Lenovo Ideapad Y500 · DIGIT-ARC

I got my laptop from Flipkart @ 64.5k . I’ve been using it since then.
Facebook discussion page for Y500 users in India
So let me start my short review……….
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Specifications
• 3rd gen Intel Core i7 3632QM(2.2GHz, turbo to 3.2GHz)
• 8GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM
• 1TB 5400RPM HDD
• 2GB GDDR5 NVIDIA GT650M
• 15.6” FullHD Display
• DVD Drive
• JBL speakers without subwoofer
• 2xUSB 3.0 ports & 1xUSB 2.0 (always on)
• Ultrabay

First Impression
The laptop looks great. When you turn it on, the red backlit keyboard is a real head turner. The top of the laptop has a good finish (prone to fingerprints though).
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The speaker grills also looks great (lighting would have made it “wow”)
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Touchpad has sufficient area considering the embedded left & right click (i.e the touch pad works even above click area)
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Bottom side of laptop has ambient cooling vents.
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Build Quality
The laptop’s build quality is great, no doubt about that. It’s rigid everywhere except the region around ultrabay, which bends a little if you pick the laptop up with two hands.

Keyboard
The keyboard is pretty comfortable for typing. It has bigger arrow keys too, not like many other laptops. The “SHIFT” & “Numpad 0” keys have been halved.

Touchpad
Touchpad was of ELAN but got it replaced with Synaptics after waiting for 2 weeks after the complaint was registered. Now no issues with it.

Display
Display is good. The colour levels & brightness are good & sufficient.

Speakers
Speakers have great sound & appreciable bass effects even without sub woofer(not as great as JBL in Samsung Series 5 but better than HP Beats audio with subwoofer)

Temperature
Highest temp achieved by my laptop:
CPU- 83 C
GPU- 78 C
Room temp. : 38 C
I was playing Ghost Recon Future Solider for 2 hours continuously

Battery Life
It doesn’t have NVIDIA Optimus, but remember that battery life is not pathetic.
Under light usage:4hrs approx.(document editing, using light apps & in flight mode)

In moderate usage:Battery Saving Mode-3hrs approx.. (Net surfing via WiFi, listening to music, watching FHD videos, etc)
(Once I watched a 2 hr movie with 50% brightness in battery saving mode. Battery was down from 100% to 38%)
High Performance Mode- 2hrs 15min (Net surfing via ethernet, watching videos, brightness 40%,flight mode off)

Under heavy load(like gaming), expected battery life is around 1hr 30min to 1hr 45 min.

Benchmarks
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3DMARK11 Basic Edition Results Here
Max. temp. 74 C till now......

Known Issues & Its Solutions

Touch Pad : Touchpad issues are faced by those laptops having ELAN touchpad only !! If unfortunately you got an ELAN touchpad then request Lenovo for a Synaptics touchpad.
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Keyboard : While typing if you have got something like this "ja1ds5kl;\" & touchpad getting hanged for few seconds or "q9ew-ruio" being entered while you type or getting ' while pressing numpad 6 or CAPSLOCK get's ON with find option is selected (Ctrl+f) and finding "8TY][" in there in Chrome, then just Turn Off "Always ON USB" from BIOS & get your ELAN touchpad replaced with Synaptics one(Ya, that one is also caused due to ELAN)(My keyboard was replaced by Lenovo but still problem exists )

Awesome laptop. Congrats!! :razz:

you forgot to mention the price....
and the laptop looks solid ..congrats

congrats, happy gaming

This thing looks Awesome!
dat lappy, me want

waiting for benchs!

N

Is it antiglare display

nandu26 said:
Is it antiglare display

No, it is glossy.

Congrates brother!!!

Price?? Benchmarks??

My laptop went to service centre for solving touch pad and keyboard issues. ....... I will get it back in 3-4 days....

H

Hi

Can you post your windows experience index scores ?

Thanks

Nice review.
Waiting for more game tests and benchmarks too.

Gtb93 said:
Nice review.
Waiting for more game tests and benchmarks too.

What benchmarks do you want? PCMark refuses to install. I don't know about any software for game tests.....

No specific 'benchmark' required.
I just wanted to know how games run and on what setting, so whenever you play your collection of games, you could take a screenshot of the settings screen, with the highest config your laptop can handle.

Gtb93 said:
No specific 'benchmark' required.
I just wanted to know how games run and on what setting, so whenever you play your collection of games, you could take a screenshot of the settings screen, with the highest config your laptop can handle.

OK...

Have you installed any of the current games ? 1 1/2 hours gaming time is really good.

Also, as Gtb93 mentioned, please post which games you played at what resolutio and what frame rates you're getting ( use FRAPS )

Excellent gaming laptop....which games do u play on it?
and what is the GPU?

Nice short review.
Question : Keyboard back-light customizable?

anupam_pb said:
Call of Duty Black Ops 2 runs fine in medium to high settings in 720p resolution. No heating issue like in Samsung Series 5(I played continuously for 1 hr)

Haha!
You are outdated

No offence!

Epic laptop man, if I didn't have a gaming rig, this would surely be my gaming fix

anupam_pb said:
Call of Duty Black Ops 2 runs fine in medium to high settings in 720p resolution. No heating issue like in Samsung Series 5(I played continuously for 1 hr)

Sorry to burst your bubble, but S03 doesn't heat up, who said it does?

A gift for you, After playing Far Cry 3 for an hour and a half on Ultra on S03, no cooling pad used, just table :

btw, it looks very bulky.

P.S. That backlit keyboard is the only advantage you got over Series 5.

^ here we go ! LOL!

KyleSforza said:
Sorry to burst your bubble, but S03 doesn't heat up, who said it does?

A gift for you, After playing Far Cry 3 for an hour and a half on Ultra on S03, no cooling pad used, just table :
View attachment 9084

btw, it looks very bulky.

P.S. That backlit keyboard is the only advantage you got over Series 5.

You mean N550?

tkin said:
You mean N550?

Samsung Np550p5c-S03in

What Pratyush said ^^

Zangetsu said:
Excellent gaming laptop

and what is the GPU?

*www.bayernzone.com/images/smilies/meme/Suspicious.png

KyleSforza said:
Sorry to burst your bubble, but S03 doesn't heat up, who said it does?

A gift for you, After playing Far Cry 3 for an hour and a half on Ultra on S03, no cooling pad used, just table :
View attachment 9084

btw, it looks very bulky.

P.S. That backlit keyboard is the only advantage you got over Series 5.

pratyush997 said:
Haha!
You are outdated
No offence!

One of my friend has Samsung NP550P5c S02IN & another one has S03IN. I'm just comparing the heating levels of my laptop with those two.

Temperature of S02IN>S03IN>Y500 after playing for few hours... Thats it !!
B.T.W my screen gives better colours n other things compared to Series 5, overall pictures n videos looks better in my laptop than Series 5.

OK guys leave comparing Y500 & Series 5, Y500 costs more than Samsung, so it has to be better.....

d6bmg said:
Nice short review.
Question : Keyboard back-light customizable?

There are 3 lighting options: off, on but dim lights & on with bright lights. Only red colour....

lmao It 'has to be' better just because its more expensive? :-D

Nice logic, but doesn't feel like a proper one.

Screen gives better colors and 'other' things? what?

Its not expensive by far anyways, just 1-2 k difference.

There's also a huge difference between 'has to be better' and 'being better'

Where's the FPS in benchmarks? o.0

Come on man, we're gonna compare the two anyway, Since Lenovo Y500 has only one competitor in market, and that's Series 5. Only that Y500 is bulkier and looks less professional.

Or maybe its not

Since S03 performs better -

*img195.imageshack.us/img195/2673/ashampoosnap2013022214h.png

anupam_pb said:
One of my friend has Samsung NP550P5c S02IN & another one has S03IN. I'm just comparing the heating levels of my laptop with those two.

Temperature of S02IN>S03IN>Y500 after playing for few hours... Thats it !!
B.T.W my screen gives better colours n other things compared to Series 5, overall pictures n videos looks better in my laptop than Series 5.

OK guys leave comparing Y500 & Series 5, Y500 costs more than Samsung, so it has to be better.....

There are 3 lighting options: off, on but dim lights & on with bright lights. Only red colour....

So Vertu makes better smartphones than other right?
Fvck Logic

pratyush997 said:
So Vertu makes better smartphones than other right?
Fvck Logic

himanshuchopra said:
Hi

Can you post your windows experience index scores ?

Thanks

Remove all pics in quote

Le colors :

Y500
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S03
*img5.imageshack.us/img5/2786/nfs132013022215231553.jpg

Temps , Lenovo Y500 after 45 mins :
*www.thinkdigit.com/forum/attachments/reviews/9093d1361511552-lenovo-ideapad-y500-hwmonitor.jpg

S03, after 2 hours :
*img20.imageshack.us/img20/2415/ashampoosnap2013022215h.png

This confusion needs to end asap.

The samsung is a jolly good laptop, but the previous series had serious heating issues which samsung never solved completely(for those who claimed service), also severe thermal throttling of the GPU, the newer series is ok as most people claim, but we don't recommend it and even if we do we warn others that there has been such incidents in the past but now everything seems to be ok, and ask buyers to make their judgement, and they usually avoid samsung, once a reputation is lost its very hard to get back.

This is why I generally remain skeptical about Ideapads after sale service and hardware quality.

@kylesforza dude, those are screenshots, what does that have to do with colors? :rofl:

rider said:
This is why I generally remain skeptical about Ideapads after sale service and hardware quality.

Just like when lenovo replaced the touchpad in days, or when samsung never did anything to fix the heating issue with earlier N550 laptops even after repeated service calls

And if I talk about service of ideapdads 2-3 years ago. It was cruelly pathetic. There was no onsite with accidental cover like now and to describe response of cc and engineers I have no words to define. One of my friend cheated by company.

rider said:
And if I talk about service of ideapdads 2-3 years ago. It was cruelly pathetic. There was no onsite with accidental cover like now and to describe response of cc and engineers I have no words to define. One of my friend cheated by company.

Just like how Sony used be in Ericsson days, so by your logic Sony is also a bad company, my father got screwed by Ericsson service, so for that I'll never buy sony? And I don't blame samsung service either, I just pointed to you the fallacy of your statement, I only said that N550 used to have heating issues earlier, and hence people tend to avoid it.

It was not fallacy, I know the service is now fine. I'm agree with you that once a reputation is lost its very hard to get back in Indian market.

rider said:
It was not fallacy, I know the service is now fine. I'm agree with you that once a reputation is lost its very hard to get back in Indian market.

This is something I hope bites micromax someday

tkin said:
@kylesforza dude, those are screenshots, what does that have to do with colors?

Just like when lenovo replaced the touchpad in days, or when samsung never did anything to fix the heating issue with earlier N550 laptops even after repeated service calls

Just quality comparison between the two.

Same game, same car, same place.

And yes, the confusion does need to end. Even S02 doesn't heat up anymore. Even though it used to.

S03 - That one never had any heating/throttling issues.

So why target S03 as well when its quality is simply par the Lenovo Y500?

tkin said:
This is something I hope bites micromax someday

I don't have any idea of micromax phones. I never ever touched.

KyleSforza said:
Just quality comparison between the two. Same game, same car, same place.

And yes, the confusion does need to end. Even S02 doesn't heat up anymore. Even though it used to.

S03 - That one never had any heating/throttling issues.

So why target S03 as well when its quality is simply par the Lenovo Y500?

This.
Agreed

And about all those colors, 'better display' talk, I have a question to ask, just out of confusion.

Why's the text breaking and is sometimes unreadable in your screenshots? :blink:

pratyush997 said:
This.
Agreed

Heyy pratush! How many days left for your Pantech burst?

rider said:
Heyy pratyush! How many days left for your Pantech burst?

2 weeks more

KyleSforza said:
And about all those colors, 'better display' talk, I have a question to ask, just out of confusion.

Why's the text breaking and is sometimes unreadable in your screenshots?

Its a phenomenon known as Jpeg compression.

G

KyleSforza said:
Sorry to burst your bubble, but S03 doesn't heat up, who said it does?

A gift for you, After playing Far Cry 3 for an hour and a half on Ultra on S03, no cooling pad used, just table :
View attachment 9084

btw, it looks very bulky.

P.S. That backlit keyboard is the only advantage you got over Series 5.

sorry to burst one more bubble...

only backlit keyboard is not the advantage over samsung series 5..
it has FHD screen
GDDR5 graphics where as ddr3 graphics in samsung series 5(20% speed in difference)
and it has advanced better cooling system no heating issues at all....
no keyboard flex...

KyleSforza said:
Just quality comparison between the two. Same game, same car, same place.

And yes, the confusion does need to end. Even S02 doesn't heat up anymore. Even though it used to.

S03 - That one never had any heating/throttling issues.

So why target S03 as well when its quality is simply par the Lenovo Y500?

I have used S02 & S03. Yesterday I was comparing Y500 & S03 with few friends. We all concluded that Y500's screen is better in colour reproduction, etc(both laptops at 100% brightness). Whereas we just compared heat given out my laptop's exhaust

by our hands, and S03's exhaust felt hotter........Thats it !!!

As far as support is concerned, my friend's S03's one 4GB RAM got corrupted. Service centre took that and RAM and told that it will take really long time for replacement(approx 1 month) :shock:

S

@gnam2 it has got disadvantages too like
1-no subwoofer
2-battery life sucks since no optimus
3-colour reproduction is good since its glossy and Samsung got matte screen
4-1600*900>fhd for gaming,better fps

regarding that ram corrupt issue,such kind of defects are possible in all brand laptop.
regarding service-even company replaced mobo of some users in 10-15days and even several got replacement and refund.
please stop complaining about throttling in series 5 since it had been solved several months before and s03/so4/s05 don't have throttling at all

saurabhraipur19 said:
@gnam2 it has got disadvantages too like
1-no subwoofer
2-battery life sucks since no optimus
3-colour reproduction is good since its glossy and Samsung got matte screen
4-1600*900>fhd for gaming,better fps

regarding that ram corrupt issue,such kind of defects are possible in all brand laptop.
regarding service-even company replaced mobo of some users in 10-15days and even several got replacement and refund.
please stop complaining about throttling in series 5 since it had been solved several months before and s03/so4/s05 don't have throttling at all

Battery life isn't pathetic. 60% charge to 10% takes more than 2 hours if not gaming.

gnan10 said:
sorry to burst one more bubble...
only backlit keyboard is not the advantage over samsung series 5..
it has FHD screen
GDDR5 graphics where as ddr3 graphics in samsung series 5(20% speed in difference)
and it has advanced better cooling system no heating issues at all....
no keyboard flex...

FHD screen on a 15.6'' display, yeah right, proves why his screenshots are smaller and less clearer. What's the use of FHD when you're barely gonna use it?

I do agree, GDDR5 should be better, but I haven't seen that so far, nothing in this review proved that.

I never had any heating issues either.

and What's a keyboard flex? lol

I have used S02 & S03. Yesterday I was comparing Y500 & S03 with few friends. We all concluded that Y500's screen is better in colour reproduction, etc(both laptops at 100% brightness). Whereas we just compared heat given out my laptop's exhaust by our hands, and S03's exhaust felt hotter........Thats it !!!

As far as support is concerned, my friend's S03's one 4GB RAM got corrupted. Service centre took that and RAM and told that it will take really long time for replacement(approx 1 month)

Series 5 comes with color adjustments in 'settings' panel, try that. I'm using Movie(bright) scheme.

and no that's not it, cause I just proved with screenshots that S03 is giving less heat, with more time of gameplay, and no cooling pad.

You gotta come up with better facts, or stop giving Series 5 a bad name just so your bulky laptop can gain some extra sales. :wink:

P.S. Dude, My S03's battery lasts 7 hours when not gaming, and easily 4 hours when gaming, I mostly game on battery! Probably that's why I don't have any heating issues.

The highest I ever reached was 84C, in GTA IV.

Also Saurabh forgot to mention that Y500 also has a slower processor.

KyleSforza said:
FHD screen on a 15.6'' display, yeah right, proves why his screenshots are smaller and less clearer. What's the use of FHD when you're barely gonna use it?

I do agree, GDDR5 should be better, but I haven't seen that so far, nothing in this review proved that.

I never had any heating issues either.

and What's a keyboard flex? lol

Series 5 comes with color adjustments in 'settings' panel, try that. I'm using Movie(bright) scheme.

and no that's not it, cause I just proved with screenshots that S03 is giving less heat, with more time of gameplay, and no cooling pad.

You gotta come up with better facts, or stop giving Series 5 a bad name just so your bulky laptop can gain some extra sales.

P.S. Dude, My S03's battery lasts 7 hours when not gaming, and easily 4 hours when gaming, I mostly game on battery! Probably that's why I don't have any heating issues. The highest I ever reached was 84C, in GTA IV.

Also Saurabh forgot to mention that Y500 also has a slower processor.

The same reason people would buy a 5" phone having 720p display, or even 1080P.

S

let me clear everybody misconception of ddr5>>dr3
yes ddr5 is 20% better than its ddr3 counterparts but but not in case of NVidia GeForce gt650m
ddr5 version of gt650m has normal clock of 735mhz and turboboost of 850mhz
ddr3 version of gt650m has normal clock of 835mhz and turboboost of 950mhz
due to the additional 100mhz and comparing several benchmarks I am pretty sure that ddr5 of gt650m is JUST 3-4% better than its ddr3.

anupam_pb said:
Battery life isn't pathetic. 60% charge to 10% takes more than 2 hours if not gaming.

IMHO we are getting above 3hrs in 60% to 10% when not gaming so u can guess additional 1hr battery per cycle charge with same capacity battery.
even lenevo y580 has much better battery than y500 and both have the same capacity battery

tkin said:
The same reason people would buy a 5" phone having 720p display, or even 1080P.

Comparing a phone display to a laptop display

*i1.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/000/554/facepalm.jpg

Here's the thing, from my personal experience.

My old laptop had a 1366X728 display, this one has HD+ and man, the first time I turned it on, I was like, everything looks so small

It took me around two days to get accustomed to it.

Its very different in phone, I have used phones with different displays, never experienced anything of that sort. With resolution, they also increase the icons/text size to suit the display.

Its not like that in laptops.

KyleSforza said:
Comparing a phone display to a laptop display

*i1.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/000/554/facepalm.jpg

Here's the thing, from my personal experience.

My old laptop had a 1366X728 display, this one has HD+ and man, the first time I turned it on, I was like, everything looks so small It took me around two days to get accustomed to it.

Its very different in phone, I have used phones with different displays, never experienced anything of that sort. With resolution, they also increase the icons/text size to suit the display.

Its not like that in laptops.

Ever thought about scaling the DPI? Or maybe pressing control and scrolling the wheel to adjust icon size?
Make the text on your screen larger or smaller

Next time, hold a minute before you start using facepalm pics, because its ridiculous how you are fighting the Y500 over tooth and nails for the last few pages, posting stuff like, GDDR5, no matter, FHD, can't read, keyboard flex, impossibru.

And yes, even on a 15" screen FHD will give you better sharpness, the Samsung is a fantastic laptop, no doubt about it, but in past they had heating issues and once you lose your reputation its near impossible to get back, that's all.

R

No doubt Y500 is good but Samsung series 5 is in demand there4 Samsung is launching new models also heating is not much der in S02, ddr3 has higher clocks so ddr5 doesn't make much difference, the ultrabay feature is useless in y500.As fr nw I'm getting max temps 84 after 2.5 hours of online AC3 gameplay.... :-D

KyleSforza said:
FHD screen on a 15.6'' display, yeah right, proves why his screenshots are smaller and less clearer. What's the use of FHD when you're barely gonna use it?

I do agree, GDDR5 should be better, but I haven't seen that so far, nothing in this review proved that.

I never had any heating issues either.

and What's a keyboard flex? lol

Series 5 comes with color adjustments in 'settings' panel, try that. I'm using Movie(bright) scheme.

and no that's not it, cause I just proved with screenshots that S03 is giving less heat, with more time of gameplay, and no cooling pad.

You gotta come up with better facts, or stop giving Series 5 a bad name just so your bulky laptop can gain some extra sales.

P.S. Dude, My S03's battery lasts 7 hours when not gaming, and easily 4 hours when gaming, I mostly game on battery! Probably that's why I don't have any heating issues. The highest I ever reached was 84C, in GTA IV.

Also Saurabh forgot to mention that Y500 also has a slower processor.

I'm not trying to give Series 5 a bad name. I was going to buy S03IN, but because Flipkart offered Y500 @64.5k(within my budget, at current price I wouldn't have bought this one) with 2yr warranty+ADP, I just bought Y500. I know that the touchpad issue would be fixed as its Lenovo.... But still everyone would agree that Y500 is better than S03IN after seeing both. S05IN is a great laptop for 60k, Y500 is overpriced for 67k.

Performance of both lappies are approx. same but Y500 looks great. Just don't see the dimensions on paper & weight. I know that on paper Series 5 is smaller & lighter but in real life difference is not much. Though Y500 is bigger than S03 but it still doesn't annoy its owner in looks dept.

As far as battery is concerned, ya its backup is a hour or maybe two less than S03(when not gaming), but still its great. And....S03 doesn't even last 3 hrs under heavy gaming, I think no laptop can last that long that much power under the hood !!!

Another pic uploaded directly ....

tkin said:
Ever thought about scaling the DPI? Or maybe pressing control and scrolling the wheel to adjust icon size?
Make the text on your screen larger or smaller

Next time, hold a minute before you start using facepalm pics, because its ridiculous how you are fighting the Y500 over tooth and nails for the last few pages, posting stuff like, GDDR5, no matter, FHD, can't read, keyboard flex, impossibru.

And yes, even on a 15" screen FHD will give you better sharpness, the Samsung is a fantastic laptop, no doubt about it, but in past they had heating issues and once you lose your reputation its near impossible to get back, that's all.

Ok, According to your logic, Nokia used to be the best phone company in the past, so its still better than Samsung, HTC, Sony, Apple etc.?

P.S. I'm not fighting over how S03 is better, I know that on paper at least, Y500 looks better. But I'm trying to tell the OP to post some benchs which prove the difference. Not the same **** we already know about.

or I must say one thing, which we all can agree to, Y500 is for noobs, and if you are a advanced user, you should get Series 5.

And again Anupam, I'm not saying Y500 is inferior to Series 5, even though it has only a fraction of owners compared to the Series 5, but come on man, if you're saying its better , you gotta show where is it better? In what thing?

and oh the colors in that game, still look faded out.

KyleSforza said:
Ok, According to your logic, Nokia used to be the best phone company in the past, so its still better than Samsung, HTC, Sony, Apple etc.?

P.S. I'm not fighting over how S03 is better, I know that on paper at least, Y500 looks better. But I'm trying to tell the OP to post some benchs which prove the difference. Not the same **** we already know about.

or I must say one thing, which we all can agree to, Y500 is for noobs, and if you are a advanced user, you should get Series 5.

And again Anupam, I'm not saying Y500 is inferior to Series 5, even though it has only a fraction of owners compared to the Series 5, but come on man, if you're saying its better , you gotta show where is it better? In what thing?

and oh the colors in that game, still look faded out.

You are so funny

*www.cavemancircus.com/wp-content/uploads/images/2012/februrary/i_dont_want_to_live_on_this_planet_anymore/i_dont_want_to_live_on_this_planet_anymore_20.jpg

rider said:
*www.cavemancircus.com/wp-content/uploads/images/2012/februrary/i_dont_want_to_live_on_this_planet_anymore/i_dont_want_to_live_on_this_planet_anymore_20.jpg

Join the line buddy

A

KyleSforza said:
Ok, According to your logic, Nokia used to be the best phone company in the past, so its still better than Samsung, HTC, Sony, Apple etc.?

P.S. I'm not fighting over how S03 is better, I know that on paper at least, Y500 looks better. But I'm trying to tell the OP to post some benchs which prove the difference. Not the same **** we already know about.

or I must say one thing, which we all can agree to, Y500 is for noobs, and if you are a advanced user, you should get Series 5.

And again Anupam, I'm not saying Y500 is inferior to Series 5, even though it has only a fraction of owners compared to the Series 5, but come on man, if you're saying its better , you gotta show where is it better? In what thing?

and oh the colors in that game, still look faded out.

You seem to be so desperate to defend your purchase..and y is that y500 is for noobs and series 5 is for advanced users??
look at the temps dude y500 is much better(and fyi i own a series 5) and you're temps are pure bullshit it pretty much shows u started monitoring after u stopped playing(by comparing max min and current temps)
plus that is a screen shot not a photo so the quality of the pic u see depends on the display u use...since ours is matte display colours aren't great.
don't make a fool out of yourself trying so desperately to defend your purchase by showing fake temps...just accept that y500 is better than series 5...but of course it is costlier

Calm down, boys!! Accept the truth Y500 is a better laptop for today. S03 is also great but it was of its time. My laptop dv6 (HD 6770M 2GB DDR5) was use to the best at thing range and then dell inspiron turbo(HD 7730 2GB DDR3), series 5 (GT 650M 2GB DDR3) and now Y500 (GT 650M 2GB DDR5) succeeded. This is the world of tech where nothing is best forever. Be satisfy what you have. Keep Calm and Game On.

KyleSforza said:
or I must say one thing, which we all can agree to, Y500 is for noobs, and if you are a advanced user, you should get Series 5.

STOP this fanboism.

You have Samsung S03 and OP have Y500. Both are good in their own way and both of you have specific reasons for buying any of them.
Both of you should be happy with respective laptops that you guys own.

This is review thread, not a 'what's better than what' thread.

Last but not plase please don't start flaming all over again.

KyleSforza said:
and oh the colors in that game, still look faded out.

If you judge colors by game screen shot then I've got no words.

saurabhraipur19 said:
4-1600*900>fhd for gaming,better fps

Buddy, more fps due to lower resolution doesn't makes it any better. What looks better, that matters; and if low fps is gained due to it, then be it.

KyleSforza said:
Le colors :

Y500
*fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/179291_608031659214350_1282144861_n.jpg

S03
*img5.imageshack.us/img5/2786/nfs132013022215231553.jpg

Temps , Lenovo Y500 after 45 mins :
*www.thinkdigit.com/forum/attachments/reviews/9093d1361511552-lenovo-ideapad-y500-hwmonitor.jpg

S03, after 2 hours :
*img20.imageshack.us/img20/2415/ashampoosnap2013022215h.png

That's because samsung monitor is better than lg monitor and about temps quad core should heat up more.. and since both are gaming category laptops it all depends on the processor being used. If the power watt of the processor is more or when turbo boost is enabled definitely temps will rise up. May be the game in y500 ran at full hd and turbo boost turned on while samsung is at hd+ .

^ FYI GT 650m is weak for gaming on FHD
and remove all pics you just quoted :-x

pratyush997 said:
^ FYI GT 650m is weak for gaming on FHD
and remove all pics you just quoted

Yeah, but the thing is, since its a 15" monitor you could just play the most demanding games at 1600x900, you won't feel a thing, just like how I play at 720p at my 768p screen, a high res screen is always welcome.

tkin said:
Yeah, but the thing is, since its a 15" monitor you could just play the most demanding games at 1600x900, you won't feel a thing, just like how I play at 720p at my 768p screen, a high res screen is always welcome.

Yeah FHD is clear winner anyday but gaming FHD is kinda not cool

pratyush997 said:
Yeah FHD is clear winner anyday but gaming FHD is kinda not cool

Unless you have this: Village Instruments : ViDock

^^ haha I see what you did there

It comes for a price

Currently I'm playing Crysis 3 with medium settings in FHD resolution......

anupam_pb said:
Currently I'm playing Crysis 3 with medium settings in FHD resolution......

Y500 has quad core hyper threaded processor which is about 15-20% slower than 2600k and a GT650m, its the least you could do

tkin said:
Unless you have this: Village Instruments : ViDock

Cool....

tkin said:
Y500 has quad core hyper threaded processor which is about 15-20% slower than 2600k and a GT650m, its the least you could do

Overall I'm happy with my purchase & I'm not targeting Samsung Series 5, trying to spoil its image(It's a good laptop too)

P

dude its been a month. when will be your touchpad be repaired. And after that do post some good benchmarks

You should grill these lenovo center guys to repair your laptop or they'll delay

avj said:
You seem to be so desperate to defend your purchase..and y is that y500 is for noobs and series 5 is for advanced users??
look at the temps dude y500 is much better(and fyi i own a series 5) and you're temps are pure bullshit it pretty much shows u started monitoring after u stopped playing(by comparing max min and current temps)
plus that is a screen shot not a photo so the quality of the pic u see depends on the display u use...since ours is matte display colours aren't great.
don't make a fool out of yourself trying so desperately to defend your purchase by showing fake temps...just accept that y500 is better than series 5...but of course it is costlier

Feel free to get on Teamviewer to check my temps yourself.

and again, I never said Y500 is inferior(for those who don't understand the word, it means its no less) than Series 5. All I'm saying is the owner should atleast prove its better. Show us what's better about it.

Compare his screenshots with mine, mine looks clearer, on any display.

pankaj_bhardwaj135 said:
dude its been a month. when will be your touchpad be repaired. And after that do post some good benchmarks

You should grill these lenovo center guys to repair your laptop or they'll delay

Actually they told me to restore my system to initial state using OneKey recovery. Today I was going to do that(just to tell them that its not software problem) but I found that in that process my hard disk will be fully formatted & repartioned. Thats why I didn't do it. Now my next move will be sending an email to Lenovo support India & not calling the local guys.

KyleSforza said:
Feel free to get on Teamviewer to check my temps yourself.

and again, I never said Y500 is inferior(for those who don't understand the word, it means its no less) than Series 5. All I'm saying is the owner should atleast prove its better. Show us what's better about it.

Compare his screenshots with mine, mine looks clearer, on any display.

There we go again, just install 3DMARK11 Basic Edition & run it. Post the results after its finished.
I hope you will not start comparing our phones.........

P

lenovo has done nothing in US and wont do anything in India.
synaptics is all rumour ( tried to find something but got nothing on Google. Just promises by lenovo guys and god knows what)
by the way has anyone tried to install drivers manually from elan website for the laptop.?? Do check...

S

As an outsider, the only statement that people are using to accuse OP of calling Samsung Series 5 inferior (note that he didnt call it inferior) is when he said "heating issues like Samsung Series 5 laptops".

Now, people whose posts can be seen here do agree that there had been throttling/heating issues with Series 5 S02 or maybe even S03. Having said that, the discussion went into display and graphics cards and touch pads and what not!

A simple comment "Yes, the issue was there. Maybe is there too in some. But they will replace the motherboard etc." would have been enough.

As for which laptop is better, well, that is pretty subjective and benchmarks run in two different places cant prove anything. To each his own.

Just agree to disagree people.

Just my two cents.

S

My 5.5 years old 8600m GT (yeah laugh it off people) died on me last week, had to get it repaired which delayed my purchase of Y500. Cant try OCing it

Thread cleaned up.

Synthetic benchmarks like 3d Mark are also silly really. WEI on the other hand is stupid. I really hope people stop using those to compare things, even in reviews or while arguing. Unigine Heaven is an okay synthetic benchmark if you really want to compare nVidia cards.

ico said:
Thread cleaned up.

Synthetic benchmarks like 3d Mark are also silly really. WEI on the other hand is retarded. I really hope people stop using those to compare things, even in reviews or while arguing. Unigine Heaven is an okay synthetic benchmark if you really want to compare nVidia cards.

I used to think exactly opposite :shock:

btw now thread looks incomplete ;|

pratyush997 said:
I used to think exactly opposite btw now thread looks incomplete ;|

Companies can release "magic" drivers to improve/bloat scores in synthetic benchmarks while not increasing performance in games. Synthetic benchmarks never tell you the real world performance. Same is true for Unigine Heaven also. But you're likely to reproduce Heaven scores across multiple machines rather than 3d Mark. I've used my HD 6950 in a few machines. 3d Mark Vantage score has varied whereas Heaven FPS was always in line.

yea, thread looks incomplete. Only sensible posts remain.

S

Ok, so am new here. Prem Chopra, are you a mod or something?

sanemate said:
Ok, so am new here. Prem Chopra, are you a mod or something?

Mod of Mod, The Admin

Hi Anupam/all y500 owners,

Its an amazing purchase.

I just came across a picture, can someone tell more about the cooling system in this lappy and what u understand by this picture.

CHK this URL: *www.lenovo.com/shop/WW/products/splitter/notebooks/ideapad/Y-Series/gallery/IdeaPad-Y500-Laptop-PC-Closeup-Removeable-Drive-9L-940x475.jpg

Thanks for replying in advance.

^This $30

hhh said:
Hi Anupam/all y500 owners,

Its an amazing purchase.

I just came across a picture, can someone tell more about the cooling system in this lappy and what u understand by this picture.

CHK this URL: *www.lenovo.com/shop/WW/products/splitter/notebooks/ideapad/Y-Series/gallery/IdeaPad-Y500-Laptop-PC-Closeup-Removeable-Drive-9L-940x475.jpg

Thanks for replying in advance.

Cooling system is good. Max temp. achieved by my lappie is 74 C.
I think the pic shows additional fan for cooling(ultrabay stuff)

ico said:
Thread cleaned up.

Synthetic benchmarks like 3d Mark are also silly really. WEI on the other hand is retarded. I really hope people stop using those to compare things, even in reviews or while arguing. Unigine Heaven is an okay synthetic benchmark if you really want to compare nVidia cards.

Thanks for cleaning the thread.........

Did you try out any more games anupam_pb?
Also, if I'm correct your received your laptop back from cc, and still the touchpad issue looms?

Lenovo cleaned wires connecting touchpad & mobo. Touchpad working fine for last 2 days

P

is it synaptics now???

Still ELAN though..... The service centre guys are just not believing me to replace touchpad with synaptic one

Well let's hope it works fine. The repaired thing is not giving you problems right? Cause if it does, you can shout your %3$ off at the service centre dweebs.

It is giving problems sometimes but turning touchpad off for 5 sec solves the problem for about 5 min

I wouldn't accept that as a proper servicing done on their half. I suggest that you hammer them for doing the servicing with "kaam chala lo" attitude. Might get you a synaptics.

Gtb93 said:
I wouldn't accept that as a proper servicing done on their half. I suggest that you hammer them for doing the servicing with "kaam chala lo" attitude. Might get you a synaptics.

I'll call them tomorrow........

G

Great Review,

Update: Lenovo guys are asking me proof that Synaptics is the solution. .....hmm...

anupam_pb said:
Update: Lenovo guys are asking me proof that Synaptics is the solution. .....hmm...

Show them to this thread !

KyleSforza said:
Sorry to burst your bubble, but S03 doesn't heat up, who said it does?

A gift for you, After playing Far Cry 3 for an hour and a half on Ultra on S03, no cooling pad used, just table :
View attachment 9084

btw, it looks very bulky.

P.S. That backlit keyboard is the only advantage you got over Series 5.

sammy has got optimus & a subwoofer

^ Buddy don't dig up past !
We already got like 3 pages trashed

Update: Gave Lenovo guys a post, posted by Administrator at Lenovo community. They told me that they have given order for my new touchpad. :-D

S

anupam_pb said:
Update: Gave Lenovo guys a post, posted by Administrator at Lenovo community. They told me that they have given order for my new touchpad.

You mean this one *support.lenovo.com/en_US/research/hints-or-tips/detail.page?DocID=HT076627

sankar said:
You mean this one Y500 touchpad pointer drifts or jumps

Your link is just not working

Do check Y500's problems & solutions in first post !!

T

anupam_pb said:
.....but because Flipkart offered Y500 @64.5k(within my budget, at current price I wouldn't have bought this one) with 2yr warranty+ADP, I just bought Y500.....

Is the additional 1 yr offsite warranty only provided by Flipkart or would I get it even if I buy the laptop from somewhere else?

You should get the 2nd year offsite warranty + ADP from any authorised Lenovo store.......

K

Any info on the presence of the 16GB mSATA SSD and the max ram capacity? I saw that indian versions do not ship with the SSD, but some people got it. And also about the max RAM capacity, some said they got one 8GB stick, and so they had one unused slot - which means is it 16GB max?

Guys I have a confusion regarding 650M graphic chip ....

I checked graphic card comparision yesterday and found 650M wayyy below even a 100$ desktop graphic card ...are laptop graphic cards soo slow...but then how will it play games at mid-high settings??

Also I checked the reviews and it says it plays games at manageable frame rates at 1366x768 and 1600x900 and at full HD frame rates are quit bad...is it true??

sujoyp said:
Guys I have a confusion regarding 650M graphic chip ....

I checked graphic card comparision yesterday and found 650M wayyy below even a 100$ desktop graphic card ...are laptop graphic cards soo slow...but then how will it play games at mid-high settings??

Also I checked the reviews and it says it plays games at manageable frame rates at 1366x768 and 1600x900 and at full HD frame rates are quit bad...is it true??

The GT650M is just a bit better than my 2 yr old HD5670 desktop card. Laptop cards are not that powerful. Ya FPS is low for newer games at high settings with FHD resolution

kernelhunter92 said:
Any info on the presence of the 16GB mSATA SSD and the max ram capacity? I saw that indian versions do not ship with the SSD, but some people got it. And also about the max RAM capacity, some said they got one 8GB stick, and so they had one unused slot - which means is it 16GB max?

No 16GB mSATA for Indians. Max RAM capacity is 16GB. I also have 1x8GB RAM stick

Highest temp achieved by my laptop:
CPU- 83 C
GPU- 78 C

Room temp. : 38 C

I was playing Ghost Recon Future Solider for 2 hours continuously

T

anupam_pb said:
Gaming Performance
NFS Most Wanted 2012

*fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/179291_608031659214350_1282144861_n.jpg

View attachment 9093 View attachment 9091 View attachment 9092

Note: Played the game continuously for 45 minutes

FIFA 13

*fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/267847_608033872547462_1802144566_n.jpg

Note: I know that FIFA 13 is not that much demanding game. I manually turned MSAA off for better performance

Are those original copies?

theterminator said:
Are those original copies?

While uploading the pixels of the screen shot were reduced, so it's not as good as it should be.

anupam_pb said:
While uploading the pixels of the screen shot were reduced, so it's not as good as it should be.

well read many threads regarding Y500 made a lot of idea about it, I was hoping to know a few thing s about the lappy, though I am not in a hurry to buy the laptop , may be I will buy one after 4 months, should I buy this then or wait for the upgraded gpu and haswell processors, in such a type of similarly configured lappy and buy that one??

Please suggest!!!

if you are not in hurry, why not play "wait and watch game"

P

KyleSforza said:
Le colors :

Y500
*fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/179291_608031659214350_1282144861_n.jpg

S03
*img5.imageshack.us/img5/2786/nfs132013022215231553.jpg

Temps , Lenovo Y500 after 45 mins :
*www.thinkdigit.com/forum/attachments/reviews/9093d1361511552-lenovo-ideapad-y500-hwmonitor.jpg

S03, after 2 hours :
*img20.imageshack.us/img20/2415/ashampoosnap2013022215h.png

I think the scenarios in the both image is diff as in lenovo pic, no lights in game and there are lights in Samsung.

^ Buddy I request you not to bump those post

We had 3 pages trashed!

prudhivisekhar said:
I think the scenarios in the both image is diff as in lenovo pic, no lights in game and there are lights in Samsung.

Don't forget the time of the day & direction of sunlight in the game. Moreover the pic's quality was reduced during uploading.

Also don't dig up the grave as pratyush997 mentioned

H

Guys get your facts straight...the points where Y500 beats series 5's are:

Full HD 1080p Screen
2GB GT750m GDDR5 (instead of GT650 DDR3 in S03)
Ultrabay (Yeah, that's a killer feature to have)
RAM expandable upto 16GB

and the points where the S03 beats the Y500 are:
Ci7 3rd Gen 2.4-3.4 GHz (compared to the 2.2-3.2GHz in Y500)
Blu-ray drive
Subwoofer
Anti-glare Screeen

Now, people are to decide what'll do better for them. I'd personally go with Y500, since I'd get an option to setup SLi via Ultrabay.

HeRock said:
Guys get your facts straight...the points where Y500 beats series 5's are:

Full HD 1080p Screen
2GB GT750m GDDR5 (instead of GT650 DDR3 in S03)
Ultrabay (Yeah, that's a killer feature to have)
RAM expandable upto 16GB

and the points where the S03 beats the Y500 are:
Ci7 3rd Gen 2.4-3.4 GHz (compared to the 2.2-3.2GHz in Y500)
Blu-ray drive
Subwoofer
Anti-glare Screeen

Now, people are to decide what'll do better for them. I'd personally go with Y500, since I'd get an option to setup SLi via Ultrabay.

S05/3 is upgradable to 16Gb too but it has 2x4GB whereas y500 has 1x8Gb.
Also y500 has a backlit keyboard and mSata slot which i don't think s series has (?)

I bought Y500 bcoz of following:
- Black colour
- Red colour backlit keyboard
- 1080p display
- 2 yrs with ADP

Earlier I was planning to get Samsung but when I first saw this in FK, I just ordered it before it got Out of Stock

rohanz said:
S05/3 is upgradable to 16Gb too but it has 2x4GB whereas y500 has 1x8Gb.
Also y500 has a backlit keyboard and mSata slot which i don't think s series has (?)

128GB mSATA SSD costs 12k in ebay.in but its a nice upgrade......I'll consider this upgrade after 1-2 years

anupam_pb said:
I bought Y500 bcoz of following:
- Black colour
- Red colour backlit keyboard
- 1080p display
- 2 yrs with ADP

Earlier I was planning to get Samsung but when I first saw this in FK, I just ordered it before it got Out of Stock

128GB mSATA SSD costs 12k in ebay.in but its a nice upgrade......I'll consider this upgrade after 1-2 years

I was considering Samsung too. But finally got y500.
Let's hope by then they get cheaper. Are there any 7200 hard disks for the msata slot available in India?

No.....I think. I only saw mSATA SSDs.

G

Great review man

S

finally got laptop from service center, the touchpad is synaptics but sometimes gesture touch stop working after restart everything's normal. Any fix for this niggle.

Ya, I've noticed that too. Sometimes my scroll stops working(rarely happens though). When that happens, i just connect my ext mouse & carry on !! :-D

Turning off the touchpad for sometime solves the issue too(use ext mouse during that time)

Moreover, I have not encountered it with Always ON USB turned off

gamefreak4770k said:
Great review man

Thanks

anupam_pb said:
Ya, I've noticed that too. Sometimes my scroll stops working(rarely happens though). When that happens, i just connect my ext mouse & carry on !!
Turning off the touchpad for sometime solves the issue too(use ext mouse during that time)

Moreover, I have not encountered it with Always ON USB turned off

Thanks

My always on USB works on standby even though it is disabled in BIOS.

No issues so I will ignore it.