Ideapad Y460 build quality

Hello there, I am debating on a new laptop and have been looking at mainly the Y460 and the Hp envy 14.

I want something with some semi powerful graphics but also with the ability to be somewhat portable. My main concern is the build quality of the y460, my previous laptop was excellent internally, but eventually the hinges gave out and cracked severly, ultimately killing the screen. Is the y460 a good build? How about the hinges? Since the envy 14 is all aluminum im not too concerned there. Ive also heard of screen problems in the ideapads, this true with the 460 as well?

Also this is for a Canadian order, so would you know of any ways to save on coupons if possible?

Thanks in advance and hope to hear some replies

 

if you are worried about hinge i say you should go with an actual thinkpad.

 

I would have to imagine that the Envy would have better hinges and in general would be built better. From what I've heard from other owners is that the y460 has the build quality of most consumer laptops excluding some here and there. There are no problems with the screens, but the y560's have seen "dancing pixels." (Not all of them) The Canadian site does offer coupons, but they seem to happen less frequent then the American site.

 

HP Envy 14's build quality would obviously better since you also pay a lot more and Envy series is top-of-line class.

From my personal observation, build quality of Y460 is average. It's not bad. It's not great, either. It's about the same quality as my XPS M1330.

In my experience, the smaller laptop gets, the tougher it gets against wear and tear.

 

Yea im aware of the envy being all metal, but what im really concerned about is really the hinges, if say the lenovo hinges were quite strong and maybe metal as well, then I wouldnt be so worried, would any owners be able to chime in? also any other suggestions are appreciated.

 

AboutThreeFitty and I are both owners of Y460. I see no problem whatsoever with hinges and I don't think I will have any problems either in the future.

I could take pictures of the hinge part for you if you like.

 

The hinges are decent. In the 3 months I've had mine they have giving me no troubles or cause for concern. In the y460 and y560 forum I haven't heard anyone say that they have had problems with them.

 

yea that would be great, what are they made out of? Is the quality decent? Do you think there may be any problems in the future with normal use?

 

anyone else?

 

I'm gonna probably guy a Y460 also. Personally, of all the things to worry about, the hinges are about number 999 on a list of 1000 I always spend the 100 bucks and get the 3 year warranty anyway.

As far as build quality, we have Dell, IBM, Lenovo, Toshiba, Acer and Asus laptops in the family. I have to put Toshiba at the complete top here, as they are just a league above. The old Thinkpad (IBM branded) is a close second in terms of being sturdy, but it is ugly and heavy. I also have a brand new Lenovo X200S, which is built like a tank, but also ugly and boring. Asus is ok, but not great. Dell and Acer, disposable at best.

The Lenovo guys know what they are doing, thats for sure. They don't skimp and are great engineers. Obviously, since I don't have the Y460 yet, I'm speaking out of my arse , but I have to believe there will be no problem. Hinges haven't been a problem in a very long time.

Its usually displays that die, or cooling fans that clog with dust and cause planar (motherboard) failures. Or some port comes loose and jambs against some other circuit and kills something.

The only other unit that meets your description (my exact one as well) is a Toshiba L630 with the ATI 5150 in it. Its a few less dollars, and its a 13.3 instead of a 14 (not too big a difference for me at least) I'm torn now between the 2 (lenovo and toshiba) at the moment.

I've had just terrific luck with Toshiba over the past few years, so my muscle memory keeps putting that one in the shopping cart. But the Lenovo Y460 is just fantastic, and I have one of those in a shopping cart also!!

I'm just gonna have an extra Patron on the rocks tonight and randomly buy one of them

 

For some reason i find the consumer line of Toshiba to be rather ordinary in terms of quality. Also, the L630 that you mentioned is just a consumer line laptop, which has pretty much the same hinge design as the Lenovo ideapad.

Toshiba uses mostly JDM (joint design manufacturing) and ODM (original design manufacturing) laptop designs, which means they are designed by the CM (contract manufacturers) on behalf of toshiba.

I don't think any of my friends whom have used Toshiba says their laptop quality is anything extraordinary like they once were. Their business laptop is okay, but not that exciting in design either, and user friendliness is also not on a high priority list.

 

Haha thanks nano, appreciate the opinion. Any owners willing to chime in? How about screen quality, is it really as glossy as some would have you believe?

 

so you would recommend lenovo in this case lead?

 

It is up to you, which laptop you want to purchase. Personally most of the consumer line laptops are pretty similar. Most of the consumer laptops tend to have high hinge failures and cracking of cases around hinge. So i would recommend a laptop that has solid hinge design.

I am not sure how robust the Y460 design is, since i have never used them before.

Don't always choose a laptop based on how good it looks, it must be durable and functional, otherwise don't expect your laptop to last too long.

 

Yea, the hinge issue is what im most afraid of, my other laptop was otherwise perfect aside from the hinges literally falling apart. This is something i want to avoid in the future

 

This is why i recommend you spend a bit more and get an entry level thinkpad T series. Personally i would never buy another full size consumer grade laptops.

 

yea unfortunately the T series doesnt seem to have the same kind of power behind it regarding graphics, which is the only fault i can see.

 

Correct. I don't see a problem with these hinges though. Granted, they are not of Thinkpad quality, but they are rather large and seem sturdy. I let my warranty worry about the hinges.

 

Then you should consider the DIY vidock option, while it is not portable (in relative sense), a desktop grade ATI 4770 is probably going to beat most of the mobile GPU in terms of graphic performance. And you also get 3 extra LCD output, which including the DP + VGA on the laptop, would get you up to 5 LCD.

 

I had an IdeaPad Y560 which was great for gaming but since I don't do that much gaming I traded it for a new ThinkPad T410. The build quality of the Y560 had me a little worried. (A bit too much flex here and there, creaky hinges, wobbly screen.)

The ThinkPad T Series has very good, solid build quality. The steel hinges, the "rollcage" and great keyboard, etc. Also, the new integrated Intel HD graphics is strong enough to play some games at high detail (like Half-Life 2). I'm not an Nvidia fan for reasons I won't go into here. The ATI cards have always performed well for me.

 

does anyone know if the ati 5650 in the envy 14 and the y460 uses ddr3 or gddr3 memory?

 

which Y460 graphics card are you talking about? there is two ATI options.

 

I am sorry that I ddin't upload pictures. I get pretty tired after work and I didn't want to spend time to take pictures.

I've had around 6 laptops so far, some of which weren't included in my signature. I am pretty sure that the hinges won't be an issue for Y460. It's well built and hidden well. Alienware M11x seems to be suffering from a hinge issue though. I am glad I chose Leonvo Y460 over M11x.

For a consumer laptop which cost me 933 CAD, I got what I paid for. The build quality is higher for what I paid for, so I have no complaints. I know there are better laptops out there if I paid more, but you know, money is always the issue. (For me at least)

Take care of your laptop and it will take care of you digitally. It doesn't matter how tough a laptop is. If you are careless, it's going to break sooner or later.

My only issue with Y460 is that Expresscard slot is not built well. I am using a 128gb SSD as main and am using a 64gb high-performance expresscard SSD 64gb as a second drive. I am having a hard time keeping the expresscard in place because the card doesn't go in completely. My bag is designed for 14 inch and my expresscard is always getting in its way for me to put into my bag, so I have to take it out everytime I put it in my laptop bag.
That's my only problem.

For what I paid for, I am satisfied.

 

are you sure that there are two options?

on this page I see two options with integrated graphics and one with an ati mobility 5650:
Lenovo - Laptops & netbooks - IdeaPad laptops - Y Series - Y460

the one on this page is the one I am wondering about (the $999 config on the right)

 

^^I have no clue what lead_org is talking about. Read more information here: Notebookcheck: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650 Graphics Card Review

If you don't want to read..... "With the help of a magnifier, we could make out the label “5TQ1 G63BFR” from the company Hynix, which is immediately identified as DDR3 modules by means of Google. For this review this is relevant as faster GDDR3 modules could further improve the performance of the ATI Mobility Radeon."

 

On the Y560 I had (ATI 5730) the video ram was GDDR3 according to GPU-Z. I'm betting the 5650 also comes with GDDR3.

 

If you don't need the expresscard slot, could look at a cheaper Acer 4820TG.

US$900 14" Acer 4820TG i5-450M 2.4 4GB 500GB HD5650+HD

 

the y460 is $100 off the $999 price through july 7th


Lenovo - Lenovo laptop savings

 

AboutThreeFitty, would you be willing to run GPU-Z on your y460 and post a screen shot of the result?

Thanks,
Alec

 

I mis-read a spec from a review site, which listed the Y560 ATI option in addition to the Y460 ATI option. My bad.

 

Here you go.

For some kicks, read here http://forums.amd.com/game/messageview.cfm?catid=264&threadid=130754

 

so im thinking of going with the ideapad, being a canadian, are there any coupons that i could use or go with? it seems like theres already 200 off, but it would be great if i could knock off a bit more

 

When I bought it, the 200 off was still present. I also had managed to get some father's day coupon as well which knocked off 100 off that, so my discount was 300 total.

It got shipped after 4 days from Hong Kong and arrived 4 days later.

 

You could also see if anyone you know either works for IBM (the best lenovo corporate discount) or works for a company that gets an Lenovo corporate discount. It usually ends up being about 10% less than the Lenovo public website (but not always). I haven't impulse bought one yet. There's always tomorrow.