Lenovo 3000 Y500 Laptop

An increasing number of people are looking at enhanced security features in their laptops, apart from just good looks.

Keeping this in mind a number of vendors, have started working on embedding new methods of security for their users, utilizing a hardware-software combine to achieve the desired effect. Lenovo has recently introduced its “Y” series of laptops which feature biometric face recognition that aims to enhance data security similar to fingerprint scanners.

The product we are checking out today is the Lenovo 3000 Y500, which is the flagship model of the 3000 series.

One of the things I really like about Lenovo is the solid construction of its laptops. Lenovo usually pays close attention to its manufacturing processes and builds tough notebooks that can withstand a lot of abuse as compared to offerings from rival manufacturers. The Y500 is built in a similar vein and is aimed at being a desktop replacement. Its body is accented in a light shade of metallic silver and has the Lenovo tag emblazoned across the top. The underside of the laptop matches the silver accent, with a dark-grey finish that gives the area around the LCD panel and keyboard a very classy look. The construction materials used are excellent as always, but do have the negative point of adding un-necessary weight to the laptop.

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The Y500 weighs in at 2.7 Kg— a trifle heavy for a 15-inch laptop. Regretfully Lenovo has not provided a carry bag with the retail package. This we think is a bad move, if one is to consider the weight of the laptop. You will need to purchase a bag separately. It also adds an un-wanted cost to the laptop purchase, as good bags that are capable of holding a heavy laptop such as the Y500 cost Rs. 2,500 upwards.
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The LCD panel on the Y500 is a 15-inch widescreen that has a native resolution of 1280x800 (16:10 aspect ratio). It’s a transflective screen means it will allow you to view the screen display even under the harshest lighting conditions. Lenovo advertises the screen as a ‘Vibrant View’ screen which delivers as promised. Compared to a lot of laptops, we have reviewed recently, the monitor definitely offers sharper color output, contrast and a decent level of brightness. This is a heaven-sent feature as it allows you not only to work for long hours without eye-strain, it makes watching movies and television on the laptop a good experience. There is a 1.3 MP camera present just above the LCD panel, which acts both as the biometric scanner and a webcam.

The keys of the Lenovo Y500 are of a standard design and have properly elevated keys. There is good tactile feedback and allows rapid typing without causing spelling mistakes. The only annoying thing is the placement of the standard Home/PG UP/PG DN keypad. It has been put into the right hand corner and causes you to hunt for the keys when you are working.

The area around the keyboard of the Y500 is fairly cluttered. Apart from the standard keyboard, there are separate control keys present for the subwoofer, Bluetooth /Wi-Fi radio, web-cam application, and one touch restore and a mute button. Despite such a large no of keys present, they are properly elevated and truly serve their purpose of being of being one touch. The last button and control key, towards the right side of the keyboard serve a special purpose i.e. allow you to access the TV tuner directly.

The touchpad of the Y500 was a bit of a disappointment. It was a bit too smooth and did not offer the precise control that we have come to expect from Lenovo. The responsiveness was also a bit off and despite us adjusting the speed, the mouse still did not improve. This could easily have been avoided by having a little more of a rough texture for the touchpad.

In terms of connectivity the Lenovo Y500 is well equipped. There are 4 x USB 2.0 slots present, 1 Firewire port, a single PCMCIA slot, 1 x headphone and microphone jack and a 4-in-1 card-reader. In keeping with the media-center aspect of this notebook there is also a TV tuner present with a remote control, a slot-loaded 6x DVD combo drive and a 2.5W subwoofer with a pair of 2 x 2W speakers.
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Specifications Table

| Model | Lenovo 3000 Y500

The specifications of the Lenovo Y500 left us a bit disappointed. Lenovo should have shipped the flagship model with a Core2duo processor. Instead it has shipped it with a mid-range core-duo processor the T2250 which runs at a clock speed of 1.73 GHz. System memory is quite insufficient too, at just 512 MB of ram. Storage is taken care of by a 5400 RPM 80 GB hard drive which is fairly adequate for a laptop.

In terms of graphics, Lenovo has clearly chosen to aim this laptop as a media center. They have chosen to ignore the excellent graphics output, that is normally offered by ATI and Nvidia and have instead chosen to equip the Y500 with a pedestrian Intel GMA950 chip. This chip will not allow you to game but has good support for video acceleration and is Windows Vista Ready.

For checking out the performance of the Y500 we broke up our tests into 3 different segments. Our first series of tests we ran the laptop through multiple rounds of PCMark 2006 to eliminate overheads and reach a consistent conclusion. The test score we received was 2862 which is fairly low and quite reflective of the weak specifications of the Y500.

For our second test we put the laptop’s battery through its paces. The results we got were quite good. The laptop was easily able to cross 2 hours 25 mins. using Battery Eater Pro 2.70. This is an above average result and speaks highly of Lenovo as a company to be trusted considering Lenovo claims about 3 hours of battery life overall on a standard 6 cell battery.
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The final part of our test was to check the laptop’s most advertised features. We are of course referring to the biometric face scanner and the shuttle center progam. The biometric face scanner works on a hardware and software combination. Using the bundled Lenovo Veriface program, it scans your face and retains the image.

This same image is used as the reference point for the security program which scans your face whenever you start the laptop. If the image is matched the laptop will login and allow you to work without the need for entering a password. Lenovo claims that this program has very great accuracy and can be used for multiple accounts. This is not very far from the truth. We put the program through several tests by using different people and the program worked as advertised. However it was not too friendly to people wearing spectacles (like this reviewer) preferring not to recognize faces at all. This is a rather negative point in my opinion.

For the final part of our comprehensive test we checked out The “Lenovo Shuttle Center” application which is a media-center type application overlay. Through this interface you have direct access to the TV tuner and other digital media such as movies, pictures and songs. As compared to the Lenovo 3000 Q desktop which is also a media center machine, the interface that is present here is far more user friendly and works without any issues. It scrolls easily and does not slow down in the least even after hours of operation.

After taking all the facts in consideration we can safely say the Lenovo 3000 Y500 is a good effort from Lenovo despite a few niggling problems. Though a Core2Duo effort would have been preferable, the Core Duo option used here still has a lot of juice. A lot of optimization still needs to be done for the Core Duo platform, in terms of software. The security aspect of this laptop which Lenovo has touted as being “revolutionary” works… to a certain extent.

Priced at Rs. 60,000, the Lenovo 3000 Y500 is a safe purchase for anyone who is looking for a Core Duo laptop with media center functionality and an added layer of security.