It's been just under 3 weeks since I got this laptop so I thought I'd do a review. (also they're offering free stuff for the review so that's great)
Chassis & Display
Optimus Series: 13.3" Matte Full HD LED IPS Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-4710MQ (2.50GHz) 6MB
Memory (RAM)
16GB KINGSTON SODIMM DDR3 1600MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 960M - 2.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12
M.2 SSD Drive
120GB Kingston SSDNow mS200 mSATA (upto 550MB/sR | 520MB/sW)
Memory Card Reader
Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
Intel 2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack
Wireless/Wired Networking
GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® N-7260 HMC (300Mbps, 802.11BGN) + BLUETOOTH
USB Options
3 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT AS STANDARD
Battery
13.3" Optimus Series 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (62.16WH)
Power Cable
1 x UK Power Lead & 120W AC Adaptor
Keyboard Language
13.3" OPTIMUS SERIES BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Windows 10 Upgrade
FREE Upgrade to Windows 10 with all Windows 7 & Windows 8.1 Purchases*
DVD Recovery Media
NO DVD RECOVERY MEDIA REQUIRED
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Webcam
INTEGRATED 2.0 MEGAPIXEL WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 8 to 10 working days
Quantity
1
The laptop was intended as a replacement of my old one (nearly 5 year old ASUS laptop).
I use the laptop for playing games while I'm not at home, doing college work and watching videos.
I have a gaming-oriented desktop already so this laptop didn't need to be extremely high-performance so I went for something more portable, hence the 13.3" form factor and the 960M.
I added a 1TB HDD I had spare for mass-storage.
Before adding the HDD this laptop was silent when idling. Now I get around 35db, of course it's hard to tell how much of that was due to the laptop itself. Either way, it's quiet when it's not doing anything.
However when it's under load it's pretty obvious; ~62db from the fans while the GPU is active.
I also did a somewhat rough look at temperatures under some conditions.
Under the default windows balanced power setting while idling, the temperature stays at ~55C which isn't too bad considering the form factor.
Under power saving settings the temperature drops to ~53C.
When the CPU was under 100% load for a few minutes the temperatures rose up to ~88C with one core reaching as high as 95C. I used OCCT to max out the CPU and view temperatures.
The laptop is pretty fast at booting up and resuming from sleep with resuming from sleep taking seconds at most and a system restart taking ~30 seconds.
All issues I have had with this laptop are software related and not related to pcspecialist, the hardware works as advertised and expected.
From ordering to receiving the laptop it took 21 days with processing taking 7 days, pre-production taking 8 days, building taking 1 day, testing taking 4 days and QC/dispatch taking 1 day.
Overall I'd give the laptop an 8/10
Chassis & Display
Optimus Series: 13.3" Matte Full HD LED IPS Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-4710MQ (2.50GHz) 6MB
Memory (RAM)
16GB KINGSTON SODIMM DDR3 1600MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 960M - 2.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12
M.2 SSD Drive
120GB Kingston SSDNow mS200 mSATA (upto 550MB/sR | 520MB/sW)
Memory Card Reader
Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
Intel 2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack
Wireless/Wired Networking
GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® N-7260 HMC (300Mbps, 802.11BGN) + BLUETOOTH
USB Options
3 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT AS STANDARD
Battery
13.3" Optimus Series 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (62.16WH)
Power Cable
1 x UK Power Lead & 120W AC Adaptor
Keyboard Language
13.3" OPTIMUS SERIES BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Windows 10 Upgrade
FREE Upgrade to Windows 10 with all Windows 7 & Windows 8.1 Purchases*
DVD Recovery Media
NO DVD RECOVERY MEDIA REQUIRED
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Webcam
INTEGRATED 2.0 MEGAPIXEL WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 8 to 10 working days
Quantity
1
The laptop was intended as a replacement of my old one (nearly 5 year old ASUS laptop).
I use the laptop for playing games while I'm not at home, doing college work and watching videos.
I have a gaming-oriented desktop already so this laptop didn't need to be extremely high-performance so I went for something more portable, hence the 13.3" form factor and the 960M.
I added a 1TB HDD I had spare for mass-storage.
Before adding the HDD this laptop was silent when idling. Now I get around 35db, of course it's hard to tell how much of that was due to the laptop itself. Either way, it's quiet when it's not doing anything.
However when it's under load it's pretty obvious; ~62db from the fans while the GPU is active.
I also did a somewhat rough look at temperatures under some conditions.
Under the default windows balanced power setting while idling, the temperature stays at ~55C which isn't too bad considering the form factor.
Under power saving settings the temperature drops to ~53C.
When the CPU was under 100% load for a few minutes the temperatures rose up to ~88C with one core reaching as high as 95C. I used OCCT to max out the CPU and view temperatures.
The laptop is pretty fast at booting up and resuming from sleep with resuming from sleep taking seconds at most and a system restart taking ~30 seconds.
All issues I have had with this laptop are software related and not related to pcspecialist, the hardware works as advertised and expected.
From ordering to receiving the laptop it took 21 days with processing taking 7 days, pre-production taking 8 days, building taking 1 day, testing taking 4 days and QC/dispatch taking 1 day.
Overall I'd give the laptop an 8/10