Samsung Series 7 Laptops - 15.0" and 15.6" Models (NP700Z4 & NP700Z5)

Two things:
1. Did you try to adjust the brightness on both of them? They might both be on different brightness levels.
2. It looks like your angle of shot is closer to the UX411's ideal viewing angle. It's common for the brightness to fade as you increase your viewing angle.

I personally went to BB and compared the brightness to a Lenovo Y460 sitting next to it. They both looked around the same brightness.

 

I'm not sure why people are still complaing about the Best Buy model when its been pretty much confirmed that this is not the final version.

 

I actually didn't attempt to adjust brightness on the Chronos, The BBs around me have their techs setup the laptops for optimal show so I did not think of the possibility that it wasn't, but I regret not checking it since I was in a hurry to make it to a meeting.

2. I did that intentionally as it was the only way to get a proper representation of the difference in screens to show people why the BB model is considered inferior. I went in with high hopes only to be disappointed.
Side note, I come from the tech side so this is my professional opinion, not a general consumer.

Even with a backlighting adjustment I cant see the color saturation quality increasing to compete.

 

It still sucks, buyer beware.


tho I will also say you get what you pay for. Best buy likes to focus on carrying sub 1k laptops now.

 

I disagree with you on this one, consumer might go and mess around with the setting when they are testing out the laptop. The low contrast version is still very disappointing.

 

thx... the size seems decent, no longer than your htc desire...
but looks like abit thick? same thickness as laptop?

 

Probably a silly question, but how do you right-click with this laptop?

 

Touch the bottom on the right side of the touchpad, like on every other laptop?
And the Power adapter looks exactly the same as mine for the R560...

By the way, I just ordered the german S03 version

 

I tried that on the Best Buy model and it was always behaving like the left-clicker.

 

Hm, i'm sure you can configure that yourself in the touchpad settings...
I will see^^

 

Like a Mac? Two finger tap?

 

I saw this video series about the Series 9. If it's the same trackpad as in the 9, he mentions that there are 20 customisable gestures.

He also mentioned that the right-click is done by clicking towards the bottom of the trackpad on the right hand side, and that you can press to click the upper parts of the trackpad but that it is a bit harder to do so.

 

just pinged compusa about the NP700Z5A-S02US model on their website ( CompUSA.com | NP700Z5A-S04US | Samsung Series 7 15.6 Notebook PC ) and they said that they didn't have any more info on when it'd be available, but they did suggest 'checking the website again on Monday'.

 

i have the high end model since yesterday, i can answer some questions

a few things right away:

- if you want to use something that needs opengl, don't buy this laptop. it has some kind of amd/intel dynamic switchable graphics. sadly it doesn't work always and you can't manually tell the laptop to use the amd graphics. well you can select which applications should be run with the amd one, but it doesn't work. it works for everything but opengl applications. so you have to accept that opengl runs on the intel one, which is really fking slow (minecraft runs at ~10fps, im sure the amd could run it easily at 100 fps if you could tell the laptop to use it lol) the hp pavillion dv6 or something like that had the same problem and it took hp months to release a driver update. hopefully samsung brings a driver update to fix this.
directx on the other hand runs great. i can play battlefield bad company 2 at middle-high graphics without problems.

- i like the screen. it's really fking bright at 100%, i had to turn it down to 80% because it was too bright for my eyes lol. contrast is a little bit worse than on the hp probook 4520s (google it or something lol), but it's still good. viewing angles are good too. i have no camera so i cant provide pictures, sorry

- noise is good. it's pretty quiet as long as you dont do some cpu/gpu intensive stuff. when you do something cpu/gpu it gets a bit louder but it's still not too loud (let's say you can barely hear it if you stand about 10 meters away)

 

1. Is the body aluminum or plastic on the bottom?
2. How's the sound quality?

 

Hi and congrats for the new toy.

I've made this request before to other owners and haven't received an answer yet. It's about a detailed report of the components like the one you can get from SiSoftware Sandra Professional Home/Business/Engineer or AIDA64 Extreme Edition. Can be saved in word and published here, for us to know what exactly is inside.

Besides that, could you tell us something about the sound, is it loud enough, how about the bass and which is the location of the speakers, hinge or/and bottom?

Thanks.

 

WORSE as the ProBook 4520? Then this machine has a really bad screen. Can´t wait for the first reviews with meassured figures.

 

Does it get hot? Any info about temperature on keyboard, palm rest and bottom?

 

the bottom and the part in front of the keyboard (where you have your palms) is plastic, everything else is aluminum.

sound is good. i mean, if you use the speakers you can still hear that the sounds comes from a laptop, but there is nothing wrong with it, i think it's even a little bit better than on my old laptop (hp probook 4520s). and you can of course use headphones or external speakers if you need "more"

 

If you could, I'd REALLY appreciate knowing how the machine handles Ubuntu. Not working with OpenGL sounds really bad for potential linux support..

 

The OpenGL thing is definitely a driver issue, so if you can find mobile AMD Drivers for Linux, then you are good to go, also for windows, if you can replace the crap samsung drivers by official AMD drivers then I'm sure OpenGL will also work.
Gonna test that when I get mine, I'm planning to do a full wipe and then install only the important Samsung crapware like for the FN Keys and original drivers.

 

i played bfbc2 for about an hour and it didn't get hot, the keyboard got a bit warm, but it's not like you burn your fingers or something lol. i don't know if it get's worse if you have it under heavy load for more than an hour.

Sandra overview, i'm sorry it's in german because i don't know how to change the language

 

i have already tried to install the driver from the amd page but i couldn't install it. it said something like this driver isn't compatible and i have to download the drivers from the manufacturer.

i have also tried to disable the intel card in the device manager but it didn't work either. there is also no option in the bios to disable the intel graphics or something like that.

 

Intel' 2nd generation processor (SandyBridge - switchable graphics) is not working properly with openGL?

 

powerfoggeli, could you download hwmonitor and tell us the temps idle and with full load (playing games)? thanks!

 

Thank you.

Just that I don't see anywhere the display description. Could you take a look at this please?

 

Im starting to get sooo pissed off waiting to buy it >.< I'm just gonna delete all bookmarks and go to work mindlessly for a week, then check back, hopefully I can pick it up right away in a store by then !

 

Me too, one of the reasons i wanted this lappy so bad was because i didnt have the will power to wait and save for a MBP. The amount of time it is taking for this release though...

 

I confirm that there is a mini display port and that Samsung give an adapter Mini/VGA

 

It's not really a problem with the CPU, it's AMD switching graphics. They had problems on multiple brands, Hp was one of them as mentioned, Dell was another.
If only this laptop had a nvidia card (optimus >> amd switching), since i need openGl this might be a huge deal breaker for me now...

 

Oh no, why can't manufacturers use the AMD reference drivers? What do they gain by forcing their own adaptation, which in general is updated very rarely and only in the early part of the product's life span?

This was the reason I steared clear off the Sony Vaio SE - just to find out that Samsung does the same. Well, I'll probably get the Samsung anyway but the OpenGL problem worries me...

Anyway, Powerjoggeli, thanks for sharing your impressions. From your system spec dump I couldn't see if the AMD graphics uses DDR5 but I think 6750 implies DDR5. Otherwise it woud turn into a 6650.

 

I just want to say this computer could of been awesome but samsung messed it all up and it sucks, the screen sucks and any version you get and the switchable graphics is crap. I'll wait till samsung gets their shat together because they can't be serious with this.

 

Thank you for your valuable input, can you leave the thread now that you've decided not to buy the laptop

 

Powerjoggeli, could you please tell, is there 8GB of SDD (express cache), subwoofer and GDDR3 or GDDR5 GPU memory on 6750?

 

I wanted to apologize again for being disappointed (albeit just my opinion) but a bit misguided when I expressed my being upset at the computer reality (as I saw it) vs. the hype. I wanted this computer (with the 6750), but the screen/issues on the BB really disappointed me.

And not being listened to I took too personally. (Sorry.) You guys have really, overall, been nice about it, and I won't repeat the mistake. Thanks for the 2nd chance.

That out of the way, I see this as a near miss (or maybe close enough). Maybe even better than a near miss as $950 at BB for this machine is not that bad. Moreover, we should wait for real reviews such as from this site, individuals, notebookcheck, laptop mag, anandtech, Amazon and so on.

I would counsel waiting. If not, you won't buy a terrible machine, especially given the price. Personally, I hope the reviews/machine are good, but I'm no longer emotionally invested in this machine. I'd advise the same --- with any machine.

It may still be a good value and everyone has different needs.

 

yes it has an 8gb ssd and the 6750 has gddr5
i don't know if it has a subwoofer, but it doesn't sound like it. how can i check this? i'm not really experienced with audio stuff lol

 

powerjoggeli do you (in seconds) how long does it take to boot up (cold boot) and to be responsive from sleep?

 

Seems to be a LOT of confusion between the watered down Series 7 (like the model Best Buy has) and the REAL CHRONOS 7 Series we all want.

The NP700Z3A-S01US 14" is the watered down model, like the 15.6" Best Buy had early. Not the "Chronos" 7 series everyone has been drooling over and as seen on Samsung's website. People seem to be REALLY confused on this.

What I (we) want is the 14" NP700Z3AH this is the true 7 series chronos model with backlit keyboard, etc. Correct me if I am wrong someone. Samsung is borderline deceptive with this IMO. The other model does not have some of the features the "Chronos" one does as seen on the Samsung website. There are some unhappy reviews on Best Buy already for the 15".

I have not seen the NP700Z3AH on sale anywhere yet.

A review @ bestbuy http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Samsung...95331&id=1218406257887#tabbed-customerreviews

Maybe I'm confused. I see sites listing the non-Chronos model but with features like the backlit keyboard?

 

optimus doesn't work with linux at all though, and my experience with the open-source driver and ATI has been a lot smoother than nvidia's closed source driver or nouveau.. soo... yeah.. I guess the sooner someone else can try the nice 15" version with linux the better for me. I'll certainly do it myself if I can get a hold of one from tigerdirect.. (they have a store near me)

 

What model is at tiger direct then? They list it as the S04. Is that the full spec CHRONOS version? I'm just waiting for the laptop to be released so I can order one, getting a whole lot of stuff posted to me in UK with a forwarding service. Do you think it would be a good idea to pre-order the one from tigerdirect? I definitely want one, it's exactly what I'm looking for, not really too bothered about screen quality use my dell monitor a lot of the time but I don't mind waiting and I need at least the 6750 so no BB version for me.

 

I personally would have pre ordered by now if Samsung's release wasn't so damn confusing

 

You can preorder it here: Microsoft Store Online - Samsung Series 7 Notebook (14.0-Inch)

 

Is the NP700Z5A-S04US the full CHRONOS top spec version or at least the version with 6GB ram instead of 8GB?

 

So I have one of these machines, and I'm fine with the display (BB version). Almost all the time, I'd have this connected up to (hopefully) two monitors. The HDMI is easy enough to work out, but I can't for the life of me figure out what the other "Monitor Port" is. It's not Mini DisplayPort, it's not Micro DVI or Micro HDMI. It's not Micro USB. Anyone out there who might know? I've googled to death and can't find anything. Samsung doesn't sell any accessories for this series of laptops yet, so I'm out of luck there too.

Hoping someone with more connector knowledge might be able to help. The connector is 8mm wide and 3mm tall, as measured by my (non-digital) caliper.

I'm attaching two pictures to this post, one of the port and the USB next to it (for scale) and one of the port as close as I could get without getting too blurry.

 

Please please please...even though I'm not due for an upgrade for at least another year and a half, I'm hoping this turns out to be a winner! I've come to really respect for Samsung products (after-service support, not so much!). If it turns out the screen quality for the non-BB versions is close to top-notch while remaining matte, consider me a future customer. I don't expect too many other PC makers to try their luck in the thin/light performance notebook segment for a while.


If I can get a guarantee that I can get a super cheap Ivy Bridge Series 7 or a well-priced Haswell Series 7, I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for my future upgrade.

 

According to some of the previews it's supposed to be a (mini?) VGA port. It should come with an adapter. Do you have any extra cords in the box?

 

Comparing with Samsung Series 7 Chronos, what about Sony Vaio SA Series?
I mean, last 10 Vaio models showing on this page :
Sapthagiri Infotech - Sony Laptops

 

This is a mini VGA port usually seen on Macs. There should be a cable that coverts that to VGA.

 

i think i've set a date...
if samsung doesnt get this to me by the time i get a galaxy nexus...im getting an acer 14 inch that i've been itching to buy
AS4830TG-6450 | Product Model

i was the same way with the galaxy s2 phone when it finally came out to the u.s
i didnt even want it anymore

good thing samsung is making the galaxy nexus or else they would've lost a customer, but i'd like to attribute more of the new nexus phone to google...than samsung

 

I bought an earlier-refresh model (I think it was a 3810t) and the screen backlight gradually broke three times in a row, in addition to other components. I think the lid was so poorly designed that normal handling exposed it to damage. Based on that experience, I wouldn't really recommend this series, but that's just an anecdote.