Asus X540LA-SI30205P 15.6-Inch Laptop (Intel Core i3, 4GB Memory,1TB Hard Drive, Windows 10 Home), Silver

PROs: Very fast for surfing. Very affordable. Responsive trackpad (which is the downfall of most cheap laptops, not this one). Comfortable keyboard – rubberized key covers (even if they are "chiclet" style they work great), good key depth and tactile response. Looks attractive. When playing 480p You Tube videos, CPU only registers 18% usage and total of 1.9 GB of RAM in use. Got this for 0 on a lightning deal. It has an Intel Broadwell series 2.2 Ghz dual core, 4 hyper thread processors CPU. It’s performs plenty fast, faster than my 5 year old 3.2 Mhz AMD with SSD desktop unit. Obviously not as fast as my other "flagship" PC (i7-4790K) but hey, at this price it doesn’t have to be. I feel like I got a very good value for the money spent.

CONS: Bios time set wrong from the factory (set to Oct 2015). So, initially before I fixed this, was getting certificate errors. Issue fixed by rebooting and tapping "Del" key and entering BIOS , setting time correctly. This was a hassle and annoyance though. They try and foist McAfee Anti-virus on you during the Microsoft setup wizard process. I disinstalled McAfee and put Norton Security 2016 on it, much happier. Had to disable a lot of the default Microsoft snoop settings. C’est L’vie.

Overall I am happy, feel I got a super deal and it has ample performance for day to day surfing use. Rarely am I waiting for anything to respond or load.

DETAILS: MODEL NUMBER: ASUS X555LA-HI31103J
P/N # (Part Number): 90NB0652-M28460

Amazing product for the money!! I was looking at buying a Desktop replacement, used to own a Toshiba and it was running on it’s last legs, the processor just wasn’t strong enough after 4 years of use to handle basic Youtube videos in HD. So I elected to upgrade before it died during a crucial project. So basically right now there are several top brands in laptops in terms of brand quality, reliability, costumer satisfaction etc – the top three brands are 1. Apple (duh right?) 2. Dell – Which made a MAJOR push in the laptop industry in the last five years, their company motto was to put more effort into laptops, I know because my friend works there. In an age of netbooks and tablets, they’re pushing hard to take over laptops. 3. Asus – Asus has been around for a while and has always been top 5 in quality and reliability, I’ve never had the pleasure of owning one of their machines but now I do.

I was deciding honestly to get the Asus F555LA-AB31 15.6-Inch Laptop. The processor was solid for basic home use (not crazy gaming) and for Microsoft Office. That laptop was also super high in ratings across the board, and one of Amazon’s best sellers. I think it was #116 in laptop sales rank. Can’t go wrong with that model for sure. But I saw this one, running a bigger hard drive AND a newer model AND it weighed less AND cheaper (For now)

So out of the box reviews –
Week 1
Fantastic – the machine is the quietest laptop I’ve ever owned, there isn’t an internal fan and the laptop never runs hot. The webcam is just fine, and a way better upgrade than the laptop I had before. The sound also was very nice, I didn’t experience any distortions and the sound was loud enough. I tested all the pots, the USB 3.0 was awesome, I was able to transfer files from my portable hard drive in half the time. Moreover, I tested out the HDMI and connected it to my TV and ran a movie – the screen didn’t transfer over in correct ratios, and this seems to be an issue with most laptops I’ve tested so just a FYI, it’s not just this laptop. The screen is good but not as vibrant as the Dell I used to own that’s for sure. (However that Dell was WAY more expensive and failed in a couple of years). The laptop measure 1 inch thick and looks like a very high end laptop – which is an absolute plus. The battery runs about 2.5-3 hours depending on what you’re doing on it which isn’t a big deal for me but might be a deal-breaker for those who need 7 hours of battery life to type during class.

Some small Cons: One thing I have to note is that the mouse is a bit sensitive, I’ve definitely accidentally touched it a few times while typing – I need to change the sensitive settings on it for sure. Another thing I’ve noticed is that the keypad isn’t very quiet, if you’re typing next to someone trying to sleep, it might not work out for that person, I believe someone else noticed the same thing in their review, the bounce of the keypad is slightly higher than most of the other laptops I’ve used, but overall not a big issue.

Week one out of the box I was getting all my files in order, installing programs, updating programs, and uninstalling bloatware that Asus preloaded. It did take a little bit to uninstall all the Asus preloaded "bloatware." I did a bunch of research before uninstalling to make sure I wasn’t doing something that made my programs not work. There’s great forums for this sort of stuff out there. Just look up the name of all the Asus programs that came with your computer, and google will tell you whether it’s safe to uninstall.

The computer took a while running multiple processes in the background to upgrade everything, and uninstall everything, sometimes it did run a little slow and i had to check the task manager to make sure there wasn’t a bunch of malware on the computer that I installed accidentally. It’s now day 7 of my computer use, so far zero issue with dramatic memory/CPU usage from any of my programs.

I will get extra memory to put in this laptop immediately, I’ve noticed that almost half of my RAM was being used running programs sometimes and that’s only going to get worse with time and more updates for programs. The extra memory isn’t easy to install like the other laptops I’ve owned but I’ve taken apart plenty of laptops before and it also shouldn’t be an issue. Look on Youtube for a how-to guide.

Overall – for it’s money – YOU WILL GET NOTHING BETTER IN THE MARKET. I honestly believe that. You can get a cheaper laptop maybe, but it wouldn’t have all the specs this one has and it definitely won’t have the brand quality of ASUS attached to it. I did a TON of research before I bought this laptop and from what I can see, it’s mostly an overseas model, not too many US consumers has purchased it and made it as popular as the F555LA-AB31 and I’m glad. I love finding deals and steals in the market and this one is a definite steal.

I really like this laptop so far it has a very fast processor so far and has amazing storage capacity — plus Asus has about 1,000 gb cloud storage availability for free online once you register your computer, and so far it has been perfect for studying and getting Microsoft office tasks done. I haven’t had much issues with the laptop, other than some apps not opening properly or right away, hopefully it is an OS glitch. For 15.6 inches It is very light weight which I love perfect for taking around and as a teacher I like that I can carry it from class to class, and I am enjoying this laptop, it is perfect for watching shows, movies, youtube videos too because of the nice big 15.6" screen. Overall I am happy with this laptop and the price is amazing for what you get!

You may want to uninstall the security system already in place on this laptop its great for securing the laptop but it slows down the processing annoyingly and web browsing and it will expire anyways! I suggest to arm your laptop in other ways get a spam blocker and additional software you need just google it!

I’ve had this laptop for a couple of months now and it still works just as well as I first got it