Lenovo has always made good-looking laptops, regardless of price, and this new IdeaPad 3 is no exception. With its brushed aluminum lid and keyboard surround, it certainly doesn’t look like a cheap laptop. The bottom and screen bezel are both plastic, but build quality is good and it’s nice to see an interesting color, as my review unit came in an elegant dark cherry red.
In addition to Platinum Gray and Business Black, there is also an attractive Abyss Blue option. At 20 mm, the notebook is not particularly thin, and even the taped corners cannot hide this. This is not unusual for a notebook of this price, and the weight is reasonable at 1.6 kg. Lenovo claims that the IdeaPad 3i has narrow edges around the screen, but I wouldn’t call it that, especially on the bottom where it’s huge and there isn’t even a logo to break it up.
On the plus side, there is a physical privacy shutter on the webcam, but the camera itself is low quality at just 0.3Mp (not even 720p). The biggest drawback we found with the design is that the front edge is a bit sharp, which is uncomfortable on the palm when using the trackpad. The Lenovo Ideapad 3i features a 14-inch full HD (1,920 x 1,080) display with an anti-glare coating.
That sounds good on paper, but it’s not a touchscreen, and when it comes to watching movies or playing games, it doesn’t offer the best visual experience. Brightness is weak (220 nits max), colors on videos look washed out, and contrast is low. The sound from the two 1.5 W speakers is not particularly good either. The sound is quite tinny and bass is almost completely lacking.
Yes, it is a budget notebook, so you should not expect a premium experience in this area. But there’s no sugarcoating it: The video and audio quality are the areas where Lenovo has made the biggest compromises to achieve a low price.
