Lenovo Y480 Review

[gadgetrants]

Weird, HP keeps redirecting me to their Thailand page...? 

Yeah, speaking of "glare"...why would anyone put that in their display description?  Did I miss the day in school where everyone voted that calling something "glare" was a GOOD thing?    LOL

-Matt

[sano]

Hi appster,
I think that's a hybrid hard drive that consists of a drive that spins at 5400RPM and a 32GB buffer (Solid State Drive)
Hope this helps,

[gadgetrants]

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sano wrote:
Hi appster,
I think that's a hybrid hard drive that consists of a drive that spins at 5400RPM and a 32GB buffer (Solid State Drive)
Hope this helps,

---

Indeed.  Listings updated this morning -- new feature seems to be a "Blu-ray Rambo Drive."  Rambo...?    All the units are still gray, and still come with only the 2GB 640m.   CPU descriptions are all fixed too. 

Oh, on second thought:  isn't the ssd actually a separate mSSD card?

-Matt

[LenovoOrBust]

So much for seeing the 650M on Monday Still same crap 640LE

[gadgetrants]

Lenovo updated the tech_spec sheets recently:

http://www.lenovo.com/shop/americas/content/pdf/system_data/y480_tech_specs.pdf

Unfortunately all the new units listed clearly show the 640m LE, including both 1GB and 2GB models.    No sign anywhere of a real 640m or a 650m.  Maybe it will be until fall before they show up. 

-Matt

[andrewbaxter]

Found another decent review of the Y480 here

http://www.studentbuyingguide.com/2012/05/lenovo-y480-review-a-powerful-portable-laptop-for-students...

Price of the model I reviewed has dropped $200 down to $799 with coupon on Lenovo.com right now

[flynavy03]

I just chatted with a rep at Lenovo who told me that the SSD option is for a stand-alone SSD configured with the OS.  I specifically asked if the SSD was drive C: with the spinning hard drive being drive D: and he said yes, they are two separate drives.  If that's the case I would say it's quite the deal-maker, especially given the current $949 pricing for the 1TB 5400RPM + 32 GB SSD.

[gadgetrants]

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flynavy03 wrote:

I just chatted with a rep at Lenovo who told me that the SSD option is for a stand-alone SSD configured with the OS.  I specifically asked if the SSD was drive C: with the spinning hard drive being drive D: and he said yes, they are two separate drives.  If that's the case I would say it's quite the deal-maker, especially given the current $949 pricing for the 1TB 5400RPM + 32 GB SSD.

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Thanks for the info!  I saw a comparable configuration on the HP -- but the specs list the SSD as an accelerator/boost drive, not a stand-alone.  But from all the discussion I read on notebookreview.com about the Y470/Y470p, it's clear the two drives should also run independently on the Y480.  I presume by "drive C" you mean "the SSD is the boot/OS drive", correct?  That's good news.

Now please, call back 4 more times and report the mean/modal answer! 

-Matt

[flynavy03]

Funny you should mention it. I was chatting with another rep on an unrelated matter and asked the same question again, just to be sure. So far we're 2 for 2 saying that the SSD is completely separate from the spinning hard drive and that it is the boot/OS drive.

[theswee]

FYI - I took the plunge and bought the Y480. I got the 1TB 5400 + 32GB SSD. I mean, I couldn't pass this up. How bad can the computer be with i7 Ivy Bridge, 8GB of RAM, 2GB Dedicated GPU, all that HDD space, and all the other stuff? I got it with the max 3 YR in home + ADP warranty off their website for 1,195.27. Huge deal, IMHO.

I'm super-stoked about OS being on the SSD. Best of both worlds in my opinion - no need to pay out your eyes for max 256GB solid state when you can just boot faster with the only-OS partition on SSD (maybe not as fast as plain SSD-only models, but who cares?) and then still have A TERABYTE of space to store stuff on. I'm maxing out a 500 GB HDD on my current computer (amatuer photog). I can't believe I'm going to DOUBLE that space, and it will cost less than what my current comp cost 2.5 years ago (boooo Dell).

Ship date is May 24th according to order status (SSD option takes longer to ship). I will hopefully come back and post once I get it and let y'all know how (hopefully) awesome it is.