Question 1

I see some experience overheating issues with this. Will this be an issue when it's just being used for general office apps (Quickbooks, etc.) and internet usage?

Accepted Answer

Great question.  This answer may be a little on the late side but I nonetheless would like to weigh in.  The overheating issues I have found with this model occurs mainly when it is woken up from sleep mode.  I believe the issue arises when the internal fan doesn't get going properly once the computer is awake and running.  It only happens maybe once in 20 times the computer is woken up but when it does the fan is barely audible or completely silent and large amounts of heat begins to build up on the bottom of the case.  Please take note however that this computer runs an AMD processor as well as a dedicated Radeon graphics card, both of which can run a bit hot at times when at load so heat may be noticeable during normal operation.

Having owned this laptop for the last few months my overall experience has been very positive.  I bought this computer for graduate school and it has served me very well.  Heat is not normally a problem for me when using general office applications.  When performing more intensive actions however such as light gaming as well as watching videos more load is paced on the graphics card and processor and heat can be noticed.  I've found a  laptop cooler useful when using this laptop for longer periods.

Question 2

What is the battery life I will expect from this laptop?

Accepted Answer

It depends on your usage, software/OS settings, and your power consumption settings. If you run on powersaving mode you could possibly get four to five hours on it. I get around 1 1/2 to 2hrs of battery life on "normal" setting just simply browsing the internet and streaming video. If you do any sort of gaming, the battery life is less than 1 1/2. There is a reason why the battery life is so short and the laptop is so light...the battery that comes with a laptop is a four cell (which is one of the lowest capacity batteries you can get for a laptop) Hope this helps!

The battery looks like in could be ugraded to a 9 or 12 cell for better battery performance.

Question 3

How would this laptop fair with graphics programs such as CorelDraw? This would be used as a backup to my desktop.

Accepted Answer

I would not recommend it for that, it seems to have some issues with doing drawing.  You want something with a bit more power.  Also has issues with heating up because of fan placement.

I use it for some light gaming and as a full size laptop for going to a wilting group.  I also use it for progamming my home arduino network which takes no power but I like the full size keyboard.

Question 4

Will this computer have the capability of handling games like chivalry medieval warfare and minecraft with ease?

Accepted Answer

Chivalry: Medieval Warfare runs Direct X 9 you should have no problem at all.This runs Direct X 11 (High to Ultra settings)

PC Requirements for Chivalry: Medieval Warfare

CPU:	 Core 2 Duo 2.4 GHz or Althon 64 X2 2.7 GHz
CPU Speed:	 Info
RAM:	 2 GB
OS:	 Windows XP
Video Card:	 ATI Radeon HD 3870 or higher, Nvidia GeForce 8800 GT or higher
Sound Card:	 Yes
Free Disk Space:	 3 GB

As you can see it doesn't take much to run this game so you have allot of head room

You can run Minecraft on  this max no problem

Recommended Requirements for Minecraft
CPU : Intel Pentium D or AMD Athlon 64 (K8) 2.6 GHz
RAM : 4GB
GPU : GeForce 6xxx or ATI Radeon 9xxx and up with OpenGL 2.1 Support (Excluding Integrated Chipsets)
HDD : 150MB

This laptop is choice for you good luck & have fun :P

Question 5

Does anyone know exactly what Version of windows 8 it has?

Accepted Answer

it ships with windows 8 basic. but you can easily upgrade to 8.1 since this computer was built prior it would have shipped with it. now it appears to be out of stock so most likely a newer model is going to come out with windows 8.1 pre-installed. if you are talking about needing the 8.1 professional version you do have to buy that separately in most cases.

Question 6

The answer is probably no but can you run BF4 on this laptop?

Accepted Answer

i don't know what the requirements are for BF4 but i am a gamer and i run all of my video games at full specs. i lose a lot of framerate, but i think i can solve that by upgrading the ram. as far as newer games perhaps they have even more intensive software (probably the most intensive i have gotten is cryengine with crysis 2, but i still run it at full specs without major issues)

Question 7

what is the most ram i can install on this machine?

Accepted Answer

Not sure, but it makes a fine internet box.  I have the latest build of Win10 running on it and it is very fast.  But given it's age I would recommend something else that is newer unless you are getting a hell of a steal on it.

Question 8

how much does it weigh roughly? I already purchased it but as a student I want to know how much I'll be lugging around

Accepted Answer

As a student, I'd say it weighs about the same as a one inch binder with 100 sheets of paper in it.

Question 9

I just wanted to clarify - the RAM is only upgrade-able to 8gb, even if I replace the original 4gb it came with and put in 2x 8gb sticks?

Accepted Answer

in addition why would you be running more than 8gb? i run video games and right now use the default stick of 4 and i can max out the settings on most games. if i ran 8gb of ram i could run max settings without any major framerate loss, which is the only issue i currently run accross.

Question 10

Due to the nature of the "dual-graphics"on this system; has anyone found a way to solely run the dedicated GPU?

Second, does anyone know the PLL to the A8-5550m APU?

-Reviewer "Nate"

Accepted Answer

@Nate:  You can turn off the Hybrid mode in the Catalyst control panel to run solely the Dedicated GPU; however, you should note that the dedicated GPU is not extremely powerful.  Hybrid mode significantly helps.

Can you define PLL?  I've not heard that acronym before.

Brand	Lenovo
Model	G505s (59378837)
Part Number	59378837

CPU Type	AMD A8-Series
Processor Name	AMD A8-5550M
CPU L2 Cache	4MB

Screen Size	15.6"
Wide Screen Support	Yes
Resolution	1366 x 768
Display Features	LED backlight, 200 nits, 16:9 aspect ratio

GPU/VPU	AMD Radeon HD 8570M
Video Memory	2GB
Graphic Type	Dedicated Card

Memory	4GB
Memory Speed	DDR3 1600
Memory Spec	4 GB x 1
Memory Slot (Total)	2
Max Memory Supported	8 GB

Lenovo Laptop AMD A8-5550M 4GB Memory 500GB HDD AMD Radeon HD 8570M 15.6" Windows 8 G505s (59378837)

Learn more about the Lenovo G505s (59378837)

Customer Reviews of the Lenovo G505s (59378837)

Warranty & Returns

Warranty, Returns, And Additional Information

Warranty

Return Policies

Manufacturer Contact Info

LAN	10/100Mbps
WLAN	802.11b/g/n Wireless LAN
Bluetooth	Bluetooth 4.0

USB	1 x USB 2.0 2 x USB 3.0
Video Port	1 x VGA
HDMI	1 x HDMI
Audio Ports	1 x Stereo headphones / microphone in combo jack

Audio	Dolby Advanced Audio, 1 x internal analog mic
Speaker	2 speakers x 1.5 watts

Touchpad	Multi-touch touchpad
Keyboard	AccuType Keyboard with Numeric Keypad
Webcam	720p HD
Card Reader	2 in 1 Card Reader (SD, MMC)

Battery	4-cell, 2800mAh Li-Cylinder battery
Battery Life	Up to 5 hours

General
Style	Standard
Type	Mainstream
Usage	Consumer

Dimensions & Weight
Dimensions (W x D x H)	15.0" x 10.2" x 1.0"
Weight	5.3 lbs.

Item#: N82E16834312830