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  • - Hey guys, this is Austin.

  • It's always fun to check out

  • the $5,000 laptops of the world,

  • but in reality, this is what you should buy.

  • At $500, this ASUS Vivobook F510UA,

  • which is a wonderful, easy-to-remember name,

  • has a lot going for it.

  • Inside, there's an Intel 8th Generation Core i5 8250U,

  • and that's kind of a big deal at this kind of price point.

  • These new U series processors

  • are a huge step up in performance,

  • and it's really nice to see them trickle down

  • to even fairly affordable laptops like this.

  • With a full quad-core CPU on board,

  • you're getting so much better performance

  • than any kind of older budget option.

  • That Core i5 can boost up to 3.4 gigahertz,

  • which should be more than enough

  • performance for most people.

  • The only real downside is that you're not going to have

  • any kind of dedicated graphics for gaming,

  • but if that's something you're interested in,

  • the Acer Aspire 5, which I've talked about many, many times,

  • is going to a better option.

  • Remove a few screws on the back of the laptop,

  • and you're going to get access to, well,

  • basically everything you might want, including the memory,

  • which is going to come with eight gigs by default,

  • but it's going to be super-easy to upgrade that to 16 gigs,

  • assuming you didn't have to pay $90

  • to pick up another stick of RAM,

  • but, I mean, the option's there.

  • The base model of the laptop, which is what I have here,

  • is going to run you $510 on Amazon.

  • Now that's going to get you

  • a standard one terabyte mechanical hard drive,

  • but there's also going to be an empty M.2 slot

  • if you want to upgrade with an SSD.

  • Now interestingly, Amazon actually does sell

  • another SKU of this laptop

  • which just has that SSD installed.

  • It's going to be 128 gigs

  • as well as the one terabyte hard drive.

  • It's going to cost you $600.

  • That doesn't sound crazy,

  • except that you can actually do it yourself

  • for a lot cheaper, which is exactly what I did.

  • This is a 128-gigabyte ADATA SSD

  • that I was able to pick up for just under $40.

  • Now if you don't mind opening up the laptop

  • and reinstalling Windows,

  • it's going to be an easy way of saving yourself 50 bucks

  • if you want the extra speed.

  • And trust me, if you're buying this laptop,

  • spend the extra $40.

  • It is going to be so, so much faster.

  • With the SSD upgrade paired with that eight gigs of RAM

  • as well as quad-core CPU,

  • you're looking at a very reasonably powerful computer,

  • especially considering the price.

  • Now I know especially when it gets

  • into creative applications such as video editing,

  • that's going to make this a lot more usable.

  • I know especially if it was me a few years ago

  • when I was first starting out,

  • I would've absolutely killed to have a laptop like this

  • that was going to be so cheap.

  • While we've got the laptop opened,

  • you'll also be able to see the Wi-Fi card,

  • which is not only easy to upgrade if you ever want to,

  • but it's a pretty solid card in itself.

  • You're going to be getting dual-band AC Wi-Fi,

  • and that speaks to a lot of my thoughts on this laptop.

  • The ASUS engineers did a good job

  • of picking a pretty solid list of components,

  • and they didn't really cut any major corners

  • with the laptop design.

  • The only real issue here

  • is actually going to be with the battery life.

  • With only a 42 watt-hour cell,

  • it's going to give you a decent battery life.

  • ASUS claims about eight hours,

  • and while that's going to be a little bit ambitious,

  • it could be better, especially considering that

  • there's all this space up here

  • which could totally be used for battery,

  • although I assume that that's probably

  • for some higher-end version

  • where they would stick the dedicated GPU.

  • At this price, the design is going to be all plastic,

  • and that's not really necessarily going to be a bad thing.

  • It's pretty well-built.

  • There's going to be a little bit of screen flex,

  • but there's not a whole lot if you actually go ahead

  • and press down the keyboard.

  • It is a fairly well-built laptop.

  • Port-wise, it's a good selection.

  • You're going to be getting three USB-A ports,

  • a USB-C, as well as HDMI, a headphone jack,

  • and an SD card reader.

  • If you're not catching the trend yet,

  • it's not going to be spectacular,

  • but there's really no corners cut.

  • It's going to be a good selection

  • of pretty much everything you need.

  • Like most laptops in 2018,

  • you are going to be getting a Windows Precision Touchpad.

  • As you expect, it works well, there's solid tracking,

  • and you're also going to be getting

  • support for all the different Windows gestures.

  • Essentially at this point,

  • most of these Windows Precision Touchpads

  • are going to be very equivalent.

  • There's going to be minor differences

  • in the actual surface area and stuff,

  • but it's going to be totally fine

  • and so much better than old-school trackpads.

  • A really nice touch is the addition

  • of a fingerprint sensor built into the trackpad.

  • Now I'm not a huge fan of the positioning.

  • It's going to get a little bit in your way here,

  • but the good thing is is that it's going to have

  • full support for Windows Hello,

  • which makes logging in much, much simpler.

  • Honestly, this is something I like to see on any laptop,

  • so it's especially nice to see it

  • on something that's going to be so affordable.

  • The keyboard is going to be classic ASUS,

  • so it's going to have a fairly light touch

  • without a lot of feel, but importantly,

  • they completely nailed not only the layout,

  • but also the spacing between the keys.

  • Now it would be nice to see some backlighting,

  • but again, we're talking about a $500 laptop here.

  • While it might not look impressive on paper,

  • the display on this guy is actually pretty nice.

  • It is a 15.6-inch panel with a 1920 by 1080p resolution.

  • Now that resolution might not sound all that impressive,

  • but especially when you put it

  • compared to other laptops in this price range,

  • especially a lot of the Acer panels,

  • this is going to look so much better.

  • It might not be the brightest thing in the world,

  • but the color and especially the contrast

  • are a lot better than what you would expect

  • at this sort of price point,

  • and that even includes the bezel.

  • Even though it's going to be a 15.6-inch display,

  • the actual overall footprint of the laptop

  • is actually pretty small.

  • - But it's not exactly going to be the best solution in the world.

  • - What's also not the best solution in the world

  • are going to be the speakers.

  • So they sound okay,

  • but they especially get tinny at higher volumes,

  • and a lot of that is because

  • not only are they not all impressive in the first place,

  • but they're also going to be on the underside of the laptop,

  • which means that you should probably

  • just get a pair of headphones.

  • At around $500, this really does feel like

  • a solid sweet spot.

  • Spend even $100 less, and you're going to be

  • seriously sacrificing on performance,

  • whereas when you start to spend more,

  • you're going to get nicer things

  • like build quality and stuff,

  • but you're not going to see

  • any kind of massive performance gains

  • until you get into a much more expensive system.

  • The main thing is, though,

  • is that you should definitely upgrade with the SSD.

  • It's going to make a huge difference