Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15 Review: Durable Design, Affordable

Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15: At First Glance

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 15″ is the brand’s mid-range laptop. This laptop could be the ideal laptop for practically everyone, thanks to its modest spec sheet and beautiful design.

In addition, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15 is a good-quality lightweight laptop. On direct comparison, it matches up to a reasonable level with many laptops in its range.

Overall, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 appears to be an excellent value. Furthermore, the laptop is quite affordable.

When I published this article in June 2021, the laptop’s starting price was $659.90.

Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15: Design, Dimension and Weight

When we think of Lenovo, we think of those black, boxy ThinkPads that are ideal for business. The Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15, on the other hand, manages to maintain a stylish appearance.

The chassis is virtually identical to the IdeaPad S540, although the thickness is slightly different. The laptop is made of aluminum and plastic, and it follows the newest trends in bezel-less displays in terms of style.

Furthermore, the laptop’s Platinum Gray casing is simple yet attractive, with a flat lid space on the side for a small Lenovo logo. The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 is also available in Onyx Black and Abyss Blue.

Additionally, the laptop’s lid is resistant to heavy bending. The laptop’s base, on the other hand, is prone to bending.

When you open the lid, you’ll see a lovely display with a slim side and top bezels. The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 feels smoother and sleeker than the Dell Inspiron 15.

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15 is a nice-sized laptop with remarkably minimal bezels around the display. However, the quality of the bezels is a clear indication of where Lenovo kept the cost low.

If you want to buy the Lenovo IdeaPad S340, you’ll have to put up with its terrible viewing angles. Moreover, the display isn’t particularly brilliant, topping out at 215cd/m2, despite Lenovo’s claims of 250 cd/m2.

Even when I was indoors, I had to increase the brightness to the maximum of 220 nits due to the bad display lighting.

Additionally, the colors on the laptop are similarly washed out, and the contrast is weak, with blacks looking like grey. All things considered, the IdeaPad S340’s display is disappointing due to its lack of color and readability.

Directly above the laptop’s display is a 720p webcam. The laptop also comes with a TrueBlock privacy shutter, which is a new design that allows you to cover the webcam if needed.

Moving on, the keyboard and touchpad on Lenovo’s IdeaPad S340 are identical to those on the IdeaPad S540 and S740 models. Moreover, in terms of a laptop keyboard, Lenovo ThinkPads have some of the best.

However, the keys on the IdeaPad S340 Keyboard are spongier, shallower, and appear to be of inferior quality. For a low-budget laptop, the keyboard shouldn’t come as a surprise to most users.

Additionally, several keys, such as the up and down arrows, are annoyingly small. However, there are some function keys at the top of the keyboard that allows you to quickly modify things like the screen brightness.

Also, a 10-key numeric keypad is located beside the keyboard, while a trackpad is located beneath the keyboard.

The trackpad isn’t particularly large, but it does the job. Although it can be a little sluggish at times, this isn’t a major issue, and it performs admirably with good palm rejection.

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 has two down-firing speakers on either side of the base panel. Despite using the integrated Dolby Audio software, the sound is pretty loud but dull.

When it comes to connectivity, the IdeaPad S340 does not disappoint. On the laptop’s left side, you will find a power port, an HDMI port, 1 USB-C 3.1 port, and a 3.5mm audio jack for headsets.

Additionally, there are two USB-A 3.1 connections on the right side, as well as a full-size SD card reader slot. Unfortunately, there is no LAN port, fingerprint scanner, or Kensington Security Slot on the laptop.

The laptop’s dimensions and weight are 358 x 245 x 17.9 mm and 1790g, respectively.

In comparison, the Lenovo Chromebook C340 is heavier than the Lenovo IdeaPad S340. The Lenovo Chromebook measures 361.5 x 248.85 x 18.95 mm and weighs 1960 g.

Finally, I’ll give the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 an eight for overall design in this review.

Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15: Processor (CPU) Performance

Lenovo offers two processor options for the IdeaPad S340: an Intel Core i7-10510U processor and an AMD Ryzen 5 Pro 3500U processor. The Intel Core i7-10510U has an 8MB cache and runs at a base frequency of 1.8GHz and a maximum frequency of 4.9GHz.

On the other hand, the AMD Ryzen 5 Pro 3500U has a base frequency of 2.10GHz and a maximum frequency of 3.10GHz. The AMD Ryzen 5 Pro 3500U also has a 4MB cache.

With each of these processors, the IdeaPad S340 has enough capacity to handle regular computing tasks including heavy ones. Web surfing, word processing, sending of emails, all work smoothly on the laptop.

Moving on, the processor in the laptop I reviewed was an Intel Core i7-10510U. To determine the processor’s performance, I ran a Geekbench 4 test.

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 scored 6163 points in the test. When compared to the Lenovo V330, this outcome fell short. In my tests, the Lenovo V330’s Intel Core i5 8th Gen 8250U processor scored 9211 points.

Finally, I’ll give the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 an eight for processor performance in this review.

Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15: Memory (RAM) Performance

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 comes with two RAM slots. 1 RAM slot has a 4 GB memory soldered to the motherboard.

Additionally, the second slot can take up to 8 GB – making a maximum of 12 GB RAM.

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 laptop I reviewed has 8 GB of RAM (4 GB soldered to the motherboard, the second upgradable slot had 4 GB). For high-demand tasks, the 8 GB RAM is more than sufficient.

Furthermore, I was able to multitask – I was surfing the web with many browser tabs open, and playing music at the same time. The laptop, on the other hand, handled these tasks with ease.

Basically, the laptop is good for web surfing and word processing.

I ran a PCMark 10 test to find out more about the laptop’s RAM performance. The Lenovo IdeaPad S340 received a score of 2753 points in the test.

In comparison, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340’s performance falls short of the Acer Aspire 3, which received 2960 points. However, the score was higher than the category average of 2000 points.

Finally, I’ll give the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 a seven in this category because of its RAM performance in my tests.

Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15: Storage Option and Performance

Let’s have a look at the storage options for the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 Laptop. The laptop comes with either a PCIe NVMe M.2 SSD or a SATA hard drive.

Furthermore, both storage options can hold up to 2TB of data. For a laptop at this price, I believe the storage options are enough.

In addition, the laptop also includes a 4-in-1 SD card reader for extra storage. For those who demand a large amount of storage space, the SD card storage option should be handy.

The model I tested had a 512GB SSD, which should be enough for most users. With 512 GB of storage, you can save a large number of images, music, videos, and games.

I performed a CrystalDiskMark test to determine the storage transfer rate of the 512GB SSD that came with the laptop I reviewed. The laptop did quite well in the test.

In the CrystalDiskMark test, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 scored a sequential read speeds of 1842Mbps and sequential write speeds of 982.4Mbps.

In comparison, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 outperformed the Acer Aspire 3. The Acer Aspire 3 delivered a read speed of 1390 Mbps and a write speed of 300 Mbps.

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340’s storage is quite adequate for its price. As a result, I rate the Lenovo IdeaPad S340’s storage performance an eight out of 10.

Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15: Graphic Card Performance

Just like its processor and storage, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 also has multiple graphics options. The graphics options that come with the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 are the NVIDIA GeForce MX-230 and the AMD Radeon Vega 8.

The NVIDIA GeForce MX-230 graphics card has a dedicated 2GB VRAM. Unfortunately, the AMD Radeon Vega 8 lacks dedicated memory.

In addition, the NVIDIA GeForce MX-230 graphics card has a 1519MHz base frequency and a 1531MHz boost frequency. The AMD Radeon Vega 8, on the other hand, offers a 300MHz base frequency and a 1200MHz boost frequency.

Moving on, the laptop I reviewed had an NVIDIA GeForce MX-230 graphics card.

To determine the laptop’s gaming performance I played some games such as Rocket League and DOTA 2. Unfortunately, at low graphical settings, the laptop still struggled to play both games well.

For instance, while playing Rocket League in low graphical settings, the laptop only managed to hit 45fps. It’s also worth noting that games like Fortnite, Apex Legends, Minecraft, PUBG, and GTA V will not run on this laptop.

Furthermore, while playing DOTA 2 in low graphical settings, the laptop was unable to maintain Boost clock rates for an extended period of time. Standing still at 45fps at the start of the game, only to fall and stabilize at 33 fps after an hour.

In comparison, the laptop performed worse than the Dell XPS 13. While playing Rocket League on low graphical settings, the Dell XPS 13 was able to reach 114fps.

To further see how well the laptop performed with these graphics cards, I conducted a 3DMark 11 benchmark test. According to the test results, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 laptop scored 2339 points.

Unfortunately, the Dell XPS 13, which scored 2999 points in the test, outperformed the laptop once again.

Lenovo IdeaPad S340 disappointed me due to its gaming and graphics card performance. In view of all of this, I’ll rate the laptop a six for graphics performance.

Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15: Battery Life and Performance

The Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15 has a 42Whr Li-Polymer battery, which is quite okay for a laptop at this price point. Lenovo claims that when charged fully, the laptop will last up to 10 hours.

However, to verify Lenovo’s claim, I conducted a real-world battery test .

During the test, I charged the laptop fully and left it inactive, disconnected from the internet, and the brightness adjusted to the lowest setting. Under these conditions, the laptop lasted an incredible 9 hours and 50 minutes.

After that, I turned on the Wi-Fi, returned the screen brightness to normal, and began web surfing. The laptop lasted 4 hours and 18 minutes in this scenario, which was still outstanding.

Finally, I turned up the screen brightness to maximum and was web surfing and running many applications at the same time. In this setup, the laptop lasted 1 hour and 20 minutes.

In comparison, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340-15 lasted longer than the Dell Latitude E5430, which lasted 6hrs 40mins in an inactive state.

After all considerations, I will rate the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 an eight in this category for its excellent battery life.

Frequently Asked Questions

Conclusion

With a few key upgrades, the Lenovo IdeaPad S340 is extremely similar to the IdeaPad 330S. Improved aesthetics (including a smaller frame), a privacy shutter for the webcam, and longer battery life are among the upgrades.

Lenovo has created one of the greatest affordable laptops on the market, as we predicted when we first saw the Lenovo IdeaPad S340.

It’s affordable but it looks great, has a good keyboard, a lot of useful ports, and a long battery life. Of course, performance is restricted to basic tasks, but if you require more power, there are more powerful models of this laptop available.

The display, which is quite basic, is the biggest letdown, as it is with many inexpensive laptops.

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