Samsung R80 Notebooks Exclusively Available at Best Buy Discussion

Best Buy will be offering exclusive Samsung R80 notebooks starting 7 March.

Read the full content of this Article: Samsung R80 Notebooks Exclusively Available at Best Buy

 

The R780 doesn't sound bad, if the rest of the specs are decent.

 

Yea, the specs sound good. I have never used a Samsung notebook.

 

I've heard they'll be putting "Touch of Color" displays on their notebooks. Dunno what that means.

 

Doesn't mean much of anything. It's sort of...instead of having a (for example) grey band around a tv or something, they have a little bit of red mixed in with the plastic to sort of give it color. It's not bad looking, but doesn't mean anything.

For some reason they always seem to use red in the U.S., though the TV I bought had (to me a nicer looking) blue in England.

 

Kind of nice to see Samsung machines beginning to be available more and more here in the US ... I have heard good things about their netbooks at least.

 

The value proposition of all three models is pretty impressive...especially the R780 on sale for $799 or even the R580 priced at $829. Those prices include Core i5, nVIDIA discrete graphics, BluRay player, 500GB storage and 4GB DDR3 RAM....for $800!

The potential drawback, for a lot would-be buyers, will be the not-so-subtle RED color scheme. The specs caught my eye and the design and dimensions (weight, thickness) are quite good for the price...but that flashy/tacky color choice will limit the market-

 

Yeah, it looks like Samsung is employing the "Touch of Color" design themes from their flat-screen TV line into notebooks. The design will no doubt be a purchasing factor for some people.

I agree that the value of these notebooks is rather impressive. The Nvidia GT 330 in the 17" R780 should be able to handle most modern games at medium-high settings (it is a rebadged GT 230M).

I have yet to see a Samsung notebook in person so I can't say anything about the build quality.

 

The only Samsung notebook that I've actually seen and used in person was their 14.1" X460 that came out in late 2008. It was aimed at the upper-end of the business market- the stylish alternative to the Dell Latitude E6400 and HP EliteBook 6930p. Oddly enough, it had a RED and black exterior, but in brushed aluminum the deeper red hue was as classy as the Dell Latitude Z600 is now! The price was also very similar to the Z600- $1700 for the one I looked at! It had a magnesium alloy chassis and felt very durable and it was only 0.8-1.2" thick and 4.2lbs...I seriously thought about forking over asking price!

Sadly, the X460 and it's 13.3" X360 sibling disappeared earlier last year and Samsung hasn't replaced them. The business market is tough and they were among the most expensive...not the best strategy during an economic nosedive!

Their more affordable notebooks have been rated dead average by most reviews- no fatal flaws, but nothing special either. The thickness and heft of most have reminded me of some Toshiba models, but without as much style.

 

I have only put my hands on one of their netbooks ... it seemed to be fairly sturdy iirc....

 

Concerning the R480 now listed on the best buy site, they claim it is core i3, yet they also claim an 800mhz bus and intel GMA4500. These specs are not indicative of a core i3 system, which would have on-chip GMA HD graphics, so what the heck is going on here?

 

The attached specs (from the R480 user guide) show that there is a big range of hardware options. Potential purchasers will need to check carefully what configuration they are being offered.

John

 

Hey allfiredup, i tried to send you a PM about my Dell fan issues but it doesnt seem your accepting them. Im sorry to go off topic, but ive been getting nowhere with Dell, and would love the letter and email address you said woudl get results. My email is Eric C Junk (at) gmail.com with no spaces. Or you can PM me here. Thanks!

 

Yeah I went and looked at it, the site is wrong, but what's more sad is that every single "review" site that showed up through a google of the model number repeated the exact same incorrect specs. Nobody thought it odd that they claimed they added a redundant inferior integrated graphics chip, which would never happen. What a joke.