ASUS VivoBook F510UA Thin and Lightweight 15.6” FHD WideView NanoEdge Laptop, Intel Core i5-7200U 2.5GHz, 8GB DDR4 RAM, 1TB HDD, USB Type-C, Fingerprint Reader, Windows 10 – F510UA-AH50

Purchase this for my wife who has been using the same laptops for about 5 or 6 years now. I spent a long time looking through a lot of sites and local stores for a good laptop particularly with a good amount of RAM and processing power to handle video that she will be uploading and processing that she takes with a digital camcorder. At first the touch screen laptops caught my eye but then I realized Windows 10 isnt very suitable for touch like the Android operating system is so its pretty much pointless and I think just more of a gimmick anyway in a laptop. I just opened it earlier today and my initial Impressions is that it is very attractive and very sturdy feeling and I love the screen which non reflective, its very nice not looking into a reflective glossy screen for a change. Like many of the reviews state, there are a lot of updates that this laptop performs so far its been updating itself for the past 8 hours and I expect it to continue to do so well into the night. However its probably due to just the nature of the software and amount of updates available. I will be installing a solid state drive like many do however I dont feel it is necessary at all unless you plan on doing a lot of intense computing. I would say this is probably one of the best all around laptops you can get for your money in the under $1,000 price bracket. Also just so you know for some reason I was under the assumption that the case was aluminum at least the top part where the keyboard is and the monitor enclosure however it is not but it still feels very solid. UPDATE: Just installed a Samsung 256GB m.2. Disassembly and install was easy with a guitar pick to pry open the bottom cover. Instally was a bit confused and stuck after booting up because even though bios showed the drive and the software detected it as well, it would not show up in windows but after some fiddling around trying different things it finally showed up as an unpartitioned drive so then I was able to clone the OS and changed the boot order in BIOS and now its super fast. So with the added SSD it makes it around a 600 dollar laptop but you will have a hard time finding another laptop of equal specs for that price even since it has an 8th gen processor.

Show more

This laptop is one-of-a-kind in that it has a 15.6" screen (large) while coming in at 1.7kg in a small frame. For any other laptop which pushes the size-to-weight ratio, you pay a hefty premium, but for some interesting reason this one is at the very bottom of the price range. Given its specs, with the latest 8th gen quad-core i5 (which beats the 7th gen high-performance HQ model) and full-HD screen, that is quite amazing. The colour is fine, and I couldnt care less which shade of grey it is (there are 50 after all). The charger is small and light. Best I ever saw for a 55W charger. It has an M.2 SATA3 slot (which is incompatible with PCIe / NVMe) that allows you to install an SSD. I have installed a 250GB Samsung Evo 850 M.2 drive, which works very well. When running from the normal hard drive, it is painfully slow. I tried to do a clean install, but Windows wouldnt have it (complained about volume incompatibility, etc., which would have required me to temporarily unplug the HDD, which would in turn have required me to take it all apart and temporarily remove the M.2 drive, which I could not be bothered to do). So I cloned the Windows installation from the HDD onto the M.2 using the free application Macrium Reflect. I had to resize one of the 4 partitions, which worked fine. The cloning process took half an hour, and worked flawlessly. The Windows which comes with it does not have bloatware and is perfectly fine to use. There were a few gotchas: to get into the BIOS, you have to hold down F2. To be able to boot from another drive, I had to first disable secure boot to be able to disable CSM, after which I could press F8 while in the BIOS to be able to boot from my USB drive. I also had to disable fastboot. There may be a faster way, but this is what I did. After cloning, I changed settings back and re-enabled fastboot. Others have helpfully provided photos of which screws to open. Easiest way to remove the back once the screws are out is to stick a thin plastic object (e.g. spoon or knife) between the cracks at the back in the middle and slide it left-and-right to wedge it open. The screen is great, is able to fold back far enough for someone tall to see the screen well without having to hunch down, and the keyboard is fine (yes, there is some flex, but I hammer when I type, and yet it does not bother me at all. I am the fastest typer in the office). One issue I have is that the left touchpad button gets stuck against/under the chassis. I may be able to fix that, but it is annoying. It is possible that this is from having to take it apart a few times, which is not easy. I would have given it 5 stars, except: - The build quality could have been better (even for a plastic laptop) - The process for removing the back makes it crystal clear that this laptop was not designed to be user-serviceable - Asus provides zero support for users wanting to upgrade it, and they only reluctantly provided information about the M.2 being SATA3 - It has zero documentation in terms of specs or servicing (for same reasons) - This laptop does not even show on their website at the moment. One it runs from an SSD, it is an incredible piece of kit for the price. But do not buy this if you do not know how to install an SSD.

Show more

If you are looking for an affordable yet powerful laptop with a great design, look no further. I recently purchased the ASUS X51UAR Signature Edition laptop. Here are a number of reasons why this might be a good laptop choice for you. 1. Design and Display – The ASUS is very impressive in this area. Its immersive screen was one of the main reasons I purchased the laptop. The narrow bezels on this device make its 15.6-inch full HD display look very appealing. The laptop is more suited for indoor use as the screen’s lack of brightness makes it difficult to use outdoors. Built around that large screen is a sleek metallic grey body that gives this affordable laptop the look of a premium one. While the material used to make the body looks great, the laptop should have been made to feel more rigid. Apart from that, the laptop has an ergonomic keyboard that feels great when typing on it, though professional writers may want to look elsewhere. If you are looking for some extra security, then this may be the laptop for you as the ASUS X51UAR comes equipped with a finger print scanner built into the trackpad that provides you with a quick and secure way to access your files. 2. Battery life – Being a college student, a decent battery life is very important to me. The ASUS delivers on this front as well. With an impressive 7 hours of battery life on a full charge, you could confidently leave home without your laptop charging cable. Its long battery life is especially surprising given its large screen and the impressive hardware it has hidden under its hood. 3. Performance – For $500, you could not find a better laptop on the market than this one. It has the latest i5 processor, a very adequate 8 GB of RAM and a large 1 TB hard disk. Included in all this is an impressive network card that will ensure that you maintain a high-speed internet connection. As a result, this laptop can easily handle the day to day tasks of a student or a businessperson. This incredible deal does come with a few small tradeoffs. The sound output quality isn’t the best through the built-in speakers, the built-in webcam isn’t as clear as I would have hoped, and the hard drive can get sluggish under heavy use. There is however a workaround as this laptop is easily upgradeable. Swap out the built in mechanical hard drive for an affordable solid state one and you get a device that can compete with a $1000 laptop for half its price. The combination of an affordable price, a good battery life, and an impressive set of hardware make this laptop a must buy for its price range.

Show more

Pros: * 15.6" display in 14" body * Thin and light * 1920x1080 screen * IPS matte display with good color accuracy, deep contrast, and wide viewing angles * Quad-core i5-8250u * 5-9 hours of battery life * Lots of usable ports * Decent keyboard and trackpad * Extra m.2 slot for SSD, 4 total RAM slots for 32GB total * Solid build quality * Silent at idle, quiet at full throttle Cons: * No dedicated GPU * Meh speakers * Fingerprint reader sometimes takes 2-3 tries to work (not sure if this is Asus or Microsofts fault) For the money, this is the best $500 budget laptop you can buy. Its a near ultrabook notebook at a budget laptop price. A few years ago, a laptop with these kind of specs would cost $800 and up, and a $500 laptop would get you a 1366x768 screen with a washed out TN panel and a dual-core i5. This laptop has no compromises, and the pros easily outweigh the cons. You get a thin and light laptop with quad-core performance and a good screen with good battery life. Geekbench 3 score was 3172/12439, which is 10% shy of my old desktop i7-4770k at 3496/13396, crazy. In battery saving mode with normal web browsing it lost 11% battery in one hour. In best performance mode it lost 20% battery in one hour. The keyboard is good, I get over 100 wpm, and the trackpad is accurate and responsive, I don’t hate using it. And unlike other premium $1000+ ultrabooks like the Macbook, this laptop has a ton of usable ports. But understand this is still a budget laptop. The i5-8250u is good, but there’s no dedicated GPU, so this is not a gaming laptop. The screen is good but it’s not the best, it doesn’t have 100% RGB color accuracy, and it’s not super bright either. Keyboard is good, but it’s still a thin laptop, so there’s not a lot of travel. Trackpad is decent, but it’s not made of glass. Build quality is solid, but it’s made of plastic not aluminum, so it still flexes (but not that much). Battery life can get you through a whole day if you leave it on battery saving mode, otherwise bring your charger. Ignore people who comment saying this laptop needs a backlit keyboard, or that the keyboard flexes. Theyre comparing a $500 budget laptop to a $1000 ultrabook, which doesnt make sense. The most underrated feature of this laptop is the expandability. Popping off the back panel is easier than baking a pie, just take off the screws (two hidden ones in the rubber feet) and pop off the panel, takes less than 5 minutes. Theres an available m.2 SSD and 4 total RAM slots with an 8GB stick in place, leaving you room for 32GB total, that’s insane. I got a 500GB m.2 SSD for $90, making this a $600 laptop in total, and it’s money well spent (considering the 128GB SSD version is $620). So if you’re on a budget and you’re looking for the best laptop in the $500 range, this is it.

Show more

I got this laptop since there were lots of good reviews around it. Well, I wish I had bought a different product. Here are some of the shortcomings I have had to deal with: - First, this laptop comes shipped with an excruciatingly slow hard drive -- which I had to promptly replace with my own SSD drive. This was an easy solve, however for those who dont want to open up their laptop just stay away. - The audio for this laptop was poorly planned out. The speakers on the bottom of the laptop (under where your wrists rest when youre typing). So the audio can easily be muffled. When the laptop is laying on a flat surface the audio bounces off nicely and it is plenty loud -- however if you have it on your lap or on different surface the audio waves can easily be lost making it hard to hear. - One of the other let downs of this computer is the webcam -- seriously this is a webcam you would expect in a netbook for years ago not something from 2018. - Battery life: they promise an 8 hour battery life, well good luck. You can get about 3 or 4 hours from this laptop if youre browsing the web (and this is with a SSD). - Even so those are forgivable offenses compared to the next and worst thing, the touchpad. This laptops tocuhpad is by far the worst I have ever used. Its downright unusable at times, you will see it moving across the screen on its own and will make moving the pointer and clicking impossible. A big reason I bought this computer was the promise that they fit a 15.6" screen into the body for a 14" laptop. Well that isnt so the case the laptop is definitively a lot bigger than my other 14" laptops but certainly not as bulky as most other 15.6" laptops. I will say I do enjoy the screen quality, the WiFi is fast on this laptop. In all, stay away.

Show more

I thought I was smart but I am not. I spent weeks in reading all the reviews and the most common problems are the blank screen and slow. So I prepare myself to NOT turning on the wifi so it wont update windows for two days. I also brought an SSD so the slowness can be fixed. I also download the Winflash and the Intel graphic driver from the ASUS official site, just in case. So open box, started up the machine and after an hour, blank screen!! I can only see the display by connecting an external monitor through the HDMI interface. Try to update the BIOS but the machine is already the latest version:309. Updated the Intel graphic driver successfully but still no luck of seeing anything on the laptop screen. Diagnostic showed that it cannot detect its own display, it can only detect the external display. If you check the recent review, most complaints were blank screen, which failed from within an hour to within several month. I think there might be something wrong on the hardware side related to the screen circuit on this laptop. The laptop has very good value IF it works. Not sure if I should try the same one at a later time? I hate to return the laptop since it waste a lot of social resource but I have no choice. Please recommend some better choices if you have. Thanks.

Show more

Amazing Computer, but YOU NEED THE SSD (m.2 SATA 3), It went from 2 min to turn on to 14 sec. Cons: No backlight Keyboard, not light indicator on the CapsLk key, Power button too close to "Delete" key. Pros: The computer is amazing, lightweight, slim design, Beautiful Screen, Great Battery life and really powerful. And one of the best things is super upgrade friendly. You can add M.2 SSD and RAM memory without having to take anything away, NOT EVEN YOUR 1 Year Warranty!!!! First of all, About , THE WARRANTY: As you can see in the picture, I contacted ASUS Customer Service myself, and asked if adding RAM or the SSD would void the warranty, and even confirmed saying "If I open it (the computer) and add the SSD myself"; they confirmed you still have warranty, BUT ONE THING, they also said that the only thing that, in this case, would void the warranty is IF YOU DAMAGE THE COMPUTER in the process. But honestly is not that easy to damage it, as long as you dont try to open it with a Hammer and a chisel is gonna be fine. Its delicate, but not a little baby. So if you want to Upgrade the SSD or RAM, here is how: I have read a LOT of reviews online and here on Amazon saying that "is a pain to open" or " easy to break" but its not true, Ive opened it 5 times, I do it in less than 2 min, and nothing has broken. so here is how: 1.- There are 12 screws, 10 visible (silver color) and 2 underneath the black sticked rubber pads, (the screws are also Black). The rubber pads can be taken out with a flat Screwdriver, just be careful not to puncture them. The glue is good quality, so it will stick back, not need to worry. Once the 12 screws are out 2.- Insert a card or if you have a pry tool, just a little bit, only about 5mm, into the back of the laptop, by the vents. First work your way right and left of the center, youll hear when the lock pop out, and slide along the edges until you worked your way all around. 3.- The cover comes out STRAIGHT UP, no to any side. 4.- Add the Upgrade: 4.1. For the Ram, just slid it in and push it down there is not tricky part or lock. 4.2.1 For the M.2 SATA SSD, insert it upside down, be sure the 6 pin side is on the right side of the plug. 4.2.2 Add a screw. This is not included on the computer (and unfortunately for me, nither on the SSD), so you may have to buy one, or as I did, I took the screw off the top center from the motherboard, it seems to work well without it (>.<) This is everything to do in order to install the RAM and SSD. Youll have to migrate the data to the SSD and then format the HDD in order to have the 1tb + SSD size you bought. To migrate the information, youll have to install a migration software, I used "Samsung Data Migration", I have used it twice and it works well. This are the steps to do that: 1.- Install the SSD, and close the computer back (Youll have to open it again, so I would advise you to put the cover and put Only the black screws and the back line silver ones, including the center one, to give enough support to the hinge of the laptop) 2.- Install the Migration Software in the HDD (at the beginning I could NOT see the SSD on My PC but it was recognized in the BIOS and once I open the migration program, it was there too) 3. Do the Migration. Once finished DO NOT REBOOT!! If at this point you reboot, go to BIOS and Change the Booting order, Due to both the SSD and the HDD having windows, the system is not going to boot from the SSD properly. 4. Turn OFF the computer, Open it. 5. Take out the SSD in order to... 6. Take out the HDD, there are two screws underneath the tape, be sure to take those ones out too before trying to remove the HDD 7. Put back the SSD And close the computer, YES, WITHOUT THE HDD. 8. Your computer will automatically boot from the SSD. 9. Format the HDD, I did it with an external SATA to USB cable. 10. Open computer, take out SSD, Install HDD, put the SSD back and YOU ARE FINISHED Now you have a computer worth over $900, for just around $600.

Show more

I’ve had this laptop for three weeks. The hard drive sounds like a distant lawn mower. This thing is SLOW! I have installed NO software on it yet it updates something every day and wants to reboot. I’m trying to do online college college courses with it and it gets hung up in some intimate nevernever land of unresponsiveness. It just locked up again. I’m very disappointed. Did I mention it sounds like a lawn mower? Don’t do it.

Show more

Bought the laptop less than two months ago. Used it maybe three times week for Youtube and other videos only. Today tried to turned it on, but to a blank screen! Completely dark/blank while the power and all the other indicator lights were on! Only to find out this is a common problem with ASUS? It eventually turn on after pressing the hot keys... Very disappointed!

Show more

Used as bought, it is an OK laptop, but not great (probably a 3 star value). Most of the laptop is actually very good, but is held back by a 5400 rpm HDD. Not only is it a HDD, but its a slow one. Other than that its components are actually very good. I bought the laptop but also bought an SSD and some extra RAM, and the difference is night and day. Once the new SSD was set as the system disk, and the extra RAM was in place, you get a laptop that compares favorably with others worth two, three, or four times as much (with the exception of the graphics card, which is OK for regular use and light gaming, but will struggle with graphics intensive stuff). I used: WD Blue 3D NAND 500GB PC SSD - SATA III 6 Gb/s M.2 2280 Solid State Drive - WDS500G2B0B Crucial 8GB Single DDR4 2400 MT/s (PC4-19200) DR x8 Unbuffered SODIMM 260-Pin Memory - CT8G4SFD824A reimage the HDD onto the SSD and youre set. The downsides? - Keyboard isnt back-lit - You get Windows Home instead of Pro - No ethernet port (Not that Ive used or needed one that I can recall) - No CD/DVD reader (but who uses them nowadays anyway) - You need to put your own AV solution in place (I do that anyway, so its not a problem for me) - You have to do some tinkering to put it all together (I consider this an advantage, but thats just me) The only real downsides are keyboard not being back-lit and it coming with Windows Home. For a premium laptop those are expected... for a 500 dollar laptop? I bought it two weeks ago and am still laughing myself to sleep over the purchase. To all the low review writers for this product I would like to say THANK YOU FOR KEEPING THE PRICE DOWN!

Show more