IdeapadY580
Latest
Lenovo IdeaPad Y580 goes on sale melding quad-core Ivy Bridge and GeForce GTX 660M
The Y580 led the avalanche of Lenovo IdeaPads unveiled at CES; its dependence on both Intel Ivy Bridge processors and Kepler-based NVIDIA graphics kept it out of the spotlight for some time, but it's now ready to ship out. The finished 15.6-inch laptop skews very clearly to gamers and other performance mavens. The range starts off with a quad 2.3GHz Core i7, a GeForce GTX 660M and 8GB of RAM. Any heavier outlays of cash upgrade the display resolution, optical drive and storage to as much as a 1080p screen, a Blu-ray combo drive and a 1TB hard drive with a companion 32GB SSD for good measure. None of them will win a contest for sheer portability, but a tight official price spread between $1,299 and $1,549 ($1,039 and $1,239 on sale) guarantees that it won't be hard to get exactly the PC you need to play Spec Ops. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Lenovo unveils six mainstream consumer laptops (and one desktop replacement)
Not content to stop at a netbook and a pair of Ultrabooks, Lenovo just a slew of mainstream laptops (and even a desktop replacement) to fill out its consumer IdeaPad line. Starting at the high end, the Y480 and Y580 are both multimedia machines with brushed metal lids and palm rests, JBL speakers, an optional Blu-ray burner and Intel's Wireless Display technology. With either model, you can get up to 8GB of RAM and a Core i7 processor, though the two start to look a lot different when you take screen resolution and graphics muscle into account. While the 14-inch Y480 has a 1366 x 768 panel and NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M graphics, the 15.6-inch Y580 steps up to a 1080p pixel count and a 2GB GTX660M card with DirectX 11. Look for these in April, starting at $899. Give up that metal design and high-res screen, and you're left with the mid-range Z series. The IdeaPad Z380 (pictured), Z480 and Z580 are also available with a Core i7 processor, optional Blu-ray player, WiDi, up to 8GB of RAM and up to 1TB in storage. Whether you choose the 13.3-, 14- or 15.6-inch version, the pixel count is fixed at 1366 x 768, though you at least don't have to settle for Intel GMA graphics: NVIDIA's 2GB GeForce GT640M card is also an option. Expect these to hit shelves in April for $599 and up. Even at the supposed low end the specs aren't too shabby: the G480, G580 and G780 will also be offered with up to 1TB of storage, up to 8GB of RAM and an optional Blu-ray drive, along with a 2GB NVIDIA GeForce GT630M card in tricked-out models. These will go on sale in June for $399-plus. Sean Cooper contributed to this post
