Lenovo has been a go-to option for a lot of buyers when looking for a budget-friendly laptop. The brand has attained unprecedented popularity among students and for business purposes. Lenovo has multiple laptops in different price segments to suit all sorts of buyers, the brand has recently launched a new laptop with an aim to provide portability and performance on a budget.
If you are in the market looking for a budget laptop, the Lenovo Ideapad S145 is certain to catch your attention.
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 looks very similar to other laptops at this price point and comes with a decent build quality. The chassis is surprisingly rigid and we did not notice much flex in the hinge area as well. Honestly, the build quality of the laptop was pretty good and we were impressed
In terms of the overall design, Lenovo has maintained a clean approach with minimal distractions, there is a small branding to the side of the lid of the Lenovo Ideapad S145. The bezels on the sides are pretty thin and the 14-inch display takes up most of the front real estate.
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 comes with a 14-inch FullHD resolution display with Anti Glare coating. The display is decent enough to be used both, indoors and outdoors. When we tested the display in extreme outdoor conditions, it did suffer a little and did not exhibit excellent sunlight legibility, it is usable for under most normal conditions.
The added Anti Glare coating to the display does help reduce the glare by a huge extent and the colors on the IPS display look pretty natural. The peak brightness of the Lenovo Ideapad S145 is about 220 nits which aren’t the best we’ve seen so far but serves the purpose for most users.
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 comes with a 7th Generation AMD A6-9255 APU with models ranging from 4GB to 8GB RAM. The default storage option on the Lenovo Ideapad S145 is a 1TB SATA SSD which can optionally be configured with a 256GB PCIe m.2 SSD. The internal graphics on the laptop is powered by the Radeon R4 Graphics card and the display on the Lenovo Ideapad S145 is a 14-inch Anti Glare display with a FullHD resolution. The I/O is pretty generous including 2 x USB 3.1 ports, 1 USB 2.0 port, 1 x HDMI 1.4 Port, an SD card reader and a 3.5mm headset jack. The lack of a USB Type-C was disappointing considering the widespread adoption that we now see.
The internals on the Lenovo Ideapad S145 are decent, the 7th generation AMD A6-9225APU paired with a 4/8GB DDR4 RAM adds up to good performance results overall. The Radeon R4 graphics is enough for most basic use and some cames in constrained settings. The performance of the Lenovo Ideapad S145 is pretty good overall for most purposes unless an intense load is applied.
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 isn’t meant for gaming and thus we noticed below-average performance for some heavy titles, we were able to run titles like CS Go and PUBG Lite at low settings Anything heavier than these titles would result in massive frame drops and might render the game unplayable.
Most daily use applications including the Microsoft Suite, Chrome, and other IDE’s that we’ve tested worked without any issues.
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 comes with 1TB SSD and can be configured with PCIe m.2 SSD to get a performance boost for an increased price. When configured with the dual storage option, the laptop comes with hybrid storage which is very helpful, the m.2 SSD can also be replaced or upgraded very easily in the future.
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 comes with 4GB or 8GB RAM options with decent speeds. The laptop is configured with a single stick of RAM and can be easily upgraded. The Hybrid Storage option is very helpful and offers a huge performance boost by installing the operating system on the SSD.
The keyboard on the Lenovo Ideapad S145 is a standard chicklet keyboard and does not come with a backlight. This makes it extremely difficult to use in low light situations. The keys are very well placed and there is enough space between the keys, if you’ve used a 14-inch laptop with a standard keyboard before then you will quickly get used to this keyboard without any issues.
The sound from the keyboard is very minimal which might be very helpful for working in sound-sensitive environments, however, we personally didn’t like it as the true feel of typing was lost and we felt that the keyboard lacked true feedback. There is a soft finish to the keys and offers nice grip preventing your fingers from sliding on to other keys and causing errors. There isn’t much to talk about the trackpad, it offers a clean layout with two integrated keys. The trackpad is smooth and offers support for most Windows gestures providing a smooth overall experience.
Verdict
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 is a really good pick for those looking for a laptop on a budget, the laptop will be a good buy if you are not looking to play games or run high-end applications. There are two different RAM variants with options for 4GB or 8GB RAM, there is also a 15-inch display variant of the laptop with similar specifications for those needing a bigger display size. The battery life on the laptop is pretty average at 4 to 5 hours. The Lenovo Ideapad S145 is available in three colors, Granite Black Glossy, Granite Black Texture, and Platinum Grey Glossy.
The Lenovo Ideapad S145 is well suited for students from various streams of engineering and for travellers looking for an affordable laptop for media and other light work.
