Samsung R530 JA06

I bought the Samsung R530 a couple of years ago to help me during my A-Levels. This was my first purchase of a laptop so I spent a lot of time researching different laptops to see which one would fulfill my requirements and also be in my price range. This laptop came out top;

The first thing that attracted me to this laptop was the very unique lid on the front of the laptop which is a mix of black and red blending into each other, which stands out from all the other laptops that I seen, and I feel is very stylish. Also the metallic casing on the inside surrounding the keys, is a very nice touch. The keys are well laid out, easy to use and even have room for a numeric pad. The mouse and click functions which are surrounded by blue lighting when the mouse is being moved which is a nice feature, also the touch pad is multi function as it allows the user to zoom in and zoom out by pinching two fingers in and out, similar to an Ipad. There are a number of shortcut items on the keypad such as turning the volume and brightness up and down by pressing Fn and the arrow button. This is excellent as it allows these changes to be done quickly.

There is an adequate 3 usb ports and a HDMI port which I use for connecting my laptop to my TV. This makes it very handy for watching content on a bigger screen. However the only problem is that when I connect it to my TV the sound does not filter through the TV but continues to play out of the laptop. Another laptop I use does however play sound through the TV however this may just take a small adjustment. There is a 3 in 1 card slot at the front, wifi, ethernet cable and a dvd writer enabling a number of possibilities. It also has a 6 cell battery which will last a few hours, but isn't exceptional. The 15.6" glossy screen is a real highlight with very vivid colours and it is LED back light. It was a very noticeable improvement to previous laptops that I had used.

I also found this laptop very easy to initially set up which however took a bit of time installing the Samsung software, however it wasn't complicated even for the most novice of users. However one of the things that I was disappointed with when I set it up was that there was no windows package installed. There was also a few demos installed that I found unnecessary, so I had to uninstall them. It does however come with DVD playback software installed and also comes with an excellent webcam called YouCam.

I found it easy to use at all times and also very quick, especially after start up on which I got frustrated with on other laptops. Also due to its memory I am able to have a number of programs open at one time while still maintaining its speed, which I do on a regular basis. There is a lot of storage for music, programs and documents, which I required.

This laptop is perfect for students and basically anyone who is looking a high class laptop at an affordable price. It is also small and compact making it very transportable perfect for university.