Solved Should I Buy a desktop or a laptop? Should I really upgrade now?

[superjose]

Confirmed the Y510p does not support 5.1 surround sound :/. Though, an external card should fix that.

 

[rvcjew]

Confirmed the Y510p does not support 5.1 surround sound :/. Though, an external card should fix that.

it should if you are using hdmi to a external source i can test it for you later if you want and yeah its a beast of a machine and you can use it outside since its matte screened it does have ass battery though i get about 4 hours with low backlight but it last long enough for what i do at work in the field (IT technician) make sure you get it with the cache ssd as it is way faster with it and its a m.2 form factor so if you want one later they are hella expensive and hard to find atm. the sli one also comes with the blu-ray reader that you can swap in if you need it at least mine did.

 

[superjose]

Confirmed the Y510p does not support 5.1 surround sound :/. Though, an external card should fix that.

it should if you are using hdmi to a external source i can test it for you later if you want and yeah its a beast of a machine and you can use it outside since its matte screened it does have ass battery though i get about 4 hours with low backlight but it last long enough for what i do at work in the field (IT technician) make sure you get it with the cache ssd as it is way faster with it and its a m.2 form factor so if you want one later they are hella expensive and hard to find atm. the sli one also comes with the blu-ray reader that you can swap in if you need it at least mine did.

Today I made some investigations

1st. A friend told me about the mSATA port, and then I searched over the web to see it. Lenovo uses m.2 as you say.
2nd. When investigating I've seen that Lenovo has deprecated the connection chip from the motherboard, which can be seen in the notebook review forums:
42mm m.2 SSD y510P?

I was checking Amazon and analyzing it very thoroughly to see which one is the best, I came to the conclusion it was this one:
Amazon.com: Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p 59385820 15.6-Inch Laptop (Dusk Black): Electronics

The thing is that I compared it with the one on Lenovo's site
IdeaPad Y510p High-Performance 15.6" Multimedia Laptop from Lenovo | Lenovo (US)

And the main differences that I note were:
- Lenovo's site has 2 USB 3.0, whereas Amazon's has 1 USB 3.0
- Lenovo's site does not have Anti-Glare screen, Amazon's has.
- Lenovo's site has 24 GB of SSD.

Now, I went on and contacted a Lenovo technician, let me post the conversation here:

 

[superjose]

So the thing is that none of the devices come with the m.2 or mSATA port. So I'll be nagging an SSD from Samsung. I was thinking of this one:

Amazon.com: Samsung Electronics 840 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5-Inch SATA III Single Unit Version Internal Solid State Drive MZ-7TE250BW: Computers & Accessories

I could use the 1 TB as external hard drive which I don't really care.

I would prefer to have at least 320 GB of hard drive space, but 250 GB is good. I'm the kind of person that usually formats its computer once each 3 months or so, and due to that I usually do a weekly backup (documents I use dropbox) for the media to external hard drives, and then delete them from my drive. So having the SSD of that capacity wouldn't matter much.

So, what do you think?

Edit: BTW, rvcjew, I currently hook up my laptop on a monitor which does not possess the ability to transmit sound, since I connect it through a DVI-HDMI cable. What I do have, is a Logitech 5.1 speakers that through my laptop I can hook them with ease.

 

[linnemeyerhere]

Don't forget the SD card slot. I use a 128gb SSD and then a 64gb sd card along with my larger usb2.0 external drives. The cost of a 64 or even a 128 sd card isn't as crazy as it used to be and will likely continue it's downward cost.

 

[rvcjew]

fudge Power went out here we go again.

If you buy a y510p in Europe it comes with a glossy screen and in usa its matte, if you decide to go the ssd route i suggest you get some form of imaging software like acronis true image (what i personally use for work) and makea disk backup of your 1TB as it has the lenovo recovery partition ect. then restore that to your ssd and pop the ssd in and you should be good to go.

 

[superjose]

Don't forget the SD card slot. I use a 128gb SSD and then a 64gb sd card along with my larger usb2.0 external drives. The cost of a 64 or even a 128 sd card isn't as crazy as it used to be and will likely continue it's downward cost.

Indeed! That'll be great for devicces like Surface Pro which has a very limited drive, this case I'd rather slap it the SSD

fudge Power went out here we go again.

If you buy a y510p in Europe it comes with a glossy screen and in usa its matte, if you decide to go the ssd route i suggest you get some form of imaging software like acronis true image (what i personally use for work) and makea disk backup of your 1TB as it has the lenovo recovery partition ect. then restore that to your ssd and pop the ssd in and you should be good to go.

Because in the USA page it said glossy....

And even on this forum, it confirmed it:

y510P - glossy or matte screen?

 

[rvcjew]

lol well then i have no idea when i bought mine their page said matte. also consider this lol who knows when though. levnovo hasn't even said anything about this. Buy Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p Touchscreen Laptop - Microsoft Store

 

[superjose]

lol well then i have no idea when i bought mine their page said matte. also consider this lol who knows when though. levnovo hasn't even said anything about this. Buy Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p Touchscreen Laptop - Microsoft Store

Thanks!

I think I'll be going with the one at Amazon, since the customers are reporting that it is an Anti-Glare Display and has 16 GB of RAM for 1099$. The only down will be that it has 1 USB 3.0, instead of 2. But it's a feature I'd rather let go by for the Anti-Glare screen which is much more convenient in my case.

 

[rvcjew]

lol well then i have no idea when i bought mine their page said matte. also consider this lol who knows when though. levnovo hasn't even said anything about this. Buy Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p Touchscreen Laptop - Microsoft Store

Thanks!

I think I'll be going with the one at Amazon, since the customers are reporting that it is an Anti-Glare Display and has 16 GB of RAM for 1099$. The only down will be that it has 1 USB 3.0, instead of 2. But it's a feature I'd rather let go by for the Anti-Glare screen which is much more convenient in my case.

if it has one usb 3 port is probably a y410p then since they are the same except for screens size and that port number might want to double check that. you can see in thier press shots on that amazon page that it has two ports and mine has two ports. it also has one port you can charge things with and its yellow and usb 2.0 could you link me to a review stating one port?

 

[superjose]

lol well then i have no idea when i bought mine their page said matte. also consider this lol who knows when though. levnovo hasn't even said anything about this. Buy Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p Touchscreen Laptop - Microsoft Store

Thanks!

I think I'll be going with the one at Amazon, since the customers are reporting that it is an Anti-Glare Display and has 16 GB of RAM for 1099$. The only down will be that it has 1 USB 3.0, instead of 2. But it's a feature I'd rather let go by for the Anti-Glare screen which is much more convenient in my case.

if it has one usb 3 port is probably a y410p then since they are the same except for screens size and that port number might want to double check that. you can see in thier press shots on that amazon page that it has two ports and mine has two ports. it also has one port you can charge things with and its yellow and usb 2.0 could you link me to a review stating one port?

Maybe it's an Amazon mistake, which isn't strange. See the pic

 

[rvcjew]

yeah that is their mistake i thought you meant people were saying in reviews that there units had one port. do they not sell the version with the caching ssd? as it makes a huge difference with the hdd as iv disabled it to test, and boot up goes from 10 seconds to like 2 minutes, and programs open mush slower as a whole. its worth the extra 100 bucks imo unless you can find a m.2 NGFF ssd to put in it later? it also has a smaller m.2 area then most so its hard to find the right length to fit inside it.
just my thoughts.

 

[superjose]

yeah that is their mistake i thought you meant people were saying in reviews that there units had one port. do they not sell the version with the caching ssd? as it makes a huge difference with the hdd as iv disabled it to test, and boot up goes from 10 seconds to like 2 minutes, and programs open mush slower as a whole. its worth the extra 100 bucks imo unless you can find a m.2 NGFF ssd to put in it later? it also has a smaller m.2 area then most so its hard to find the right length to fit inside it.
just my thoughts.

Well, actually it comes with the 8 GB SSD unit (Hybrid Hard Drive).

Regarding the m.2 NGFF SSD, that's what I was talking about. Lenovo isn't putting the connector in there anymore. The one in their site and on Amazon's does not come with it. So I'd rather get the one at Amazon, that comes with the Anti-Glare Display + 16 GB of RAM, instead of the one which is from the Lenovo site which comes with Glossy display + 24 GB HYBRID Hard Drive.

Yes, none of them come with the m.2 port... Seems to reduce costs.

So, the 100$ difference I'll use it to finance this SSD
Amazon.com: Samsung Electronics 840 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5-Inch SATA III Single Unit Version Internal Solid State Drive MZ-7TE250BW: Computers & Accessories

Or the 500 GB one.

It's a pity though. The M.2 Sata port would have done an amazing job, since it would have let me have the 1 TB hard drive and an extra 250 GB SSD

 

[rvcjew]

a m.2 250GB is probably to long to fit in there.

 

[superjose]

a m.2 250GB is probably to long to fit in there.

If the laptop did come with the m.2 port, then it WOULD fit in there.

As stated in here:
42mm m.2 SSD y510P?

Unfortunately that's not the story

 

[superjose]

Well in a few hours I'll be ordering it via Amazon with its SquareTrade warranty!

 

[rvcjew]

look to hearing back with how it goes for you, if you have issues with it you can hit up the lenovo forums for the specific model too. my advice don't get 8.1 atm since it does not play well with the SLI unless you flash the Vbios of the second card then some are still having problems with SLI disappearing lol. i also saw much longer startups of certain programs even after my index was refreshed. and if you have wifi issues you can fix them in the driver settings for intel. also don't resize your partitions or one key will not work.
rvcjew

 

[superjose]

look to hearing back with how it goes for you, if you have issues with it you can hit up the lenovo forums for the specific model too. my advice don't get 8.1 atm since it does not play well with the SLI unless you flash the Vbios of the second card then some are still having problems with SLI disappearing lol. i also saw much longer startups of certain programs even after my index was refreshed. and if you have wifi issues you can fix them in the driver settings for intel. also don't resize your partitions or one key will not work.
rvcjew

Thanks man a lot for your great support and excellent tips!

I'll be wary of it when it arrives next week

It'll be a pity that it won't handle 8.1 atm, It'll be fun anyways

 

[superjose]

Holy mother of God! This thing is amazing! Just received the PC!!!! I'm amaaaaaaaaazed!

Super quick! Super sound! Super power!!!! Will be writing it later the pros and cons of the device!!!!

Will be sticking to Windows 8 for a while as you suggested. When I have the chance I'll take the ship to 8.1 since there are colossal updates (IMO) from it's predecessor!

THANKS A MILLION FOR RECOMMENDING ME THIS!!!

Edit:
BTW:
The display was a matte one (Yeaaaah!)
It has 2 USB 3.0 ports not 1 as stated by Amazon.
It's as slim as my XPS M1530 which is a great go for me!
The display has amazing colors

 

[rvcjew]

lol i would not call it slim but it is a beast glad you like it my left speaker seems to be dying on mine but their are always lemons and it is the only issue i have and im sure lenovo will replace. it im holding off to see if it gets any worse( it has some static from what seems power fluctuations even with no sound is coming out of it and is considerably lower volume than the right one now) not a fault to lenovo though the rest of the machine is spot on. as for battery i had my first major time that i had to use it for work and had no outlet available and it lasted on power saver with half brightness about 5 hours I was incredibly impressed and it seemed it was clocked at 600mhz on the cpu for that time and balanced seems to raise it to 700 and up. so overall very good work pc its not a ultra book but its also crysis three worthy lol, and for photoshop and maya 2011 rendering it handles well.
enjoy your new laptop.