I bought this for a Networking course I'm doing which came with software that only works on Windows. I took the plunge and bought this cheap Samsung laptop and was pleasantly surprised.
The build does feel a little cheap, but solid enough to survive my son dropping it on the floor without a scratch. The fun deep red shell makes this laptop stand out from the usual grey or black. The memory is descent and runs Windows 7 well. The memory, Hard Drive, Battery and optical player are all easily accessed with panels on the bottom. The battery is even removable, so you could buy a spare and swap it out should you need.
Battery life isn't bad for a laptop this price (I've seen some with 2 hours battery) and will allow you to do most work within the 4-5 hours it'll give you (dependant on what programs you're running).
The screen is LED backlit, so this helps battery life. The colour and sharpness are good and works fine for video play back. It's not HD, but will do fine otherwise.
The sound comes from two speakers above the keyboard. They're what you'd expect from laptop speakers, a little tinny maybe, but fine for listening to music to yourself or videos.
The laptop has 3 USB ports, one display port, an ethernet port and (best of all) a full size HDMI port, meaning you can hook it up to any modern TV. I did this to watch you tube and not only is the picture and sound pipped through to the TV, but the laptop screen dims so it doesn't distract you. The computer is reasonably quiet too, with only the occasional whir of the fans until you insert a CD/DVD into the drive. The inbuilt WiFi is good and keeps hold of your connection well, and quickly logs back on when the computer is awakened from slumber. The built in Webcam is functional and will do for Skype or IM chat. It's nothing special. The keyboard was the biggest surprise for me, as it had a full keypad. This can cause problems when touch typing as the keys are a little squashed in and you can sometimes hit the keypad 4 instead of enter.
The only downside to this laptop (as with any PC) is the tonne of unwanted software (bloatware) that comes with it. I got a trial copy of Office 2010 (which I din't want) as well as the obligatory Norton antivirus. Samsung have also packed it full of bloatware which is slightly more useful like backup software, performance software etc.
One word of caution I will give you is that there is NO windows 7 DVD that comes with this (at least not in my case). You have to copy the configuration over to a backup partition when you first start. Copy this to a DVD and you SHOULD be covered should anything go wrong.
In all, as with all Samsung products, this is a good laptop and deserves more credit than it's got. For the specs and quality, you could be paying a lot more.
