Lenovo IdeaPad z460 Laptop

Be it entry-level or mainstream multimedia, Lenovo’s IdeaPad series of laptops has something for everyone. If you want gaming to be part of your multimedia experience, the IdeaPad Y series, such as the IdeaPad Y560 , is good, and for entry-level multimedia users, there’s the IdeaPad Z series. Today we have with is an entry-level variant of the IdeaPad Z460, which not only looks good but offers very good value for money too.

Design
The Z series have a less flashy exterior than the Y series, but are stylish nevertheless. The Z460 has a glossy black and nickel chrome theme, which looks pretty decent and is apt for home users, and you may carry it to your office as well. Unlike the coffee-brown fancy exterior of the Y series , this one is quite sober.

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The lid and the screen frame are black, while the wrist rest has a brushed metal (matte) nickel plated finishing, pretty neat for an entry-level multimedia laptop. What’s worth the praise is the solid build quality, and also, being a 14-incer this one’s quite light in weight, a very good pick for daily use. What’s even more reassuring is the chiclet keyboard, which is quite comfortable to type on, the keys are spaced well and are slightly concaved which makes typing quite a breeze. Even the matte and textured touchpad, and the mouse buttons didn’t give us reason to complain at all. The one downer you might notice is that the Shift and Enter keys are smaller than usual. Otherwise, this one gets a five on five, in terms of design and ergonomics.

Features
If you only take the hardware into consideration, clearly, the IdeaPad Z460 is just another entry-level laptop. However, look closely and you’ll notice a feature-rich 14-incher. It has all that takes to make a good entry-level multimedia laptop, except for a discrete GPU, but again, you’re paying much lesser than 40K.

Built around the Intel HM55 chipset, this one’s powered by an Intel Core i3-350 CPU, has 2 GB RAM (now that’s a downer), Intel HD graphics, a 320 GB hard drive and a 14-inch glossy screen (1366x 768). On the left-hand side you’ll find a USB port, a USB/eSATA combo, an HDMI port, a VGA port, an Ethernet jack, a PC card slot and a Kensington lock slot. On the right-hand side, there one USB port, a DVD writer and audio jacks. Speaking of which, we watched a couple of HD-movie trailers and the sound was pretty loud and clear, much better than many laptops. Finally, the unit comes pre-loaded with Windows 7 Home Basic (32-bit). All-in-all, it’s quite a feature packed machine.
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Comparison and options
We recently compiled a list of multimedia laptops under Rs 40,000 from various brands. Lenovo, Sony, Dell, Acer, HP, Asus, HCL, you name it, all offer multimedia laptops in this price segment. However, at this price, it’s safe to expect a multimedia laptop with decent discrete graphics, where playing games at low or medium settings is a possibility, addition to enjoying music and movies. But when it comes to a sub-35K price, gaming is actually too much to ask as of now. In any case, if gaming is a priority of you, then you’ll have to choose a 15-inch variant, the Z560, where a couple of models come with discrete graphics. Otherwise sift through the lists of other entry-level laptops ( click here ) and multimedia laptops ( click here), in the same price range.

Performance
The one thing that impressed us most about this machine was the price-performance ratio. It plays full-HD movies seamlessly and watching them on the vibrant screen with good sound is quite a good experience. Despite the absence of a discrete GPU, we ran the Left 4 Dead benchmark at native-res and low settings, and still, we got around 16 fps, and same was a case with Crysis in performance mode. So clearly, you won’t be able to play games, of course, light gaming, as in online games are playable. As far as power is concerned, there’s enough muscle to handle mainstream applications, so if you’re looking for a standard laptop for watching movies and office work, this one’s pretty good at both.

Personal Take
If you want a stylish laptop for movies, music and daily chores (not gaming), at merely Rs 34,481, this laptop is definitely recommended. However, for serious multimedia (especially gaming), it’s a good idea to shell out a bit more and get a laptop with a discrete GPU (IdeaPad Z560 for 36K, with an Nvidia GeForce GT 310 GPU). If you’re still confused, click here, to ‘ narrow down your search ’.

Specifications

• Weight: 2.4 kg
• Chipset: Intel HM 55
• Processor: Intel Core i3-350, 2.27 GHz, 3 MB L3 cache
• RAM: 2 GB DDR3
• Graphics: Intel HD
• Network: Gigabit Ethernet, Wi-Fi N and Bluetooth
• HDD: 320 GB
• Optical Drive: DVD Writer
• Screen: 14-inch glossy (1366x768)
• Battery Test: 3 Hours 35 minutes
• Price: Rs 34,481