ASUS N61JV-X2 16-Inch Versatile Entertainment Laptop
I've been using this computer for a little more than a month now, and I love it.
As a little background: I'm a computer science student graduating in a week. I've done a lot of work repairing laptops, so I know a nice computer when I see one.
Here are the highlights
> chicklet keyboard - despite the pictures of the computer up on Amazon, the computer ships with a standard US keyboard. There are no weird euro symbols, the shift keys are the right size, "at" and "backslash" are where you expect them to be. While that may not be a big deal for most people, as a programmer I expect my keys to be where I want them -- I was holding my breath in fear of a euro-board when this baby shipped. Thank God for US keyboards.
> The nVidia GT 325M handles amazingly well. L4D2, Half-Life 2 all run with the settings cranked all the way up without any serious issues - around 30-40 FPS, up to 50.
Optimus technology is AMAZING. The only way you can tell that the computer switched graphics cards is by the LED lights on the sides (the blue lights turn white when the nVidia card kicks in). The nVidia control panel gives you a lot of options for setup with individual programs - make use of it!
> Battery life is decent, given the power of the computer. On power saver settings I can pull about 5 hours of note-taking for class.
> Screen is PAINFULLY bright. Don't bother with a desk lamp - the webcam handles well in the dark, so just the light from the screen is more than sufficient.
> Core i5 w/ 4GB of DDR3 RAM, 64-bit win7, 500GB 7200rpm hard drive. With a real graphics card. for $900. wow.
There are some down sides to this product.
> number pad keys are small
> the nVidia card doesn't play nice with the computer on battery, and driver support is still a little immature. This hasn't caused me serious issues, but every now and then serious games will hang for 2-3 seconds. This happened to me twice playing through portal (about a 4 hour marathon) and more often in L4D2 - sometimes it happens every 2-3 hours, sometimes it happens every 10 minutes... I have to assume drivers, as I can't find any other probable cause. Still looking into this... Framerates on battery power, even on High Performance power settings are around 10-15... seems Optimus doesn't play nice with battery power yet.
> ASUS ships their computers with TONS of crapware. And by tons, I mean "do a clean install the moment you get your computer". The driver disk is very handy - you can re-install all of your drivers, including some that aren't on the ASUS website by simply checking/unchecking boxes and hitting go. This is much easier than sitting around and uninstalling 20 useless programs that shipped with the computer. Seriously - I don't need 3 third-party applications doing power-management and wi-fi management... it's built into Windows.
> This bugger is heavy. If you're after something portable, don't bother. If you want a moderately-carriable laptop that will play Left for Dead at your buddy's house... well... keep reading.
> ASUS touchpads are their own animal... you'll have to spend time dorking with the settings before it works the way you want it to. There is NO dedicated scroll section of the pad - it's multi-touch scrolling only. You get used to it, but it takes awhile. Eventually you'll find yourself using multi-touch for right/middle clicking things... it even works. sometimes.
Conclusion:
This processor has a lot of get-up-and-go for a laptop - it's not an i7, but this computer won't cost you $2000 either. 4GB of DDR3 RAM, with support for up to 8. 1GB of dedicated video memory, and a real graphics card. Sound is reasonable for a laptop. It has two USB 2 ports (I believe it says that a 3rd is shared with the eSATA port, but that is NOT the case), a single USB 3 port, eSATA and HDMI. A few more USB ports would have been nice, but it's not bad. The webcam and built in mic work surprisingly well.
For $900 this is an amazing computer, especially with the USB 3 and wireless-N support. I expect the nVidia issues will probably work themselves out with newer drivers in the near future, but in the meanwhile the chip is still very usable (as long as you aren't on battery...)
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