V460 impressions

If you're looking for a thin and light notebook with great battery life, carry on looking. This isn't the notebook for you. If you're okay with 2.5 to 3 hours of battery life and if Lenovo is offering a good coupon, the V460 deserves to be on your short list. At the list price of $800 there are definitely better options out there but at the $650 I paid for mine its hard to beat.

I'm not a reviewer or notebook guru with vast experience of hundreds of different notebooks. I'm just some guy who programs for 8 to 10 hours a day on a HP 6390p at work and wanted something to program on at home and has used a variety of notebooks at work over the past 15 years. I have my desktop for gaming & photo editing, but wanted to be able to work while watching the kids play or in bed while my wife was watching TV. So, this is really just my impressions of how the notebook meets my needs and not an all encompassing and balanced review.

Summary: I paid $650 + tax for i5-430M, switchable NVIDIA GeForce 310M 512MB, 4 GB DDR3 RAM, 14.0" Backlight TFT 1366x768, 320GB 5400rpm HDD, Bluetooth, Finger Print Reader.

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 if battery life isn't a requirement, 2.5 out of 5 if battery life is a requirement

Build: 4
Design: 3
Battery and portability: 2
Performance: 4
Display and Audio: 3
Heat and Noise: 4.5
Features: 4
Software: ?
Value: 4.5 based on the $650 I paid

Build
I was deciding between the V460 and the HP DM4t (for about $80 more) and went with the V460 because I wanted something with a little better than consumer grade build quality. I understand the V460 is in about the same class as the Dell Vostro in this regard.

I'm very pleased with the build quality of my unit. While not quite the legendary Thinkpad keyboard, the keyboard is a pleasure to type on. There are no creaks or groans. Every thing fits together well and feels nice and rigid. Note that I have not done the type of screen flex testing the review sites do!

The touchpad was okay when I first got it, but once I did a clean install I've found it precise and responsive. I like the textured surface and the buttons are fine. I would have liked a touchpad with gesture support and virtual buttons, but I have no complaints about this one. (I had an HP Envy for two weeks before I returned it and after a bit of tweaking I loved the touchpad.)

Design
It's not ugly. It doesn't have a colored stripe or stupid pattern or "gamer" features. But it definitely does not live up to the marketing hype. I would have preferred my bland and uninspired looks in a brushed aluminum form as the black/dark gray does show fingerprints rather easily. Carry a microfiber cloth.

Battery and portability
Its light enough and small enough to make carrying the V460 around very easy. The charger is tiny and weighs practically nothing. And it's a good thing 'cause you're going to need to carry that charger everywhere! I get 2 hours of Hulu watching over wifi out of a charge or a little over 3 hours of actual working over wifi out of this. This is no problem for me 'cause I just need to move about the house but it is a huge problem for most people.

Performance
At lot of bang for the buck here. The CPU is everything an i5-430 should be. I have not found any need to go to the dedicated graphics except for gaming. The 310m is best viewed as a bonus at this price point rather than as a gaming card. But it does the job at 1024x768 resolution. The hard drive is only 5400rpm, which actually suits me just fine. I don't need the extra speed and sticking with 5400rpm means that there is no vibration and the hard drive is nice and quiet.

Display and Audio
The screen is fine for a productivity oriented notebook. An HP brightview screen would be much nicer for games and movies, but this screen is very pleasant to work on. The speaker are actually very nice, but I don't benefit from them as I'm using headphones.

I haven't bothered testing viewing angles 'cause I have no need to share a movie or powerpoint presentation. The laptopmag review claims that colors in movies wash out as soon as you move a few degrees left or right.
All in all I have no complaints about the audio or display, but then I also find them nothing to get excited over. I would have been extremely happy if there were an option for a 1440x900 resolution screen.

Heat and Noise
This is my favorite aspect of this notebook. I'm currently typing this in a totally silent room. I've been using the notebook for a couple hours and it's been plugged in for the past hour. So its at full performance and putting out as much heat as its going to. The sound of my typing drowns out the quiet hum of the fan. The bottom is barely warm. I'm wearing shorts and if I move it onto my bare legs I can hardly notice any heat.

I docked half a point on my rating here because as cool and quiet as it is on integrated graphics its hot and noisy on dedicated graphics. It's just a 310M but when switched to dedicated graphics the fan speeds up tremendously, the air being expelled from the vent is pretty warm, and the temperature of the left palm rest increases several degrees. It doesn't become uncomfortable at all, but does become noticeable.

Edit: 6/27/10 I've gotten around to doing some gaming again since a fresh Windows 7 install. Whether its just that the thermal paste needed to cure, or some update, or just a side effect of removing the Lenovo specific stuff, but the fan is actually noticeably quieter on dedicated graphics than when I first got the notebook. It blows all the time on low speed when not gaming and produces nothing more than a quiet hum. Barely different from on integrated graphics. When gaming it obviously ramps up.

Features
It has allmost all the goodies and gadgets, including bluetooth and fingerprint reader, that you could want. There is an ExpressCard/34 for connectivity. It does not have eSata, but I backup to another computer so this doesn't bother me.

I specifically wanted a notebook with built in dvd drive 'cause at some point I plan to install a 64GB or 80GB SDD and would like the option of moving the HDD into an optical drive caddy.

Software
I can't comment on this as two days after I got it I did a clean install. I didn't notice an improvement in battery life after doing so but startup is obviously a fair bit quicker.

Value
I already commented on this at the start of my impressions, but its worth mentioning again. At $800 I really feel that I would have been better off getting a Vostro or an HP DM4t. But I paid $650 + tax for this and I'm very satisfied with what I got for the money.

Final thoughts
If Lenovo's engineers had squeezed 4+ hours out of the battery they would have had a real winner on their hands. As it stands the poor battery life is such a glaring weakness that I find this a hard notebook to recommend to anyone. It meets my needs perfectly and I'm very happy with it. If Lenovo offered a three week full refund return period like Dell and HP do on their consumer line I would tell people to buy and try to see if they can live with the battery life. But without that option I think most people would be better off getting something else.

What a downer of a way to end my impressions of a notebook I really like!

 

Great review. Shame about the battery life though. But for ~$650 it's a steal. Wish my y460 was built like this.

 

The quote that Lenovo sent me is good for another week or two, but seeing as how there might be a fair bit of commuting in my near future, I could really use something with better battery life.

Thanks for your help seayeo, I'm glad to hear that everything worked out for you in the end!

 

I'm glad I could help you make up your mind. Even if it was to make up your mind to not buy the V460!

 

I returned V460 as soon as I bought new Samsung Q430 from bestbuy.
I really liked V460 except for the annoying fan noise.
V460 is a great computer, but Samsung Q430 is superior.
Samsung's build quality is amazing and the noise level is very low.
I also have eyed HP DM4T which is not so appealing to me.

 

I wonder if your V460 had a problem with the fan. On integrated graphics my fan is very quiet.

 

My V460 was loud even on Intel HD graphics.
In contrast, Samsung Q430 is calm on Nvidia 310M.

 

*bump* because I added some observations under heat and noise

 

I'm deciding between this and the u460 any suggestions on which one is best

 

Ha, I'm also looking at this vs the Thinkpad Edge as well as the u450 or u460.

Right now, I really have no clue which way to go. Just looking for good performance, no gaming, etc. Watch a few movies, would like to output HD to an HDTV (I have no idea if HDMI port means this is possible or if it is not "full" HD), and good battery and weight/size.