Samsung has introduced some full-sized laptops this year with powerful specifications at knockout prices and the Samsung R505 laptop is the latest. This is a rather standard looking laptop with a plastic chassis that feels solid to the touch and reassuringly tough. The screen is a 15.4-inch display, so you can watch movies in comfort.
Find out how well the Samsung R505 handles by reading the rest of our review.
The Samsung R505 manages to combine plenty of processing power with a fairly entry-level price. The 15.4-inch laptop has a rather basic appearance, with the silver and black casing looking rather plain but the build quality is reassuringly high.
When it comes to processing power, you’ll find the AMD Athlon X2 QL-62 COU fitted. This is a dual-core chip that delivers 2GHz of performance. Samsung has backed it with 4096MB of memory, which is great as it means there is plenty of overhead for loading files but as the Windows Vista OS can only address 3GB, there is a hint of overkill on the spec side.
The hard drive offers 320GB of storage space and with the disk running at 5400rpm, it offered quick access to your files. In use, we found the Samsung R505 delivered fantastic performance for the price point.
Along with an AMD CPU, you’ll also find an AMD graphic controller chip in the form of the ATI Radeon HD3200. This is an integrated card but we found colour balance on the screen to be good.
Extra features include a DVD rewriter, three USB ports, 1.3-Megapixel webcam, and even a 3-in-1 memory card reader.
Verdict
The Samsung R505 isn’t about to win any awards for style or battery life but it manages to combine a good all-round level of performance for the price. The use of an AMD dual-core processor helps to keep the price down without affecting performance, which is no bad thing.
Best features
Good spec for price
Nice screen
Good keyboard
Not so good
Rather boring design
Battery life
Check out the Samsung R505 image gallery:
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