Lenovo Announced G550

By Author: Asli Mana
Total Articles: 72
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The new Lenovo G550 is an update to the Value Line G530 with the primary difference being the shift from a 16:10 to a 16:9 screen. This is becoming a common trend for most manufacturers, as they shift to the now more standardized 16:9 screens. The biggest question on our minds is how well this updated budget notebook performs; considering the previous revision earned award.

The design of the G550 has changed slightly from the G530, switching from a smooth matte exterior finish, to a black weave pattern. The new cover is every bit as strong as the last one, preventing any screen distortion even if you hit or flex the back of the screen. The interior of the notebook shares the same color as the lid, but is textured with a rougher matte finish similar to what you would find on unpainted sections of a ThinkPad. Lenovo took the back-to-basics route with the color scheme on this notebook, making it entirely black inside and out.

The laptop is built with total plastic materials which is acceptable for a budget notebook. However, the design looks very classy from the outside with a black weave pattern on it. The plastic ...
... body is also strong enough to withstand some pressure and there is hardly any notable flex when we tried to put pressure on some of the key weak design areas such as the back of the screen or the palm rests. Overall, we are quite satisfied with the design or build quality.
Image quality is another of the Lenovo's weak points. The 15.6in panel has a native resolution of 1,366 x 768 pixels, which is identical to many of the other laptops here, but while the images it produces appear eye-poppingly bright, it isn't subtle. Highlights looked crushed and poor contrast left even the most vibrant of pictures looking sun-bleached.

We were always a fan of the lenovo laptop keyboards for their durability and smoothness. This keyboard is no exception to that rule. The keys have good smooth travel and feedback. The light matte finish of the keys also feel good to the fingertips. There were also a numberpad beside the keypad which is very rare to see in notebook keyboards these days.

The standard system comes with a Intel Pentium Dual Core T4200 processor clocking at 2.0 GHz with 1 MB L2 cache and 800 MHz FSB. The 3GB DDR3 1066 MHz DDR3 RAM is also enough for all of your necessities of a basic machine like surfing web, playing SD or HD movies and playing some 2D games. The graphics performance of the Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 4500 MHD is also satisfactory unless you are going to play 3D games on it. The 250 GB Western Digital 5400 rpm HDD or Super Multi DVD RW Drive is also quite fast to go with.

Since this workstation supports both WiFi and wired Ethernet, you can surf the net using either of them. On board the device are 3 USB ports, an ExpressCard slot, the audio (headphone and microphone) jacks, a Kensington lock, a VGA port and the Ethernet connector. There is a 5-in-1 card reader that supports SD, Memory Stick, Memory Stick PRO, MultiMediaCard, xD-Picture cards. Even a 0.3 Megapixel camera is integrated into this laptop.

The Lenovo G550 15.6 Laptop weighs 2.7kg. This Lenovo laptop comes in grey and black colours. The battery life offered for normal computations is about 4 hours. The cost of this mobile computer is currently £434. Overall, we are quite satisfied with the design or build quality. Lenovo took the back-to-basics route with the color scheme on this notebook, making it entirely black inside and out.

Description

- Intel Pentium Dual-Core T4200 Dual Core Mobile Processor
- 4GB PC2-5300 DDR2 Memory
- 320GB 5400rpm SATA Hard Drive
- 8x DVD+/-RW Dual Layer Burner
- 15.6" WXGA (1366x768) Display With VGA Webcam
- Intel GMA 4500MHD Integrated Graphics
- Fast Ethernet, 802.11b/g Wireless
- Three USB 2.0, VGA, 5-in-1 Reader
- 15" x 9.7" x 1.4" @ 5.6 lbs.
- Vista Home Premium,

Asli Mana is the writer of this laptop article. Too see her work about Lenovo notebook models see her Lenovo notebook website.