28 of 28 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars Good spec for a good price, 28 April 2011 This review is from: Samsung RV511 15.6 inch Notebook (Intel Core i5 480M 2.66GHz, 6Gb, 640Gb, DVDRW, WLAN, Win 7 Home Premium) (Personal Computers) There is already a good review for this machine. I took the plunge as getting an i5 processor and 6gb ram for this price it seems a bargain (?549.99)
Just to add, if anybody is interested, the Windows experience score taken the first day of ownership:
Processor 6.9
memory 6.9
Graphics 4.9
3D gaming graphics 5.8
Hard disk 5.9
The only "negative" i can find is the machine is a little on the big side - not massive, but a little big. The keyboard has a large built in wrist rest area where the touch pad is. A nice touch is the numerical pad, something I have never had on a lap top.
All in all I'm very happy with my purchase and grateful for the previous reviews.
43 of 44 people found the following review helpful: 3.0 out of 5 stars Problem with graphics card, 15 May 2011 This review is from: Samsung RV511 15.6 inch Notebook (Intel Core i5 480M 2.66GHz, 6Gb, 640Gb, DVDRW, WLAN, Win 7 Home Premium) (Personal Computers) A reviewer said they must be unlucky. Well im part of the unlucky ones club too :(
I recieved this laptop this week after ordering it from Amazon after reading great reviews here and other sites. I was really looking forward to using it. The laptop itself is lovely looking and the LED screen fails to dissappoint. Its bright, sharp ,and just what I wanted. Thats a plus point for this laptop. Anyway after setting Windows 7 for 1st time use, I thought everything was ok. Then as I was doing normal browsing for the first time, the laptop screen went black and went back to normal after about 4 seconds with an error message popping up from the system tray saying "Display driver stopped responding and has recovered". Underneath that was another message "Display driver NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 259.93 stopped responding and has successfully recovered." I didnt know what this was and thought it was a one of situation. Anyway it happened several times after, so I realised there was a fault. Firstly I tried via the Samsung built in help and the message I got was my drivers were up to date. I then went on the NVIDIA website and for some reason the 315M graphics card was listed for driver updates. I did an auto search to identify my card and that didnt help. Basically I tried all possible methods and it was concluded my graphics card drivers were up to date. There was no option for me to roll back drivers. I have also been on the laptop's device manager and that also said my driver was up to date. For a number of days I have been searching on many forums and so many people seem to have this issue and many have failed to resolve it, therefore it is a hardware issue with the graphics card rather than a driver solution. Today the laptop went one better and completley crashed due to this fault!
Had it not been for this graphics issue, this laptop would have been the one for me. Its just what I wanted, however the faulty graphics card causes the laptop to stop working. And believe me you cant do anything easily to resolve it as NVIDIA havent got updates, Samsung havent got updates, the laptop itself is up to date believe it or not. I hope other people dont have this problem and will get better use out of it, im just unfortunate to experience this problem.
Anyway Amazon were my seller and have very kindy offered to help me out, so hats off to them for providing a top service.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews Was this review helpful to you?27 of 28 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars at this price its the best spec you will get, 1 May 2011 This review is from: Samsung RV511 15.6 inch Notebook (Intel Core i5 480M 2.66GHz, 6Gb, 640Gb, DVDRW, WLAN, Win 7 Home Premium) (Personal Computers) After owning a Samsung R60plus since may 2008 , i decided it was time to get a new laptop.
Having owned other makes before i decided i would like to stay with a samsung as they are reliable and the build quality is really good.
Delivery was really quick.(2days)
Inside the box is a recovery cd , laptop , battery , quickstart guide and power lead.
It was really straight forward to setup and within 30 minutes i was good to go.
As soon as you start the laptop it asks you to partition the harddrive , so i set my main c: drive at 150gb and left the rest to drive D , which suits my purposes really as i will not be installing alot of software.
I removed the trial version of Norton security and office 2010 and installed my own version of office 2007 and mcafee security ( which is free with o2 broadband).
There is quite a bit of trial version software preloaded, which i really hate , but once removed , its no big deal.
The first thing i did was charge the battery and head over to my brothers house to show him my new laptop. We decided to see how HD video on youtube performed ( we did this at his house as he has btinfinity ( 40mb connection)
Well the picture quality was stunning but the screen kept flickering once in a while which worried me slightly.
I got home and tried the youtube videos at home and the same thing happened , so i removed the battery and plugged it in directly to the mains and the problem vanished. It would appear the graphics card doesnt have enough power from the battery to perform during hd playback but works fine from mains power.
I have been to nvideas website to download new drivers for the graphics card but there is nothing available for the 315m at the moment , so the flickering issue might well be cured by a later driver version in future.
This issue isnt a huge problem as my laptop rarely leaves home , its more a desktop replacement as my house is too small for a big computer , so it is constantly run from the mains.
The keyboard is really nice to use and it has a nice big wrist rest. The built in number pad is a really neat addition especially since i do alot of spreadsheet work.
The touchpad also operates like many touch screen smart phones for functions as zooming in , rotating etc.
I connected to my wireless network without issue , and decided to pair my blackberry torch via bluetooth to the laptop and transfer some files - excellent . Very simple to setup and no hastles.
In summary , this is a fantastic laptop and a good price for the specification.
Would i buy it again - Yes - without question.
pros
Best spec for the price ( ?550 for rv511-s03)
great screen
laptop doesnt harvest greasey fingerprints as there are no shiney surfaces
fantastic keyboard
bluetooth v3
great battery life ( 7 hours watching youtube vids and some dvd burning / ripping)
good speakers with plenty of volume
nice webcam and software comes with some fun/good features
fits in my 15.2 inch laptop bag so no need to buy a new one
comes with recovery cd so no need to backup the laptop onto dvds as soon as you turn it on.
cons
power connector location on the laptop
screen is a little stiff to open , im sure it will free up over time
too much trial version software
lack of graphics card drivers from nvidea to resolve flickering issue of hd playback on battery power.
lack of usb v3
my advice is , if you are thinking of buying a new laptop and are looking at this one , DO IT, you wont regret it.
I am now looking to sell my r60plus to make the cost of this laptop even better :)
