Lenovo's IdeaPad Y560D 3D Laptop Reviewed

StickerWatch:

Welcome to StickerWatch, our tongue-in-cheek evaluation of everyone's favorite laptop garnish—stickers. Here, we rate each laptop's array and configuration of stickers on a scale of 1-10. A 10, or perfect score, is represented by a MacBook Pro, while the Asus G50V from a few years back is a 1:


We give the Y560D a solid 7. None of the small badges on the right-hand side can be easily removed, but the large translucent sticker to the left of the trackpad could be peeled off with little difficulty. We applaud the use of small, individually discrete badges and their placement well away from the trackpad.

Audio and Input:


Laptop speakers are typically terrible to the point that they're often ignored; it's assumed that anyone who wants audio will buy a pair of headphones. The Y560D's JBL speakers aren't just good, they're fabulous when compared to most of the paper-cone schlock on the market. Bass response is negligible, but higher frequencies are clear, crisp, and distortion-free, even when the system's volume is turned all the way up.

We tested the speakers while gaming, watching movies, and listening to different types of music. We never encountered a scenario that forced us to switch to headphones due to inherently low volume, excessive distortion, or crackling.


The keyboard's tactile response is good and it's comfortable to use, even when typing for several hours at a time. The only maddening flaw is the layout of the lower-left corner. Standard operating procedure for a laptop is to arrange the lowest row of keys as "Ctrl-FN-Windows-Alt." Lenovo has swapped the positions of the FN and Ctrl keys.

This might seem a small change, but it creates a problem. If you game using WASD (EDSF is better -Ed), your left little finger will reach for LCTRL and hit FN instead. Depending on the keyboard you're used to using, there's a similar annoyance with alt-tabbing. All too often, when we reached for Alt-Tab, we found ourselves hitting Win-Tab instead. If you aren't running Aero, Win-Tab does nothing. If you are running Aero, Win-Tab scrolls through your open desktop windows ala Flip3D.




The Lenovo's trackpad is fairly good; the surface is slightly textured to differentiate it from the laptop body, but not to a degree that grows irritating or interferes with its primary function. Button response was fine, and the pad itself is well positioned. There's one caveat to that: if you're used to resting the heels of your hands on the keyboard's wrist rest as you type, you may have to adjust your position. Otherwise, the trackpad will occasionally pick up the movement of the ball of your thumb and adjust the cursor accordingly.