 0:54 / 5:46 Transcript 00:00 Chromebooks may have started out as 00:01
inexpensive cheaply made laptops but as 00:04 they got more popular
manufacturers 00:06 started making them more powerful with 00:08 better design
to match 00:09 naturally this sent prices up and 00:11 recently it's been hard
to find a basic 00:13 Chromebook to recommend that cost less 00:15 than five
hundred dollars enter Lenovo 00:18 the company's flex five chromebook which
00:20 I will hereafter refer to just as the 00:22 Flex five isn't anything
special on the 00:25 surface but digging a little deeper 00:26 revealed what's
probably the best 00:28 Chromebook for most people and at four 00:30 hundred and
nine dollars on Amazon it 00:31 represents a tremendous value for an 00:33
everyday laptop as with so many Lenovo 00:40 products the flux 5 is an
unassuming and 00:42 understated laptop closed-up it looks 00:45 just like a
basic gray slab not too thin 00:47 at 2/3 of an inch or too light at just 00:49
under three pounds it's your basic 13 00:52 inch laptop and that vibe is the
same 00:54 when you open it up the aforementioned 00:56 13.3 inch touchscreen
has decently small 00:58 bezels on three of four sides with a 01:00 thick strip
at the bottom and a webcam 01:02 completely the physical slider to block 01:04
it up top the screen itself is pretty 01:07 excellent for computer in this price
01:08 range it doesn't have the best viewing 01:10 angles and reflections and
bright light 01:12 can be pretty harsh but it's still 01:14 relatively bright
colors and contrasts 01:16 make everything pop and the 1080p 01:18 resolution is
solid on display this size 01:20 the flux 5 has a 360 degree hinge so 01:24 that
the screen can be flipped all the 01:26 way around to use the device as a rather
01:27 heavy tablet as such you'll find a 01:30 volume rocker and power button on
the
01:31 side so you can adjust things without 01:33 the keyboard the sides
also contain two 01:35 USB C ports one on each side a USB a 01:38 port a
headphone jack a security lock in 01:42 a microSD card slot nothing too exciting
01:44 but a standard USB port is always a good 01:46 thing these days lenovo has
built a 01:49 reputation for excellent keyboards and 01:50 the company didn't
let me down on the 01:52 Flex 5 the backlit keys are nice and 01:54 large with
plenty of travel you won't 01:56 compromise the typing experience with 01:58
this device most of the Chromebooks I 02:00 review that they have had excellent
02:01 keyboards but none of them has been as 02:03 inexpensive as the Flex 5 put
simply I 02:06 can type on this computer all day long 02:08 and not miss a beat
the trackpad is also 02:10 big enough to be comfortable and 02:11 no trouble
recognized various clicks and 02:13 swipes I found a lot of Chromebook 02:15
manufacturers build trackpads that are 02:17 oddly short and wide but this
sounds 02:19 just a bit more vertical space which 02:21 makes a big difference
to me 02:22 laptop speakers have gotten surprisingly 02:24 good lately but
lenovo isn't pushing 02:26 anything forward here that's okay as 02:28 most of
the time I don't expect high 02:30 quality listening from laptop speakers 02:32
it's more about playing back at YouTube 02:33 video or hearing notifications and
these 02:36 speakers are fine for that music 02:38 playback was rather tinny
though you can 02:39 crank the volume up pretty high if you 02:41 want to the
fact that there's no speaker 02:43 on the bottom or sides means that audio 02:44
playback is pretty muffled when you flip 02:46 the screen around as well I was
02:50 pleasantly surprised with the Flex 5 02:51 once I was logged in and
putting it 02:53 through my normal routine Lenovo seems 02:55 to have hit a
sweet spot of specs and 02:56 price here making a chrome app has 02:58 nearly
the same performance as more 03:00 expensive models while keeping an 03:01
affordable price the combo of Intel's 03:04 tenth generation Core i3 processor
four 03:06 gigabytes of RAM and 64 gigabytes of 03:08 storage is pretty modest
but it handled 03:11 my work needs with no issues generally I 03:13 run a few
chrome windows with anywhere 03:14 from 5 to 15 tabs as well as dedicated 03:17
web apps for slack YouTube music or 03:19 Spotify keep Trello todoist hangouts
and 03:23 tweet deck I also run the occasional 03:25 Android app like Facebook
Messenger or 03:26 Adobe Lightroom I was worried that the 03:29 four gigabytes
of RAM wouldn't cut it 03:30 but I didn't run into skips on my music 03:33 from
low memory occasionally tabs would 03:35 refresh if I had look at them recently
03:37 but the overall experience was 03:38 consistently smooth and trouble-free
as 03:40 I mentioned earlier the flux 5 has a 360 03:43 degree hinge so you can
flip the screen 03:45 around for tablet mode if that's 03:47 something you're
interested in the flux 03:48 5s hinge is strong and flips around 03:50 nicely
with no sticking points or 03:52 friction 03:53 well no bows lots of experience
making 03:55 two and one devices like this so I have 03:57 a few long-term build
quality concerns 03:58 here either there's not a lot else to 04:01 say about how
the flux 5 works but 04:03 that's a good thing it feels like any 04:05 high-end
Chromebook I've used in the 04:06 last year but without the high price 04:08
tags that accompany many of the best 04:10 options out there put simply the
price 04:12 to performance ratio here is excellent 04:13 not just for a
Chromebook but for any 04:15 laptop the flux 5 succeeds in another 04:18 area of
battery life it's not the best 04:21 I've ever seen but the laptop did last
04:23 just over 8 hours in our 10 04:24 looping an HD movie with the screen set
04:26 to 65% brightness 04:28 I got similar results going about my 04:30 normal
day as well so I think it's safe 04:32 to say you can expect about 8 hours 04:33
unless you're spending the entire day on 04:35 Google mate or zoom calls come to
think 04:38 of it you might be doing that these days 04:40 so just find an
outlet if you're gonna 04:42 be out of video calls all day again give 04:45 them
the flex 5s relatively low price I 04:47 have no issues with the battery it out
04:49 last multiple Chromebooks that cost 04:51 significantly more it's been
about three 04:54 years since I've reviewed a Chromebook 04:56 that I can
recommend as easily as 04:57 Lenovo's flex five it's really quite 04:59 simple
for four hundred nine dollars you 05:01 get a Chromebook that works just as well
05:03 as ones that cost hundreds of dollars 05:04 more you do compromise a bit
on storage 05:07 and RAM so power users should look 05:09 elsewhere but for
anyone else the flux 5 05:12 is exactly the kind of Chromebook we 05:13 should
be seeing more of it's a great 05:15 everyday computer that can handle most
05:17 modern web-based tasks Photoshop 05:19 aficionados and video editors will
05:21 continue to look elsewhere 05:22 but if you're looking for a computer
05:24 that's easy to use and simple to 05:25 maintain the flux 5 is a great
option 05:28 [Music
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