Samsung are known for making rather attractive laptops and this is no different, even though the interior of the laptop looks rather dull compared to its glossy outer coating. The R730 is a 17.3inch desktop replacement that weighs in at 2.8kg which is still relatively light for what it is.
The most striking thing about this laptop is its display a bright and evenly lit display that has excellent contrast and colour and even though glossy and reflective in certain situations it helps to boost the vibrancy of the colours and contrast. Furthermore, thanks to the 16:9 aspect ratio there is plenty of desktop space and is a perfect laptop for watching films on.
However, even though this laptop is rather large it doesn't come with the plethora of ports that we would expect it to and only includes a D-Sub, HDMI, Ethernet, mic and headphones jacks as well three USB2 ports but that's it.
The 500GB hard drive is excellent for a machine of this type and the integrated DVD drive is an added bonus. Furthermore, the laptop boasts a comfortable, chiclet-style keyboard with each key slightly raised in the centre making your typing experience with the Samsung R730 easy and comfortable. Furthermore, the Samsung R730 includes a numeric keypad in the usual place and the trackpad is decent, supports multi-touch and has a great texture.
The Intel Core i3-330M processor is most commonly seen on smaller 13inch laptops but to include it in a 17inch laptop is rather bizarre. Nonetheless, in doing this the price does stay down. The Intel Core i3-330M processor is a lower-middle class dual core CPU that clocks with 2.16GHz and the only difference between this and the more powerful Intel Core i5-430M is its lack of Turbo Boost overclocking. Nonetheless, it is capable of handling multi-tasking.
Overall, the Samsung R73o is a great budget desktop replacement and even though under-powered for the size of the laptop it is still rather powerful and includes everything a home computer needs.