Lenovo G580 Review

Introduction

There is a common notion that when people go for a budget-class laptop, they have to make compromises in looks, performance and features. The Lenovo G580 comes at a list price of $479.00 and it completely undermines such notions. Lenovo G580 comes equipped with Windows 8 and brings a balanced mixture of performance and features in the price of a budget-class laptop. It is one of the best option for users who want good performance and admirable feature set but are on a tight budget.

Design and Features

Lenovo G580 is a budget class system and comes with a similar plastic design like most laptops in its category. It is not a slim laptop and it has a thickness of 1.35-inch, with overall measurements of 1.35 x 14.8 x 9.64 inches (H x W x D). It weighs only 5.09 pounds which is almost a pound lighter than Dell Inspiron 17-3721 which weighs 5.9 pounds.  The design is based on an all-plastic chassis, which has glossy finish with slight glittery effect, which is identical to HP Pavilion Sleekbook 15z-b000. The glossy plastic exterior attracts a lot of smudges and fingerprints within few minutes of use. Lenovo G580 comes with a variety of ports, which are on par with the competition. On the right side, Lenovo 580 has a headphone jack, one USB 2.0 port and a DVD burner (DVD+/-RW). On the left side of the laptop, there is an Ethernet port, VGA-out, HDMI-out and a pair of USB 3.0 ports. Whereas Toshiba Satellite C875-S7340 comes with only one USB 3.0 port. On the front, Lenovo G580 features a card reader.

Lenovo G580 features a 15.6-inch display with native resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels. Now a days touch-screen displays are gaining popularity, sadly Lenovo G580’s display does not come with touch-screen capabilities, but it is supports 720P content. Lenovo G580’s display has vibrant and rich colors with crisp text. The display is pleasing on the eyes making it easier to use for longer period. Lenovo G580 comes with a tiled keyboard which has rounded keys. The keys are fairly placed for comfortable use and provide the right amount of feedback when pressed. The keyboard provides excellent typing experience which covers the lack of backlit keys. Below the keyboard, there is a large multi-touch trackpad with textured finish. The trackpad is very responsive and allows users to use gestures like pinch to zoom and swipe, which further improves the Windows 8 experience. Right above the keyboard, Lenovo G580’s speakers can be found. The speakers produce crystal clear sound, even when the volume is maxed out there is no distortion and on max volume the sound is enough to fill a small room.

Surprisingly, Lenovo has filled G580 with lots of preloaded applications, software and bloatware. Some of the useful software includes Microsoft Office Starter 2010 and Cyberlink Power DVD burning suite. Some proprietary software like Lenovo Energy Management, Companion and YouCam can also be found installed on the laptop. There are some Trial software too, which include 30 days of McAfee Internet Security and Nitro PDF. Lenovo has also filled the laptop with chunk of bloatware, which includes links to Evernote, AccuWeather, Skype, FreeRide games and Amazon.com browser app. Lenovo G580 is covered by a one year limited warranty on parts and labor.

Performance

Lenovo G580 is powered by an Intel Core i5-3210M processor with integrated Intel HD Graphics 4000 and 4GB of memory. The processor is clocked at 2.5GHz and belongs to Intel’s third generation of processors also known as Ivy Bridge. These processors are famous for their performance and consume less power. Lenovo G580 comes with a 500GB 5400rpm mechanical hard drive, which is enough storage for a casual user.

Thanks to its Ivy Bridge Core i5 processor, it passed all the performance benchmark tests with flying colors. Lenovo G580 scored 2615 points in PCMark 7 while Satellite C875-S7340 and Inspiron 17-3721 scored 2503 and 2233 points respectively. During Cinebench R11.5 Lenovo G580 scored 2.74 points, leaving all the competition behind including Acer Aspire V5-571-6891 which scored 1.80 points.

Lenovo G580 proved its mettle even in multimedia tests, it completed Handbrake test in just 1 minute 18 seconds, while its rivals like Satellite C875-S7340 and Inspiron 1-3721 were left far behind with a time of 1 minute 28 seconds and 1 minute 59 seconds respectively. Lenovo G580 aced the Photoshop CS6 test in just 5 minutes 32 seconds giving it a huge lead over rivals including Acer v5-571-6891 and HP 15z-b000, which completed the test in 8 minute 43 seconds and 10 minutes 59 seconds respectively. Though it didn’t perform so well in the 3DMark 11 test where it scored 1119 points in Entry-Level settings and just 205 points in Extreme settings. Here for the first time HP 15z-b000 defeated Lenovo G580 and scored 1134 and 213 points respectively.

Conclusion

Lenovo G580 has the hardware to let users to experiment with photo and video editing without spending too much cash, though users can’t expect this budget machine to play any high-end games. Lenovo comes with a removable 48Whr battery and lasted 4 hours 3 minutes during the battery test. With its robust performance, comfortable keyboard and a price tag of less than $500, Lenovo G580 offer users the opportunity to get acquainted with Windows 8 without spending too much cash. And for all these reasons, Lenovo G580 is the best choice for a budget-category laptop.