Lenovo Y400 Owners lounge

Trust me, you won't really notice that resolution difference especially on a much smaller screen than your 16.4". What maybe more evident is the color quality.

 

New to the forum. I'm getting my y400 tomorrow. Coming from a m11x. I just hope it isn't too much bigger in size than my m11x I take it to work in my backpack and don't want anything too much bigger. Also the sales rep told.me the screen is matte finish antiglare I really find that hard to believe though

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk 2

 

Welcome! I was in the same boat as you. I came from a M11x. I would say it is about 1 - 2 inches bigger in some areas compared to the M11x. In the weight department, feels about the same.

It's definitely not matte that's for sure. I got mine 3 weeks ago and my brother just got his 1 week ago. Both have the same screen.

 

Thanks I only had my m11x for maybe 2 months. I got it off eBay for 800 than sold it for 700 when I got this. I couldn't stand the battery was barely holding an hours charge and the fan was always blowing. It probably needed a new coat of thermal paste. Either way this looks like a huge improvement with better CPU and GPU. for about the same price. can't wait! Been out of diablo 3 for over a week!!

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Posting from my Y400

God, I hate Win 8 so much. I installed Start Menu 8 immediately but now I can't seem to find that customization menu for it again.

My touchpad seems to be "depressed" as it goes down towards the left/right click buttons. Is this normal? It also seems very sensitive in that attempting to scroll just changes the zoom size instead.

 

You'll get used to the touchpad (assuming it is the same as the Y500). It is actually really cool and convenient. Just give it 2-3 days.

 

I got the sensitivity and other things all set up. I did not realize there was no single finger scrolling anymore and it required 2 fingers but I learnt that quickly. My main concern is still that of the touchpad- is it normal for the bottom edge to be more "depressed" into the chassis than the other 3 edges?

I have never owned a laptop smaller than 17.3" but still this keyboard is pretty darn good for typing on.

 

On the bottom of the touchpad lies the left and right click buttons in their respective regions. Is that what you're referring too?

 

I meant the touchpad tapers even more into the chassis as you go from the top (below the spacebar) to the bottom (where the buttons are). But I guess this is a normal thing because I saw similar things on some videos and pictures. Just seemed strange so I wanted to confirm this.

 

I think if you right click on the start menu you can get to the customization menu.

I installed the newest synaptics drivers and the options are pretty nice.

 

I gotta admit. I'm missing my m11x build form and quality. It just felt a lot sturdier. I'm going to have to go over this one with a fine comb before I decide to keep it. It is a lot better though I'm getting 100fps on diablo 3 compared to about 45 on my m11x

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Yeah the overall build is a bit better on the m11x. But I hated the m11x touchpad (at least on my R1) and I love the FPS I am getting on the Y400.

 

Anyone know how to make the laptop run full speed without the charger? I put it on high performance mode but it still won't run right. It slows down to like 15fps. I wanna know because I'm at work and forgot my ac charger at home.

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don't. you'll destroy your battery if you push it to its limits. it's not really advisable for gaming notebooks to be played with high graphics while on battery.

 

I don't think anyone can emphasize this enough. Do not. Laptops are made for portability (which makes no sense why there are like ~9lbs laptops out there) and gaming. As always, there's a trade-off. The trade-off is you either can game or you can walk with the laptop and just plop down anywhere and surf the web. When you're in class (hehe) lesser-intensive games may be played, but your battery still will be drained at an accelerated rate.
Hope this helps.

 

How are so many people gaming at work?

 

I actually know quite a few people who can plug-in and play games at work. Two of which are security guards and the other is a receptionist or something. All I know is that it is very possible to game at work.. I'd just imagine they play single-player games.

 

I work 12 hour shifts and we get like 6-8 hours of downtime so we just game as long as supervisor not around.

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So I'm on the fence about purchasing this laptop, but I have not seen reviews or comments on the quality of the screen. As I understand, 768p screens are usually associated with lower quality screens (poor viewing angles, poor contrast), which might be an issue for me since I like to play horror games and I'm not nearly as afraid of the dark as I am of the gray, if you catch my drift.

Can someone comment on the screen quality? I'm on the border between this laptop and the Y500 with its 1080p screen... just not sure if the extra size, weight, and for me, useless number pad will justify the extra $100 for a 1080p screen.

 

Get the Y500 with the best options. call up and say you do not need the 16gb msata and be nice and get the price down to 1k. not too hard.

 

Got my Y400 yesterday, got it with a single GT 750M 2GB and the 16GB mSATA option, paid $799 shipped for it. I also have an HP DM4 Beats Edition w/ Intel HD3000 and no mSATA that I bought about 1.5 yrs ago and paid around the same for, maybe a bit more. Compared to to DM4 I noticed the build quality isn't as good but really only in the screen, except in the plastic around the front. The HP DM4 screen border is actually is cheaper looking as the plastic around it has kinda a gap between the screen and is flimsier looking than the plastic on this Y400. However on the Lenovo the back of the screen is plastic compared to aluminum on my DM4, so on the Y400 the screen creaks when opening and it feels sorta flimsy and wobbly. Not while using it though just if you say carry it somewhere with the screen open or while opening it, but if you are sitting there with it on your lap or table playing on it it's fine so that doesn't really concern me.

The build quality in the keyboard area is very nice, trackpad works ok enough but I trackpads with built in buttons period, you will generally always have issues with the mouse cursor moving when pressing the buttons which is what I experience on this, the HP DM4 trackpad with it's separate buttons is way better. However that being said while gaming I'll always use my Logitech mouse and it works well enough for browsing etc so I'm ok with it. The keyboard is very nice, I put it up there with the HP DM4 keyboard, it also had red backlighting and this looks great and the keys feel nice and it's very sturdy, and the aluminum build quality around it is wonderful. It's not much heavier than my DM4 but it is a bit heavier and a bit larger/thicker as well but it's not too big. This is why I went with the 14" though I really can't stand laptops bigger than 14" especially the ones with full keyboards, drives me crazy so I like the size/weight of this laptop, and the resolution is the same as my DM4 so I'm used to it and I think it looks great, bright, good viewing angles etc.

Now where it really shines is in the games it seems, I haven't played enough yet to get a wide variety of experience as I spent most of the day yesterday loading games and such on it, but I did play LA Noire last night and ran it at max details in DX11 and it was perfectly smooth, couldn't believe it. Also ran the nVidia Supersonic Sled demo on it at max details and that ran perfectly smooth as well, and that demo looks pretty dang nice so this thing seems to be a beast for gaming. My old laptop I didn't buy for gaming but it would play some games at low details ok but I always itched to be able to sit down and play whatever game I wanted and I'm sure this baby is going to handle that just fine, can't wait to try some more. I like the options I have to upgrade this down the road though I don't feel that I need to upgrade anything now, even the 5400RPM HDD is just fine with me as I'm used to it from my old laptop. It boots up very fast, probably due to the 16GB cache SSD and the OS seems very responsive. I didn't reload Windows on it, left it with Windows 8 which I hated until I discovered Classic Shell this week, Google it and try it, it makes Windows 8 rock as it makes it just like Windows 7 and it's totally free. The laptop didn't really have a lot of junk preinstalled on it, didn't take a couple minutes to uninstall the extra stuff Lenovo threw on here.

Overall I'm very pleased with this laptop, best laptop I've had for performance, I'd rate it way above my DM4 in performance but below the DM4 in build quality even though it's still a decent build, just with the screen backing was aluminum like my DM4. I would recommend this laptop to anybody who wants a nice laptop + the ability to do some gaming on it, and I would buy it again in a heartbeat especially at the price I paid, amazing price compared to other laptops I was looking at.

 

Tried a few more games on it, Tomb Raider @ max settings and it ran almost smooth, I mean definitely playable but I bet it was dipping into the upper 20's sometimes but mostly smooth. Tried Neverwinter at max and Defiance at max and both perfectly smooth, and tried Dead Island Riptide at max and it was a little choppy probably mid 20's in parts but otherwise appeared to be 30+, probably turning down AA would make it perfectly fine. Loving this thing so far, it's blowing me away at the performance.

 

hi guys im planning on buying the Y400
right now they are offering the
IdeaPad Y400 Laptop - 59371958 with intel core i5 for $719
and
IdeaPad Y400 Laptop - 59371952 with intel core i7 for $749
everything else is the same

do you guys think its worth to spend $30 more for the intel core i7?
cons: obviously the i7 uses more energy

 

just spend the extra 30 bucks, you got nothing to loose. i am also planning on buying the 749$

 

Ofcourse it is worth buying the i7 over the i5; it increases the performance overall for the CPU and the GPU.

 

Is anyone noticing issues with wifi?

 

Nope, quite the opposite. Some of my devices like my iPad and my HP DM4 have issues with random disconnects and difficulty reconnecting to my wifi, so far this thing has never had these issues, strong as can be!

On a side note, I'm playing Metro Last Light @ Very High settings right now and it runs marvelous! So happy with this thing!

 

Hey everyone,

I plan to buy the Y400 with i7 because of the great deal going on at lenovo.com which ends today.

I will mainly be using it to surf the web and do heavy Photoshop work. I will definitely play video games every now and then, would love to play at high settings. Originally, I wanted a ThinkPad for its ruggedness, reliability, long battery life, etc. But apparently those aren't good gaming machines.

So just how reliable are IdeaPads, or more specifically, Y400s? I would like something that can last me a long time. Any issues I should know about?

If only ThinkPads came with better discrete graphics... but this current deal is ridiculously good. Should I just pull the trigger? :thumbsup: I love everything about it, my only concern is how reliable it is

 

Who uses photoshop on a 720p 14" screen? Do you have an external monitor?

 

It's a $900 - $1000 laptop. It is going to be as reliable as any other $900 - $1000 laptop.

With any piece of computer hardware, the estimated RELIABILITY of the individual unit is irrelevant. Because with anything you ever buy, you have a chance of that item lasting forever, or showing up DOA. The only information you will ever get on reliability is anecdotal stories (not data) of people saying:

* Always buy brand-XYZ, because I bought a brand-XYZ product 5 years ago, and it is still working; or
* Never buy brand-ABC. My friend bought a brand-ABC product 5 years ago, and it died 3 times in the first year.

Those are stories, not data.

If you want actual data and facts about ANY piece of computer hardware, look at the warranty. The warranty guarantees that you are going to have a functioning product for as long as the warranty is valid. If you plan on owning this laptop for 3 years, then buy a 3-year warranty, and your "reliability" of the laptop during that time will be 100%.

 

Photoshop is fine on a 14" screen depending on what you're doing with it.

 

I'm actually interested in a study of Extended warranty, because I've heared a theory that the risk of a hardware failure in the first year of purchase is far greater than after the first year. If that is true then those extended warrenties are not that useful(expect that if you are buying Apple's product LOL, "I got my macbook's keyboard replaced twice and dvd drive replaced once in three years of use" V.S. my TOSHIBA laptop which I've had it for almost 5 years now and never had any issues with it, but I wanted it to fail so that I would have a reason to get a new laptop, yet I bought the Y500 anyway). But accidental warranties are always worth it, IMO.

 

Well, extended warranties use the same math as buying insurance. If you look at warranties or insurance from a perspective of probability (calculating expected values / weighted averages), the insurance seller comes out ahead. However, people BUY insurance or warranties because they cannot afford the risk of encountering an event where they do not have insurance / warranty. This is why people pay $1,000/year in homeowners insurance to protect their $300,000 house against fire, even though they will most likely never need to use it.

The math of an extended warranty is as follows. I will use a 3-year extended warranty that costs $200 as an example:

• You are betting that your laptop will fail some time after the standard warranty expires (12 months), but before the extended warranty expir
• You are betting that the cost of repairs will exceed $200
• You are betting that the store / manufacturer that sold you the warranty will still be in business to honor that warranty.
• You are betting that claiming the warranty repairs will exceed the value of an alternative option (e.g. buying a new laptop because you want one).

Here are some more numbers:

• The average failure rate of a laptop in the field is 45% over 3 years (all laptops owned; both consumer and business users; requires some sort of hardware-based support to replace a defective part).
  Measured by a consumer group that tracked warranty claims for the big-3 enterprise laptop providers int he US - Dell, IBM (before they were Lenovo), and HP / Compaq.
• The average claim rate of an extended warranty is about 15%. Measured by Best Buy.

The reasons that you would NOT claim an extended warranty, even if you have one, are:

• The cost of claiming the warranty exceeds the value of the warranty (e.g. RAM goes bad. You can replace the bad RAM yourself for $50 that same day. Or you can mail your laptop in (paying $25 in shipping), wait 3 weeks for the manufacturer to fix it and ship it back. In this example, it may be worth you paying the $25 difference in cost just so that you don't need to wait 3 weeks for the repair).
• The warranty seller has gone out of business (e.g. CompUSA retailer in the US).
• You would just rather sell / dispose of the defective laptop, and buy a new laptop anyway, just because you want a newer model / product.

The reason that you would WANT to claim or buy an extended warranty:

• You cannot afford the downtime of fixing / replacing a defective laptop. For example, you may not have time to replace / reformat a laptop and the data contained on it, if it fails during a work trip or during university finals time. It may be worth $200 to protect yourself against that situation.

 

can you sli on y400 ?

 

On the models with GT650M SLi yes, for the models with the new GPU (GT750M) the external GPU (ultrabay) is not yet released. It looks like Lenovo are not that much in a hurry releasing it, though I know that there are few members on this forum waiting for it <-- Including me...

 

I will likely sometime down the road add a 2nd GT 750M, but really since most my games play seem to play smoothly on the highest or near max settings I see no need currently, but nice to know I'll have that option. I was going to throw an SSD in here but I bought the one with the 16GB SSD for caching and it makes it plenty fast at bootup and it's just fine in using it for programs and games so I see no point, unless I wanna save on battery drain down the road.

 

Hi all,

I would like to ask if anybody has information on whether Y400 w/ GT 750M is likely to overheat (and shut down) after long duration of gameplay, let's say, GTA IV for 2-3 hours. I now own a HP dv4t w/ 650m and the overheating issue is torturing me.

 

No.

Without exaggeration, I can say that the Lenovo Y500 is the coolest-running laptop I have ever owned int he past 15+ years.

Heat will not be an issue for this laptop.

 

Are you serious? You must've owned some pretty hot laptops. Heat is a huge issue for this machine, especially the CPU overheating. If you run a game or benchmark that loads the CPU and GPU simultaneously the CPU will get into the 90's, which is dangerously close to thermal shutdown at 105C and gives you little headroom in case of dust buildup or high ambient temperatures. People have been going as far as modding the cooling system to combat this. See here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/ideapad-essential/718695-my-y500-mod.html

The cooling system in this machine is definitely subpar for a gaming notebook running hot and hungry components. A single fan and copper heatpipe shared between the CPU and GPU just doesn't cut it. I used to own an ASUS G73Jh and the thermals on that were way better in comparison because of the large chassis, airflow, and dual fans and heatpipes. On that rig I could run Prime95 and FurMark simultaneously all day with both the CPU and GPU staying around 80C while on the Y500 I can't even run Prime95 by itself without reaching thermal shutdown in a few minutes.

Also, because of the higher voltage, the 750M in the update models also runs hotter. People who are overclocking their 750M have reported Ultrabay GPU temperatures close to 100C as well.

 

I have an external monitor but honestly, I think I am going to cancel my order and get the Y500 now.

A lot of reviews came out recently with very positive feedback about the Y500s screen and how color-accurate it is.

For only about $60 more, I can get almost the exact same specs (only diff is no 16GB SSD but I don't need that) as my quadcore Y400 but with a 15" screen.

I think I'll choose that over portability.

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

 

If you really don't need to carry it around all the time, or don't have a larger screen to use at home and can't see yourself getting one, then the y500 is the best option.

 

Hey guys. After lots of searching, reading and implementation I am finally able to say that I was successful in installing a HDD into the ultrabay using a cheap caddy and the stock DVD drive's faceplate!

Prior to this success, I was looking all over the place to find confirmation (or even a tutorial) that using a cheap hdd caddy is possible for use in the ultrabay. I wanted to use a Samsung 840 Pro SSD as my main system drive and still keep the original HDD for storage. I was willing to sacrifice the dvd drive for an external one since I don't plan to use it very often.

So through some searching and lots of reading, I found the correct caddy. I already have the Samsung 840 Pro, so I found a caddy with a removable face plate on ebay: New 9 5mm 2nd SSD HDD Hard Drive Optical Bay Caddy Adapter for Lenovo Y400 Y500 | eBay. This or any other caddy with a removable face plate should work. Just make sure the entire body is metal with no plastic on the shell.

When it arrived, I fastened the sides of the 5400 1 TB stock drive to the caddy with the provided screws. Next, I took the ultrabay mounting bracket from the DVD drive and moved it to the caddy. There should be proprietary holes on the shell that match the bracket hole locations. This bracket allows the caddy to lock into the bay.

Next, I carefully took the faceplate off of the dvd drive. This took a while since I wanted the locking tabs on the faceplate to remain intact as best as possible. I used an oring or dental pick to get into the small spaces. At first I was doubtful about how I would mount the faceplate, but turns out the orientation of the tabs are similar to the one on the hdd caddy. I can assume that the spacing and holes is an industry standard. The faceplate fit pretty well over the cutouts. When I pushed the caddy into the ultrabay it required a little bit of extra force, but it also helped lock the tabs firmly into place. The finished product looks like the DVD drive is still there. Pictures will follow when I sort through it.

The computer read the drive like it never left. I formatted the large system partition and kept the Lenovo one. 883 GB is enough space for me. The mSATA slot is empty but I'll add a drive there if I feel like I need more space in the future.

I found the original idea from here: http://forum.techinferno.com/lenovo-ibm/3420-y500-y400-aftermarket-hdd-caddy.html and followed through with the DVD drive faceplate.

 

I ordered the same caddy few days back and I was thinking in doing exactly what you did already; it looks like I am not the only one thinking about it... Glad it worked out well for you, I was doubtful about how it will be looking / if it will be looking ok. Thank you for your feedback!

 

i am gonna get the y400 this week probably before Wednesday. i wonder if the new y400 supports sli ? why Don't anyone post picture of their laptop. and there is barely any unboxing vid on youtube.

 

Yes it does support SLi. However the new bay with the extra Graphic Card (GT750M), is not yet released by Lenovo. It will probably take few weeks more if not months for them to release it. Though they have released the one for the Y500 quite fast.

 

I brought y400 from USA , the problem is that the AC adapter is 110~120v and in India it is 230~240v, and I am using voltage converter every time and it gets heat up very quickly. So can I use a Indian 3pin wall plug and attach it to us AC adapter. Can any one tell me.

 

How does long term gaming work on this system? I know it can run pretty much every game out there on medium settings, but does heat become a big issue? Can you get over three hours without any issues?

- Thanks!

 

What is this I don't even? I haven't found a game yet that I've had to set to lower than High. The screen-resolution definitely helps when it comes to gaming.

This laptop gets HAWT. The system inside never reaches a level that would degrade the parts to much or make it overheat and power off, but it does make the casing very hot & you can feel the heat on the keyboard's left side. You shouldn't have to worry much about it but if you are worried I'd suggest getting a laptop cooler.

 

I do not know what are you talking about. The power brick supports 110/120/220V and it should work perfect. I go to Dubai and even I went to India last October and never had any issues. If you could do something about it is to buy a power protection bar since you have so many issues with power cut there. While I was at the hotel, atleast 4-5 times a day the power was down and they were going from continuous power to generators etc.

There is so much fluctuation in the electrical power sockets there that it goes from 200v to 240v, very casual was a situation when it would be at 220v (that is the reason your adapter gets hot and probably very soon it will die on you).

 

I agree with Lykos, every game I've played except for the new Tomb Raider, Metro Last Light, and Far Cry 3 has ran at the max details and perfectly smooth. In the games I mentioned I only had to turn AA down and left the rest at the highest to smooth things out. The list of games I've ran at max details smoothly so far are:

LA Noire
Defiance
Tera Rising
Neverwinter
Path of Exile
Aliens Colonial Marines
NFS Most Wanted
Black Ops 2
Dead Island Riptide
Resident Evil Revelations
Call of Juarez Bound in Blood
Sonic & All Stars Racing Transformed

...and some others I'm sure I'm forgetting, plus probably 20 more I have installed but not fired up yet but I suspect they'll all run the same. This laptop is a beast for gaming! As far as heat, yes it gets quite hot pretty quickly while gaming. I bought a Cooler Master laptop cooling pad with a huge fan from Amazon for cheap before I got this and been playing it with it sitting on the coffee table until last night for the first time I set the laptop on my lap and started playing RE Revelations. Within about 10 min it was too hot to leave on my lap without hurting lol so I put the laptop cooler on my lap and played like that and it cooled it down pretty quick.