’t expect a particularly high-quality screen at the price, but twisted nematic panels are hard to stomach in 2020. An IPS display, even a bad one, would make this a much better laptop for video and gaming. According to PC Mark 10’s battery tests, it lasts for five hours and 28 minutes of basic office productivity work. Using it to write a document outdoors, which all but mandates maximum display brightness, and it lasts around six hours. That may seem impressive until you remember the screen itself is pretty dim.This line-up had me wondering why the IdeaPad 3 comes with Windows 10 S instead of full Windows. A Core i3-1005G1 is much more powerful than the kind of Intel Pentium Gold processor that usually gets the cut-down OS. As ever, there’s nothing wrong with a Core i3. The Lenovo IdeaPad 3 keyboard also suggest this laptop is meant more for work than play. While there’s a certain hollow sound to key presses ringing through the plastic shell, if you type hard, this is actually a lovely keyboard for long-form typing. You don’t get a graphics card, just the integrated graphics that is part of the Core i3 processor. There was little point in subjecting the Lenovo IdeaPad 3 to our usual gaming tests, but I did try out Skyrim to see if it would run. Battery:These systems do not support batteries that are not genuine Lenovo-made or authorized. Systems will continue to boot, but may not charge unauthorized batteries. Attention: Lenovo has no responsibility for the performance or safety of unauthorized batteries, and provides no warranties for failures or damage arising out of their use. Battery life (and recharge times) will vary based on many factors, including system settings and usage. Mine has Windows 11 Home in it in S-Mode. In the box are instructions to get it into normal Windows mode.