Ideapad u330 - New owners :-)

Happy to hear am not the only one waiting, expected shipping by 10/23.
I need this laptop, I am replacing my SONY PCG-FRV26 (Very Old). I hope I don't experience any problems. Is there anyone on this forum that regrets buying the U330?

-Am gonna call about compensation...thanx samwisegamgee

 

Yeah please do. Let us know how it goes. Good luck.

I don't regret getting U330. It's still one of the best buys out there, if not the best out there at that price point.

I am aware we have lots of complains about the build quality, but I feel some posters are just expecting perfection.

I am not saying there are no build quality problems but I do believe the problems could be fixed given enough time. This is all the more important to get extended warranty.

I had an HP laptop and it falls apart just after one year of use. Talk about build quality.

So don't get too influenced by what you read here. Maybe after all the delay your laptop will have much improve build quality.

You and I have waited so long for the laptop, to give up now is not wise.

 

I've been reading up on the Lenovo forums and it seems that "Mark" and his people have found the problems and are tying to resolve most of the issues. I just hope that all fixes are being applied to my order and those before mine, and not just the ones after it.

 

as some people have said, only the people who are nitpicking and find complaints take the time to post about them. i have absolutely nothing bad to say about my u330, its the best computer i've owned.

question for those of you who have one:
the veriface detection for some reason started only occurring sometimes when resuming from sleep or hibernating. upon a fresh reboot/startup it waits for the face scan (or pw input), and used to do the same when i would resume from sleep (from closing the lid, or choosing sleep from shutdown menu). but now it only does it sometimes, and i cant figure out why. any ideas?

 

Still waiting for my Lenovo U330...

 

spd18, maybe try reinstalling it?

 

Hey everyone. New here to NotebookReview. I bought a u330 this past weekend and just going through all of these posts... I really haven't had any of these problems.

Under power saver mode, I have my wireless lan and bluetooth on, inegrated graphics on, brightness @20% and have just been surfing the web, checking emails in outlook and typing up a storm in MSword (darn school work) and going on 4hours and still @17% on my battery remaining.

The furthest I've run on Balanced was @ 50% brightness, wireless / bluetooth on, again same stuff pretty much as above... and got just over 3 hours on the battery before I had to plug back in.

On Hi Perf. I get just over 2 hours on battery while playing WoW w/ Ati graphics on(surprisingly@ about 50fps with med to high settings).

Just my experiences

 

reminder:

live.com cashback should be available (or will be available soon) for those who ordered when the deal first came around

 

Hi all,
I have noticed several of you mention that you can just install OS X on the u330 and forego getting a MB. I am aware of the osX86 project and know that OS X can run on PC's but...

have any of you actually installed OS X on your new U330? If so, is all of the hardware supported? Any issues?

I'm not starting a windows vs os x/ mac vs pc debate. I just need to know if OS X runs well on this machine. If it does, I'm in!

 

Thanx for the input klrgoten, on a scale of 1 to 10 (bad-excellent) what do you rate the U330?

 

okay, that's the last straw. i was originally supposed to ship back in september, then it got moved to october 10th, then october 22nd. i called back again today and it's been moved again until the week of november 10th.

i needed a laptop at the beginning of october (in the interim i've had to travel with an old dell e1705 which is a BRICK!).

i'm going to check out the hp dv3510nr at best buy tonight. assuming it feels okay, i'll have it in my hands tonight. screw you lenovo!

 

I installed OSX on the U330 and it came up okay. But I could not get it to use the ATI graphics card for full resolution. Also the wireless adapter could not be detected. I installed on an external USB drive since I did not want to remove the stuff on the onboard HDD. I did not try all the fixes/patches/ktexts for the devices, but I guess I don't know enough to try out all of them.

 

Mine got delay also. Now it's the third time.

I am told the delay is due to Lenovo is waiting on LCD screen supply. Take it for what it's worth.

 

So sorry for your delays guys. I am sure you can get a $100 compensation for your troubles, as I did. If you need the name of a helpful rep, PM me and I'll send you his contact info.

 

Oh yeah, thanks for the reminder. $98 back in 2 days.

I'm pretty happy with my purchase, though my machine does exhibit some weird tendencies from time to time, such as constant HD access, sporadic difficulty switching between graphics cards, inconsistent audio functionality from the HDMI port, etc (not to mention Veriface - sure, it is gimmicky to begin with, but it really works poorly for me). I'm going to wipe the system soon and install Vista Ultimate; haven't done this yet and I'm expecting some of these weird issues to go away with a fresh install and updated drivers.

My biggest complaint by far, and I've voiced this before, is the screen. Perhaps I have a singular experience, but I simply cannot find comfortable settings. It invariably looks washed out, especially for light colors, and lacks contrast for darks. Viewing angles are poor too; a slight change can make the difference from being able to discern an image or not. Watching full screen video with the same settings that I find "comfortable" for browsing and reading text is impossible.

I've seriously been considering returning it; I spent a pretty good chunk of change on this machine and I'm hoping to not buy another laptop for many years (especially with the economy in the crapper).

Can anyone share the numerical values they use for gamma/contrast/brightness etc that they find comfortable? I've played with the settings so much that they've lost all meaning.

Sorry for the long post, but there aren't really any other places for me to discuss the U330 - I certainly doubt that I'll find anyone else using one to compare against anytime soon. Thanks!

 

if you do wipe the system make sure you have the secondary display control drivers. Other wise it will have the discrete graphics drawing power but not being functional.
or at least that is what happened when i tried. Also for some reason i got errors when trying to download from lenovos site... very frustrating.

 

Yeah I don't know what the heck is up with their website. It is hit or miss. I managed to get all the Vista drivers available except for the one touch recovery driver or whatever. I downloaded this 3 times and it kept timing out once it got to ~280 mb out of 320. Now the driver page is totally unavailable, weird.

EzTargut, if you are in considerable need, PM me your email and I'll send you a file.

 

Thanks, sensaurabh. What resolution do you get? Can you switch between the two cards?


Anyone else try this?

 

So, the top and bottom are from magnesium-aluminum? What about the area around the keyboard and trackpad. Is that plastic?

 

I ended up just reverting with one key.

I needed the laptop to do homework on so it really wasnt an option to keep it at that point in time.

I just went through and deleted most the bloatware manually.
I never got veri-face to run effectively
More frustrating than not.


Shopeshopper. Did you notice any considerable improvment in battery life when you refreshed vista.

Notebook hardware control has me draining at 14 watts(3.5 hrs) with wifi and half brightness

 

Great news everyone, I got another delay...yay. I ordered my U330 on September 25th and since then I've had 4 delays: 10/9, 10/16, 10/23 and now it is 10/23 for expected delivery.

- I really want to cancel this order, but if I do what other laptops are out there that you guys would recommend.

 

vaio's are bout it.

or if you dont care about discrete graphics get an x200
but ide assume tats part of the reson you want the u330

 

Vaios are pricey though.
I want a laptop thats lightwieght and has an optical drive.

 

Another satisfied u330 owner here. Really like this thing, for $900 it was a steal. HDMI out has worked flawlessly

I took a little time to calibrate mine after reading about the washout issues ( I didn't notice it before). I found that the lenovo forums is a good page to test the whites, there is a light gray in the margin and subject line that doesn't appear on default settings. Then I used a dark wallpaper to test black crush and another wallpaper for skin tones all compared against my desktop lcd.

For Intel I have:
Gamma 1
Brightness Red 5 Green -9 Blue -9
Contrast 43

AMD
Gamma 0.9
Brightness Red 10 Green -20 Blue -20
Contrast 70

 

Wow your settings are great. I feel like I have a brand new lcd screen. I wish I can calibrate my desktop lcd like this....

 

Wow, you butchered the 'ole handle - heh, I don't shop for shoes.

I haven't done it yet. Too busy with work and still debating on whether to use my copy of Ultimate on my HTPC or my laptop. I wish I could try it out w/o burning through the license. I just want to play around with Media Center and see how nice Aero looks on the big screen. Not sure what kind of battery life I get, mostly use it plugged in - 3.5 hrs seems about right.

 

Well crap... after waiting for my Dell E4300 and having it delayed over a month, I decided to look elsewhere and came across the Lenovo U330. Ordered it with an estimated ship date of 10/27. Now my Lenovo order is delayed until 11/3 (website still shows 10/27).

Based on the previous comments in this thread, I'm concerned my order will be extended again and again. I called Lenovo, and they're telling me the website order date is just a system generated thing, and to ignore it.

I can wait until 11/3, but I don't care to wait longer than that. What complicates matters is that my Dell has now shipped, and should be delivered to me today. I like items about the Dell (slightly longer battery life, slightly faster processor, backlit keyboard), but I also prefer items about the Lenovo (switchable graphics, no frame monitor, bigger HDD, lower price).

What to do, what to do!! I know my Dell was delayed for the display being backordered, but now that Dell has theirs, I'm wondering if it was the same supplier, and now Lenovos should be rolling out of the factory.

Thoughts, anyone?

 

You can use the license for your current copy of vista, but that would defeat the purpose of ultimate.

Lol sorry bout the name, was running late for a class when typing that haha

 

I sent my week old U330 in to have the keyboard replaced and it arrived at it's destination on 10/13 and I was given an estimated turn-around time of 5-7 days. 11 days later they still cannot tell me the status of the repairs beyond that it's "under inspection". The representatives do not know if it is repaired yet or when it will ship or the reason for the delay.

Maybe one day I'll be able to use the laptop I ordered September 5th...

 

Well, sonavagun! My order shipped!!

 

My order was shipped as well Friday evening. I should have it by Monday or Tuesday. I realized that I will be at work when they ship it at my house. What do I do since it needs a signature? Can I leave a message to the UPS guy saying it is alright to leave it at my house? Will he do that?

 

JTrix, the driver can't leave it becasue it requires your signature.
What you can do is to tell the driver to deliver it to your neighbor's house(of course, you neighbor have to sign it) or just go pick it up yourself. Their information is on the paper left by the driver on your door, so just call them and stop the second attemp deliver and pick it up at their location.
Even if they can just leave it, i won't recommend since we waited like forever to get it...

Mine was shipped on friday 10/24 as well even though Lenovo told me 11/3. I received the shipping confirmation email on friday, and got tracking infomation the next day. I did call them and complaine and got my order on the critical shipping list, and a little refund for the wait.

so excited...!!!! I hope they fixed the problems since the first patch of shipment.

Lenovo Ideapad U330 22672AU
10/24 shipped!!

 

Mine was shipped on 10/24/2008 as well. Looks like they got the LED screen restocked.

Finally

 

Hey i called Lenovo and their telling me that I am getting $25 deduction, but how did some of you get that $100 compensation? Can anyone give the contact info for the person that you talked to at lenovo? What should I tell them. I've had 4 delays already.

 

PM Havoc.

U should at least receive $50.00.

 

I think I found the cause (or at least part of it) for the poor battery life some people are experiencing on the U330. I posted this issue in foruns.lenovo, and two other people signalized the same behavior:

"Recently, I notice an issue that may or may not be one o the causes of the bad battery life on the U330. Normally, when I turn the notebook on with full battery charge I get an expected battery life of around 3:20 hours (2 levels of brightness, wifi on, bluetooth off, in battery saver mode). In this condition, if I use the notebook for light web surfing I get close to the promised 3 hours and a few minutes before the computer goes to sleep. However, if with a full charge battery I close the lid and put the notebook to hibernate when I turn it on again I don't get anywhere near to 3 hours of battery life (the difference of charge is normally of only 2-3% before and after the hibernation). I normally get only 1:40 hours of battery life, roughly half of what it gives without having hibernate.

I went further and nstalled Notebook Hardware Control to investigate this issue. The notebook normally consumes 14-16W idle with the configuration stated above. After coming back from hibernation on the same conditions my U330 consumes 22-26W, what is clearly the reason to the decrease of the battery life. The only way to return to the normal 14-16W is to restart the notebook. Charging till 100% or putting it to hibernate again doesn't work."


Did someone here noticed the same? Do you know how to solve this problem?

 

I recieved my u330 today, the laptop is AMAZING, its definitly worth the wait. There are no problem i found so far, it looks awsome. I love it so much.
The battery power is not great, but i can deal with it, 1 :45 mins under max volume music.

 

Lenovo U330 Review:
The U330 is the cutting edge of technology and design perfection. I just received mine and came across this thread. For those of you who don’t have a U330, you may aptly be led to conclude that the U330 is a plagued laptop. There are two reasons that explain why, after reading this blog, you feel this way about an otherwise tremendous laptop.

First, for reasons that escape us prudent men and women, some bloggers here are examining and scrutinizing this laptop as if it were a timeless blood diamond. Let me reiterate, this is a laptop. History informs us that they last about 3 years, at which point we will throw them out for new ones. So for those of you who plan on passing your U330 down through 7 generations, so some girl you will never know can wear perfection on her finger, do us a favor; zales.com

Second, the principle that “you get what you pay for” applies. For a few hundred bucks you may get a hooker, but unlike the former NY Governor, you’re not going to get a good one. Note the number of discount buyers who have posted here. I have paid roughly the regular price, and ordered direct through Lenovo. It is likely that the “first batch” was discounted for a reason; to compensate for some initial production issues. If you purchased a highly discounted U330, you got exactly what you paid for; a peg legged stripper that showed up late, and didn’t stay long (unplugged).

I am a law student, and my laptop is required almost everywhere I go. I have lugged around a 15.4 ThinkPad for a year now… not fun. I needed a change, and not like the one that Obama promises. Political views aside, my U330 has delivered. I ordered mine on 10/24, and it was delivered 10/28 (The 24th is a Friday too!!). It is a truly beautiful laptop that gets attention, and its thin and ultra light, I don’t even know it’s in my bag. There is not a single problem with mine. Battery life for the U330 is 4hr 40min, and that is not even on max power save setting. I may be getting this battery life because I tweaked advanced settings. (I may post a guide on here later). The performance of the U330 is superior. Plainly stated, the U330 is very fast. The LED screen is brilliant! (Turn down the brightness Dumbo).

I worked for Intel for 2 years. The technology packed into the U330 is cutting edge. There is nothing better, period. Let me lay a few things out there for perspective buyers, as I thoroughly researched this buying decision:

1. The new Intel Technology in here is the latest and greatest. It features DDR3 ram running at 1066mhz. This makes a HUGE difference since the processor will be running at this speed too. This is otherwise the single largest “gating factor” in CPU performance. (if you have CPU bus running at 800mhz, and ram running at 1066, the extra ram speed is useless). Thus, the set up in this computer is perfect, and it crunches out everything I throw at it, no questions asked.

2. The new Intel chip set also = Better wireless range and speed, and revolutionary graphics switching. Speaking of which, the GPU is more than capable. Yeah you can’t play Crysis at max settings, but I can’t even do that on my Home Entertainment PC (it packs a $500 graphics card, extreme edition core 2 duo, 4 gig ram, 7200rpm hdd). Cyrsis is just a resource consuming game, that needs SLI graphics, and that alone will run you around $800 and is only available in desktops. This is a laptop. Readjust.

3. My model comes packed with 3 gigs of ram, and 320 gigs of hard drive space. The drive comes nicely partitioned (30 gig partition for system recovery back-ups and the like). This laptop is roughly 4lbs, and is ultra-portable, yet sacrifices NOTHING. (see 1 and 2 above)

4. Where are you really going with the laptop? I take it everywhere, so it had to be light and small. Plus, I wanted something that looked sleek. The 13.3 in on the U330, however, has plenty viewing area.

5. Lenovo makes an amazing laptop. They are known worldwide for quality and durability. This will be my third one. I have never had a single hardware or chassis problem. This thing is solid, and it looks and feels it.

In sum, if you are looking for portability without sacrifice, this is the way to go.

 

Its about time I've heard some good news about the U330. Especially about how the weight of the U330 is and how it feels.

 

For a law major you sure do sound like a business major... "revolutionary", "yet sacrifices nothing".

I just received mine back and am loving it. I however do disagree with you thinking everyone is just expecting perfection... be sure to post that battery life guide (which I have doubts about). A few of my keys made horribly loud (heard in next room) squeeking sounds and one broke. I don't think my problem was expecting perfection.

However, the replacement keyboard feels and performs great and has no squeeking.

The screen on mine seems washed out compared to my old Toshiba A45-S250 but I love the keyboard (replaced under warranty) and the performance/size. I do not regret buying this laptop, the hardware is great. The customer service is another story.

 

Sorry to hear about your keys.
The screen washout is correctable. Did you try adjusting your brightness/color settings? It makes a world of difference.

 

How is the feel of the U330, noticeably light, still heavy...?

 

From the way his post is written it doesn't sound like english is his first language. Probably just getting terminologies confused.

Roycohn; a PC with a $500 GPU and a C2D processor should be able to run Crysis very well on high. I run Warhead and FC2 on a $100 9800 GT and a e6400 (@ 3.2 Ghz) with smooth frame rates, and no noticeable slowdowns.
A SLi setup doesn't have to cost you $800 either, it's simply two video cards working together to process the screen. Those two cards can have any price, in fact one of the key advantages of SLi is the ability to add a second graphics card to a system to increase performance without paying for a higher end card. That said I'm not expecting a 3450 to have any respectable gaming performance, maybe I'll still be able to run Source games in some of my more slow lectures though.
Also it might be better to refrain from throwing in an analogy every other sentence and focus on a few that make sense.


Also U330 originally ordered 9/23 (had to reorder 10/4) finally shipped today.

 

Roy you getting 4:40 mins? can you show pics please. Maybe we're doing something wrong here but that's unheard of right now.

 

Roy's absolutely right in the overall theme of the post (though he's made some gross exaggerations and one outrageously dumb statement along the way)

Basically, the U330 is a state of the art ultra-portable that doesn't sacrifice performance for it's ultra light 4 pound 4 oz weight. There's simply no computer at any price that has this blend of power and portability and switchable graphics to boot - a few are more portable but lack the fast processor and/or the GPU, and some are more powerful but are much much less portable. On top of that, it's actually considerably less expensive than other computers in it's class; basically it's less expensive and better.

Also, as Roy mentioned, notice that Lenovo paired a 1066mhz FSB with DDR3 ram at the same speed. That's a perfect setup. Some manufacturers (like the new 2,000K Vaio) are pairing the new Centrino 2 processors with the 1066mhz FSB with DDR2 800mhz RAM. They're just skimping on the tech there because DDR 3 is very very expensive right now compared to DDR 2.

As for the bent chassis problem, Lenovo recently stated that it was a manufacturing defect with the screws being tightened too far on some notebooks. Obviously, the error rate for things to happen like this are higher with the first builds. There is simply zero evidence to suggest that Lenovo was A) aware of this problem and then B) sent out the defective notebooks to people who paid less through the promotional coupon / live search cashback rewards (which btw, Lenovo has no affiliation to anyways).

Making the argument that paying more for the SAME product will get you a higher build quality is frankly silly beyond words. There's just so many things wrong with that, on top of which, the terrible cliche "you get what you pay for" was misused anyways.

The poor battery life some have reported is likely a problem with the PM system that is glitching and using too much power when resuming from hibernation (whether or not it's plugged in or on battery.) For now, a simple solution is to turn off the notebook before you travel with it and don't hibernate with it when you're on battery. You'll see much better battery life if you do this.

Anyways, anyone thinking about buying this notebook absolutely should - it's truly state of the art hardware wise and a great value in the 13.3 inch ultraportable class. Lenovo said they've fixed the chassis issue so anyone buying one now shouldn't have the problems people have reported here.

 

One last thing, the 4 hour 40 mins from a full charge on SUPER energy saver (which has the default settings set to turn everything off... including wireless and sound) is believable. I've timed 4 hours on normal power saver (which keeps everything on) in ideal conditions.

It's important to turn the computer off before taking it with you and using the battery. If you're seeing 2 - 2.5 hours now, that should give you a boost of another hour or so.

Also, anyone who did a clean install of the OS and got rid of the Lenovo PM system will likely see poorer battery performance as well.

 

Hey I just realized this but has anyone gotten to choose the color of their
U330. I know its available in 2 colors, Indigo Blue and usual Black, but I saw no option on the Lenovo website. Does anyone have the blue? How did you get it?

 

I just want to say that I think that the bent chassis problem has been fixed. I just received my u330 back from lenovo after 2 weeks (sigh) and they replaced the casing. Laptop no sits FLAT on the table - No wobble of any kind. If you send in your laptop for this problem know that it might be a while before you get it back but I believe the problem is solved.

 

Hey I am interested in installing Vista x64 on my U330. Anyone tried it already?

Will it work?

 

Has anyone gotten a differnet color U330?