Lenovo - 330S-15IKB 15.6" Laptop - Intel Core i5 - 8GB Memory - 128GB Solid State Drive - Platinum Gray

I needed a laptop for work, and I spent weeks trying to find an affordable unit with decent specs. This model eventually went on sale below $500, so I decided to take the plunge. It's been almost one month since I made the purchase, and I couldn't be happier with my Lenovo. The i5 processor and 8 GB of RAM is sufficient for everything I've used it for so far (mostly programming and related tasks, I have not tried any gaming yet), and the 128 SSD has the OS booting up incredibly fast. I happily accept the speed-for-space tradeoff made here, and you could always get an external SSD if you require more storage. It's more than enough for my purposes. The build quality is actually pretty nice. It's lightweight, sturdy, and quiet as a mouse. The keys feel a little cheap, but honestly, typing is a breeze and feels fine. I understand that there are some choices made in the keyboard layout which other users are not too fond of, but all seems fine to me. The touchpad is quite responsive, and you have a lot of options at your disposal. I purchased a mouse with this computer, as I normally can't stand using touchpads, but this one is actually very intuitive with a few tweaks made in the settings. The screen feels a bit washed-out, but I don't notice it most of the time. It might be an issue for photo/video editing. The Midtown Charlotte location may still have it on display, so you can check it out in person. One last thing to mention is the battery life, which is superb. It seems to last for hours and hours, and you have multiple options for balancing conservation and performance. It also charges very quickly. In summary, if you are looking for a competent, budget-friendly laptop, I would highly recommend taking this Lenovo for a spin. The specs featured in this model compare with entry-level Surface Books and MacBook Pros that cost twice as much. I do not normally write product reviews online, but I am so impressed with this product that I felt compelled to do so. Happy hunting.

I was in the market for a laptop, and, even though I've been an Apple devotee for nearly 25 years, I simply couldn't justify spending a grand or more for a MacBook, so I opted for a Windows machine instead. After several weeks of shopping around, I decided on the Lenovo laptop, with 8GB of memory and a 128GB solid state drive for just $449.99, it was a steal since a comparable MacBook Air would've cost over twice as much, and I got a larger screen (15.6" versus Apple's 13.3") to boot. Set-up out of the box was a breeze, and since I use Windows 10 at work, the learning curve wasn't all that great. Even after an initial upgrade, I still had nearly 90GB of storage space free and clear, more than enough for my needs, and because it's SSD, the machine is speedy when it comes to bootup and saving files while the 8GB of memory makes multitasking a good deal easier. At a hair under four pounds, the machine is comfortable in my lap, isn't at all bulky despite the large screen and is easy to carry around, I used one of its two USB ports to plug in a dongle for a wireless mouse (never been a fan of trackpads) and it worked instantly. The keyboard has a nice solid feel, and while the screen can't touch the MacBook Retina Display, it's suitable for me. The lone negative was battery life, I only managed little under 4 hours on a full charge, a far cry from the advertised seven hours. Hardly a dealbreaker, but rather disappointing. All things considered, I can't complain about the Lenovo machine (other than battery life) which works and so far has been dependable. I'd say it's worth the investment.

I have owned this laptop for a few weeks now and I have to say that I am liking this a lot. First the good. The build quality is good with a relatively stiff plastic body and an aluminum lid. The screen bezels are also really thin. So while the screen is 15.6 inches, the overall size and weight are closer to that of a 14 inch laptop. The keyboard is great to use with nice, clicky keys, and no mushiness. It is also backlit, which is a nice surprise for the price. However, there is a number pad, meaning the majority of the keyboard is offset to the left. For me, this was annoying at first, but I got used to it. The trackpad is also fine if you turn up the sensitivity and speed on it. The best part of this laptop though is the performance. With a Core i5 processor, 8gb of RAM, and an SSD, this thing is lightning fast. I mainly use this for web browsing and with this power, I can have a ton of tabs open and Youtube videos can play in 4k without any slowdowns. I'm sure some light gaming would also work fine on this. However, there are 2 issues. First, the battery life is iffy. I average anywhere from 4 to 5 1/2 hours on a charge. This is ok, but I feel they could have put in a bigger battery. This is not a good laptop if you plan to travel a lot or need something for on the go. In addition, the screen is not too good. It's a 768p TN panel and it's as bad as you would expect. On an 11.6 inch screen, this resolution would be fine, but on a 15.6 inch, it's not good with nothing being sharp whatsoever. If you need something for video or photo editing, this is not the laptop for you. But in the end, for the price, you're getting powerful performance and a good typing experience. If you can overlook the small battery and low-end screen, then this a great laptop to buy. You're getting near $1,000 dollar performance for 1/2 the price, or less if you get an open-box model like I did.

I just bought this computer today, I will update it the overall rating in a couple of days if things turn around or stay the same. Not a lot of bloatware on here, which is nice. The SSD is quiet and quick, but it'll be that way on any SSD. It's been plugged in for a while now, and has no heat and a very quiet fan. The downside is that I've been trying to uninstall McAfee and download Google Chrome for over an hour now. McAfee is stuck at just less than halfway, and Chrome has failed to download twice already. These two tasks are taking much longer than they should, and the computer is struggling to do other things like browse the web, and load/browse other applications that are already installed. I don't know what I should expect from an i5 processor, like if this is normal, but I am disappointed in how it's turning out so far. I want more, but I'm not surprised this is how it's turning out based on the price. The internet connection is strong, and I tested out similar e tasks on a ~8year old computer that worked much better than this. I'm guessing it's just some growing pains for being right out of the box. Hardware/finish is great. keyboard is comfortable and responsive. Having a number pad is nice. The track pad is an average track pad, maybe a little too sensitive for me if anything. It's still fairly light, looks good, and is thin but feels durable. I probably wouldn't recommend this to a friend unless they were on a tighter budget. I will update the review (if possible) as I get more familiar with it and as it starts to work more.

This is a great lappy for the price. There is nothing quite like it in the price range $450-$500. Purchased for my father, the main pros are the SSD/memory and the CPU combo. 8th gen i5 and 128GB of storage and 8GB RAM. It's sturdily constructed, very thin and light compared to other 15"-ers in its class. Was able to strip the bloatware easily, unlike the other reviewer I let the McAfee uninstall finish after it paused at 50%. The SD reader will be put to use; unfortunate that you have to use a full size SD adapter that will stick out instead of a dedicated micro-SD like you can get w/ the Surface line. Only compromise to speak of is the lack of touch screen and the somewhat low resolution. Not an issue for my dad's setup as he will drive an external larger monitor with this. All in all after much researching, this was the best bang for the buck at its price point and I'm very pleased with how quick and responsive it is. Recommended.

This is one of the better budget laptops within the price range. I've checked the specs of all the other laptops (6/15/18) and this one was the better of the bunch. Thanks to AMD's competitive Ryzen processors, Intel was forced to step up their game so now this i5 is a quad-core processor. The display is essentially similar to a 720p screen which is a bit disappointing. It contains 8GB of ram so it can handle a fair amount of concurrent applications running. It also has a 128GB SSD so the computer is able to boot up as well as load applications really fast. The only downside to this is the storage size since it's a small 120GB. The operating system takes up about 30GB so you're left with around 90GB of storage to use. Processor: 4/5 Screen: 3/5 RAM: 4/5 Storage size: 3/5 Performance: 4/5

I bought an HP Pavilion 14 inch with an i3 processor, 8 gb of RAM, and 500 gb of hard drive storage. I've had hard drive computers before, but the HP PC was slow in setting up and booting afterwards. Plus there was no backlit keyboard which I figure should be standard even in budget laptops by now. I knew right away there were better options out there. I paid $470 for the HP on sale, so I figured what's another 60 bucks and I upgraded to the Lenovo 330 15 inch. It boots in seconds and has a much better i5 processor, AND a backlit keyboard. I'm very happy with my purchase. I'm only slightly sore about this not being a more compact 14 inch, however this is a very small and light 15 inch. I'll deal with it.

We were looking for a light and thin 15.6-inch basic notebook computer with a solid state drive and Intel i5 processor under $500 and this fit the bill perfectly! Even has a lighted keyboard and a numeric keypad which my wife needed as a teacher to enter data that other higher end computers did not have. It has 3 USB ports and a SD Memory Card Reader and you can easily add extra RAM if you need it. The 128GB solid state drive is sufficient and we can always expand using an inexpensive SD memory card or memory in the cloud so that's really not an issue. Would have been nice to have 1920 x 1080 resolution but with a smaller 15.6 screen the 1366 x 768 resolution is more than adequate for our use. It's not meant to be a gaming computer and if it had a larger solid state hard drive and higher 1080 resolution it would cost a lot more than $449 on sale....which was a bargain for a thin, lightweight, solid state laptop with an Intel i5 processor, lighted keypad and numeric keypad!