CHUWI AeroBook 13.3-Inch Laptop, Intel Core M3-6Y30 Processor, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD, FHD (1920x1080) IPS Display, Windows 10 Home, Backlit Keyboard, 4K Video Decoding, Metal Cover

I haven’t had this for long, but so far so good. I’ve always brought well known brand laptops so I was a bit cautious going for this one. My last laptop was a student deal when I got it 6 years ago, I’ve been overdue for a new one for a while. This is a great budget laptop, working better than my Toshiba before for £100 less. The Aerobook is the perfect size for me, very easy to travel with in a backpack, only a little bigger than A4 paper, it’s thin and light weight. Some people have said about the keys being mislabelled for the UK. Chuwi included a Custom silicone keyboard cover to correct this minor problem, with the added benefit of the keys being better protected from dust/dirt/maybe a small spill. Much appreciated. After a long press of the power button, it boots up very quickly, same for shutting down. So far I’ve used it for streaming, word processing, browsing the internet and storing files. It’s well up to the job, I haven’t fully tested it’s multitasking capabilities yet. I was under the impression that it came with a 2.2Ghz processor speed but it seemed that cpu was saying 0.9GHz which is significantly less. I have found a reboot for turbo performance to improve it which of course will impact battery life, which may not be a problem for everyone. Before changing the processor speed the battery life seemed adequate, however I noted the predicted battery life in hours seems inconsistent with the battery per cent reading. Maybe this will even out once its more settled. The camera isn’t amazing but is adequate, I admit I tested it only briefly in poor light, it would be better if placed on a desk rather than on a lap when making web calls. Speakers do the job, decent key travel on keyboard, great windows 10 customisation, decent hinge for the screen. I like the dark metal design which is sleek and professional, it’s very quiet and I’m still very happy just for not having a bulky, hot, large laptop. Having no fan is a plus, as is lack of other features that I don’t actually need such as disk drive. At first glance its what I need in a laptop for performance and what I want in specs for laptop size, design and price too! If it keeps up current performance for its whole one year manufacturers warranty, I’d consider it money well spent. Nothing so far suggests it shouldn’t. I hope it lasts a long time; Chuwi, being such a good competitor in features, will be a brand I stick with if so.

Initially I thought I had made a good purchase. The speed was excellent, battery life decent, and the overlay to a UK keyboard worked well. However, a month in the issues started to mount. First, the battery started acting up. It started to suddenly die abruptly when not plugged in. After a week or two more, it had to be plugged in at all times for it to work. Secondly, the boot-up started to glitch up, with the computer turning itself off and on again before finally booting. Now it is damn near unusable, 3 months after the purchase. Turning it on is a gamble, sometimes it won't even start. Just save yourself the frustration and go with something else.

So far, so good. This is a nice little machine which’ll come in handy when moving about and travelling. Here’s what you need to know- the tech at the heart of this laptop is not brand new. This model of processor is a few years old now, as is the DDR3 RAM standard. In other words, this laptop is made up of parts that are in technical terms obsolete. I say this so you can make an informed decision-if you are looking for a true ultrabook, this is not what you want. That being said the price is still very good for the specification you’re getting. If you’re looking for a small laptop with decent everyday performance which is nice to use and doesn’t cost the earth then this is definitely worth your consideration. The build quality is really very good indeed. It feels sturdy and well put together. The hinge for the lid isn’t floppy or loose which is often a tell-tale sign of a cheapo laptop. The keyboard is excellent, at least in my opinion. The keys are nice and firm. Not spongey at all. The spacing is good and it’s very easy to type on. It has a nice large touchpad which doesn’t interfere with typing as far as I have seen. So what about usage? Well, the screen is nice and sharp. It’s bright and has good colour. I had feared that it may be a little washed out or fuzzy and was pleased to see that this isn’t the case. Once windows is running the machine is responsive and quick enough in daily tasks like browsing, media consumption and office work. I haven’t given it any intensive work to do, because whilst I would be interested to see exactly what it was capable of I have better machines to use for that sort of thing. Like I say though, for day-to-day tasks and usage it performs very well and is a pleasure to use. Battery life so far seems good, but not outstanding. The IO is pretty good too with a decent range and number of ports that’ll cover most eventualities. Personally I would have preferred a full size SD slot over a micro SD slot, but that’s very much subjective It’s definitely worth saying that this laptop has better connectivity in this regard than a lot of substantially more expensive computers. There are a couple of negatives. I find the Wifi performance a little disappointing. It’s not bad by any means but it lacks the range of other devices I have. I have a reasonable connection where I’m sitting, but if I move a few metres down the hall I’ll lose the connection completely. The speakers are also lacklustre. Volume is pretty good, but there’s no depth to the sound and they’re quite tinny. I also don’t like the charging arrangement. I’d rather a USB charger or something similar. The little old school pin plug arrangement this has feels like a potential weak point in an otherwise sturdy computer. In truth, these are all things that come with little surprise for me. There has to be compromise somewhere with a machine like this. In conclusion, I’m glad I bought it. It’s not my primary computer but makes a fantastic secondary machine for travelling and general use. It’s very compact and reasonably light, good to use and I’m looking forward to seeing what else it’ll be capable of as time goes on. I think is computer is great value for money.

After initial problems - cool bananas! The WIFI was initially turned off in the Bios and I had to re-enable (F7 on reboot to get into the bios). The micro SD Card slot - you need to turn the card upside down. Nice build quality, screen, track-board, and keyboard. Plays low spec PC games fine. You can do more on this than an android tablet. Update: The battery died and expanded pushing the keyboard up. The hinge for the screen broke away from the plastic casing - braking it (leaving exposed motherboard). Obviously, had to take out battery and re-screw in the motherboard to the casing, but the keyboard works fine and I still use it every day. It now has character - having gone through a few trials. This laptop is for people who refuse to cough up money for an over-spec'd laptop, but instead want something tittering on the brink of failure. Very enjoyable!

In terms of appearance, the brushed metal finish and dark grey colour scheme is really stylish. The build quality is also excellent, gaps are tight and even, the lid is rigid and can barely be twisted. It actually has a bit of a MacBook feel to it in terms of appearance and build quality (without that pesky Apple operating system of course) which is surprising for the price. The keyboard has a decent feel (certainly comparable to most laptops that I have used) and the touchpad, which is my biggest pet hate on laptops (I almost always use a mouse) is fairly large, smooth and quite sensitive with a nice solid click sound when left or right clicking. Performance wise, the Intel m3-6Y30 processor is perfectly capable of carrying out the tasks that I have used it for (word processing, spreadsheets, surfing the web and streaming videos). I haven’t tried testing it out with any games as that’s not really what I bought it for but it should be able to cope with some of the older ones comfortably. One particular advantage that comes with the processor is that it is totally silent, it doesn’t use a fan, so there is no background noise and absolute peace and quite (except for your typing) when you are using it. This does mean that it can sometimes get warm if overtaxed but if you are sticking to the core activities as I mentioned previously this shouldn’t be an issue. It comes with two USB 3.0 ports, one USB Type-C connector, one microSD card slot, one mini-HDMI and one audio jack which is ample and a generous spread compared with my older laptop, and, a 240GB hard disk is not too shabby and more than capable for most everyday needs. Overall, for the purpose that I bought this for, it ticks all the boxes. Super light weight, slim and stylish, while perfectly able to handle word processing, spreadsheets, surfing and streaming and at a reasonable price. No complaints.

I wanted so badly to like this laptop: It's thin and light with an all-metal body, has backlit keys, and a really long battery life, which is what I need from a laptop I intend to carry around with me. Something must be wrong in the manufacturing though, because I have had two of these and they have each lasted about a week before failing. The screen on the first suddenly stopped turning on, so I returned it and got another. The second started shutting off unexpectedly. At first I thought I might have the power settings wrong (I often multitask, so sometimes my laptop is sitting idly to the side) or that there was an update that required a restart, but then it suddenly shut off while I was streaming a television show, while plugged in. There was a slight popping sound along with a screen flash, and it shut off. When I turned it back on, the battery wouldn't charge fully anymore. Then, the popping and flashing thing happened again, and upon turning it on, the touch pad no longer works. There seems to be something wrong with quality control. I'm sending my second back and I'll not be getting another CHUWI laptop.

I'd not heard of Chuwi before! This has had good write ups by independent computer reviewers and I saw amazon were selling it at a good price. A good lightweight windows laptop. 13.3" screen has good definition graphics and a widescreen ratio compared with other laptops of this size. Quite responsive for surfing and playing movies on. Backlit keyboard and metallic case looks good. Very good value. Screen hinge looks robust compared to the odd grumble online from others. Impressed for the money by this stylish machine!

The worst laptop I’ve ever bought. I used it a couple of times and it was fine. Put it away for around a year, had to use it again and I had the problem with the keyboard where it goes into constant boot loops. Chuwi were no help at all as it was just out of warranty. Complete waste of money. Never again!