Lenovo IdeaPad 3 82KU0100US Review | Surprisingly Good!

Looking for a budget and balanced laptop for your daily tasks, light gaming, and multimedia entertainment? If so, you may want to take a look at Lenovo's IdeaPad 3's lineup, in which you'll be able to find a perfect solution for you that takes care of all your computing needs.

Evidence of it is the well-reviewed laptop we're about to uncover today in this review of the Lenovo IdeaPad 3 82KU0100US. An exciting new model that has managed to climb the ranks thanks to its low-powered AMD Ryzen 5 processor, sturdy and professional design, generous RAM, full-sized keyboard, and blazing fast SSD storage.

Without further ado, let's get to know this model in depth to see if it's the solution you've been looking for or if you'll have to keep looking elsewhere. If that's the case, don't worry; we will also offer a series of similar alternatives you should consider towards the end of this review.

The Lenovo IdeaPad 3 82KU0100US rocks a sturdy chassis whose black matte and brushed finish on the lid makes it an excellent choice for those who want a professional-looking computer, whether to use it at the workplace, in college, or at home.

Also, its lightweight design of just 3.63 pounds allows you to easily bring it with you whenever you need it.

In terms of the display, the Lenovo IdeaPad 3 features a narrow-bezel Full HD 15.6-inch screen equipped with TN (Twisted Neumatic) technology to offer crisp images with a respectable color gamut and contrasts, as well as Lenovo's eye-care technology to make sure you don't get tired after spending hours staring at the screen.  

Regarding the technology of the display (TN) this is the exception within the mid-range since most laptops tend to feature an IPS display that offers better viewing angles.

If you're looking for a mid-range laptop equipped with an IPS display, maybe the Acer Aspire 5 A515-45-R3SU would be a better solution for you. Another competitively priced laptop that also features an AMD processor, 8 GB of RAM, respectable battery life, and a modern set of connectivity options. 

Going back to the review at hand, the 82KU0100US's full-sized keyboard is perfect for you to work on your productivity tasks providing a comfortable feeling when typing, while its backlit function will be beneficial in low-light conditions as some users have stated.

The touchpad is responsive and soft enough to assure a pleasant experience while navigating through Windows 11 Home's interface, thanks to its multi-gesture technology. Obviously, you're not getting a glass touchpad like the ones you'd see on high-end notebooks, but it's still pretty good overall.

The Lenovo IdeaPad 3 (82KU0100US) packs a lower-consumption AMD Ryzen 5 5500U processor powered by six cores, 12 threads, and 11 MB of cache memory. Its base clock speed of 2.10 GHz can reach up to 4.00 GHz on the most demanding tasks. Making it more than suitable for most users.

The 82KU0100US also ships with 8 GB of DDR4 RAM, which you will be able to upgrade up to 12 GB by replacing the non-soldered 4 GB memory. However, unlike most of our RAM Upgrade tutorials, this model is not user-friendly when it comes to swapping out the RAM, so you might want to consider that you'll have to take it to a specialist if that's what you're planning to do.

Having said that, these hardware components will allow you to handle several tasks at once without any hiccups - from web browsing to spreadsheet editing, video-chatting, programming, non-professional photo/video/audio editing, software development, schoolwork, and many other work-from-home tasks.

An integrated GPU (AMD Radeon Graphics) is added for you to stream your favorite 4K content smoothly and even to play fluently some non-GPU-heavy PC games such as; The Sims 4, Minecraft, Roblox, and RuneScape, among others.

Furthermore, it comes with a 512 GB SSD M.2 NVMe drive with reading/writing speeds of up to 3200 Mb/s, so you can boot up Windows in less than 10 seconds, transfer heavy data, open your day-to-day apps, and finish your projects swiftly. And if needed, you'll be able to add another SSD unit to expand its storage capacity.

The storage capacity was, along with the CPU, one of the biggest surprises that Lenovo had on this laptop since it's pretty rare to find a laptop in this price range that offers more than 256 GB of storage, and that's definitely a bonus point to consider this laptop over its competitors.

As for the connectivity options, it comes with pretty decent solutions to improve your daily productivity. It has three USB-A ports (one of them 3.2), a single USB-C port, an HDMI output, a headphone jack, an SD card reader, and Bluetooth 5.0.

Moreover, it's equipped with the Wi-Fi 5 standard, which provides a faster and more consistent internet connection through a 5 GHz wireless network. And if you're confused about the name of the Wi-Fi standard, it's important to clarify that the well-known Wi-Fi 802.11ac is now called Wi-Fi 5.

In addition, we've got an HD webcam with a physical shutter for more privacy when needed.

Overall, we are delighted with Lenovo's connectivity options. While we would've liked to see the latest Wi-Fi 6 standard, we are happy to see it implement both an SD card reader and a physical shutter for the webcam, which are features that are becoming increasingly hard to come across.

However, if you need a computer packed with the newest Wi-Fi 6 (previously known as Wi-Fi 802.11ax) and an Ethernet port, you might want to take a look at the recently reviewed Acer Aspire 5 A515-45-R74Z.

Regarding the battery life of the Lenovo IdeaPad 3 82KU0100US, this laptop features a 45 Wh 3-Cell Lithium battery offering up to 7 hours of mixed usage. Your mileage might vary. However, don't expect much more than 6-7 hours, depending on your usage.

Verdict: Should you buy it?