This is a review of the machine itself, and how well it's functioning for me. It's not a review of the purchasing experience (thanks Amazon, for jacking the price up $40 the day before I was able to make the purchase, and for having your "guaranteed Saturday arrival" mean "late Monday evening.") Those gripes aside, on to the machine.
I did a lot of hours of research trying to find out what the best machine was that I could get on my pretty strictly limited budget. This one ended having the best specs at the best price, so I went with it despite the mediocre ratings, which I'll address in a little more detail in a moment.
This is a gaming laptop. I needed it for some more intensive work programs, but it handles games well. So far I have run Warframe and Fortnite. I haven't tested the Warframe FPS, but Fortnite is running around 60 FPS. They both run smooth. I had some hiccups with one game of Fortnite, but I believe that was connection-related, not due to the machine. It handles the work programs *much* better than my 10-year-old HP G72 (still trooping along--just outdated).
Boot times for this machine are about 6-8 seconds(!!). Updating took a couple hours on my lousy internet connection. It didn't have the latest major Windows 10 update installed, but the updates did all install and run smoothly. I installed a 500GB 5,200 RPM SATA HDD I had laying around for some raw storage to supplement the smallish SSD. It pulls data from that drive surprisingly quickly. I do wish the back of the case had some access panels so you didn't have to pull the entire thing off.
The display is nice, and the keyboard is top-notch. It feels great, and I am thankful for the backlighting, as it will make the occasions I need to work in the dark much easier.
Most of the low reviews from this machine on Amazon seem to stem from that weird hybrid HDD that they offer. I went with the SSD for a few more dollars, with a hunch the rest of the hardware would be fine if I had a good drive. That hunch so far has been correct. I realize this isn't a crazy machine with loads of top-of-the-line hardware, but for the money it is awesome. It has scored favorably on UserBenchmark, and does everything I want and need, and then some. It has very quick load times and is very responsive. It does seem at times to draw a lot from the CPU when it shouldn't necessarily be needed that much juice. I'm not quite sure what the deal is there. Opening Task Manager drops it back down to low levels.
Battery life so far has been great compared to my old PC. The PC seems very well-built and looks sexy. I am very glad to have it. I would not hesitate to buy it again. If there are issues, I will update this review later. So far though, the honeymoon is going great. I'll probably spend the $55 for another 8GB ram stick soon and put that in, so things should run even a little faster.
| Standing screen display size | 17.3 Inches |
|---|---|
| Screen Resolution | 1920 x 1080 pixels |
| Max Screen Resolution | 1920x1080 Pixels |
| Processor | 5.2 GHz ryzen_9 |
| RAM | DDR5 |
| Hard Drive | 1 TB SSD |
| Graphics Coprocessor | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 |
| Chipset Brand | NVIDIA |
| Card Description | Dedicated |
| Wireless Type | 802.11ax |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 4 |
