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133 of 134 people found the following review helpful.
Great gaming laptop, but update GPU drivers
By J. Manarang
PROS:On the initial setup, the laptop played a pretty cool Asus video that showed many "on" buttons forming various images. It made the purchase seem even more personal. Nice touch Asus. Here's a link: paste "ASUS Laptop Startup Video (2009 ASUS)(HD)" on Youtube. Watch in HD fullscreen to get the same feel. Yes simple things amaze me x_o.My first impression of this laptop is its big size. I'm used to running a netbook, in terms of mobile pc. Examining the layout closely, the screen isn't the perpetrator here- the speaker adds roughly 2 inches to the width. Although this is easily forgiven once I heard the sound quality, which is similar to an HDTV's. This may make the laptop slightly bigger than regular 16in notebooks, but for an "entertainment"-advertised laptop, it was necessary.I'm happy it has an eSATA port because this allowed me to couple my internal hard drives with a hard drive docking station (Thermaltake BlacX). Really helpful for storage and backups. The USB3.0 is a great addition as well. Makes it a bit more future-proof. As for the touchpad, my netbook had the same exact touchpad and I always turned it off because I was not a fan of it. Nothing beats a mouse!Battery life depends on 4 settings through a power-managing software called Power4Gear. At "High Performance" setting, no power saving option is on and the battery life drains within 2 hours. The more balanced "Entertainment" setting, lasts 3 hours. With the power option set to "Quiet Office", the battery life lasts 4 hours. Lastly, the"Battery Saving" mode increases the battery life even longer. What it does is it disables your wallpaper, gadgets, autohides the taskbar, lowers brightness to 20% and sets every setting to maximum power savings. Of course the realtime battery life will be ultimately affected by what task you are doing.In terms of performance, this thing packs a wallop! It will not beat a same-priced desktop, but what's important is portability. It's a great purchase for the performance. Although keep reading to learn about the current GPU driver as a caveat emptor. Another warning: I believe this was first advertised as having bluetooth. I can confirm that it does not. While this is not a deal breaker, I feel it should have been included being an entertainment laptop. Some of the pre-installed softwares are helpful, like the Power4Gear battery managing software and the Splendid Utility which enhances the screen's color/contrast/brightness settings with preset modes. The Cyberlink TrueTheater HD software is amazing. I popped in my "LotR: Fellowship of the Ring" DVD and with the smoothest playback settings (60FPS) and sharpest modes, it seemed like a whole new movie. I do not own a bluray player so I'm not used to this type of quality, but yes, it is better than any YouTube 1080p HD trailers or any HD channels I've seen.Graphic Card Tests (Gaming):All games were tested on the Geforce GT325m (Optimus driver version 189.07), running at 1366x768 native resolution, full screen, and with FRAPS frame counter benchmark. I wanted to keep it at native resolution to show the highest resolution capability of this GPU. Lowering resolution and some graphical settings will unquestionably increase the frame rates, but playing graphically-lush games is always a delight.Batman Arkham Asylum: Fight sequence VS 5 inmates at start of game)Settings: VSync Off, Hardware PhysX Off, Detail level: Very High, 2xAnti-aliasingMin FPS: 25, Avg FPS: 33 Max FPS : 50Verdict: Smooth gameplay, lag-free.--Call of Duty 4 - Modern Warfare 2 : (Single Player: Heavy gun fight on "Act II: Hornet's Nest" level)Settings: VSync On, All Graphic Settings On, All Textures set to Extra, 4xAnti-aliasingMin FPS 30, Avg FPS 35, Max FPS 60 (Remember VSync caps this at screen's refresh rate, which is 60 in this case)Verdict: Very playable considering it's at max in-game settings. Will experience some tiny lag spikes, which I also experienced on my desktop PC which has better specs than this laptop, so it must be the game.--Mass Effect 2: (Gun fights on mission to recruit Prof. Mordin)Settings: VSync On, All graphic settings on except for Film Grain, 4xAnti-aliasing, 8xAnisotropic FilteringMin FPS 24, Avg FPS 38, Max FPS 49Verdict : Smooth gameplay. Some random lags but does not ruin the experience.--Crysis: (From game start all the way to "First Light" gun fights)Test 1: VSync Off, Everything to Medium, No AAMin FPS 19, Avg FPS 26, Max FPS 34Verdict : Smooth gameplay, lag free even if the FPS results seem low. Graphic texture pop-ins on some of the vegetation, especially when using "maximum speed" boost.Test 2: VSync Off, All graphic settings to medium, except for Texture and Shader at High. 2xAnti-Aliasing . Min FPS 13, Avg FPS 16, Max FPS 20Verdict : Clunky gameplay. With these settings, the texture looked sharper and much easier on the eyes, and while there are no dramatic lag spikes that will get you killed easily (it's a steady 15-16 frames on gun fights), the slow gameplay is quite noticeable.Test 3: VSync Off, Everything to High except Shader to Medium, No AAMin FPS 14, Avg FPS 22, Max FPS 29Verdict : Smooth gameplay, but sometimes has that laggy feel to it. No jittering lag. Pretty impressive for the High setting- I guess Shader is what really stresses the framerates.--World of Warcraft: VSync off, Effects at Medium-High, Window Mode + Maximized option to properly scale the resolutionTest 1: Riding mount around Dalaran's North Bank steps with ~30 toons around me.Min FPS 22, Avg FPS 33, Max FPS 39Verdict: No lagTest 2: Outside Dalaran, flying epic flightMin 50, Avg 85, Max 150Verdict: No lagIn instances, the gameplay is very smooth. Depending on the instance, some will be over 100FPS whereas the newer ones + raids, will be in the low 50s.--6008 pts in 3DMark06--10594 pts in 3DMark05--CONS:Note: This part of the review will only be valid until Nvidia releases the proper Forceware drivers for the laptop's GPU. The GT 325m series is relatively new; NVidia has one official release for it on their website: Optimus Driver 189.07. This driver is not bad. As shown by the benchmarks, 3D gaming works well. But here's where things tend to get annoying: the Nvidia GPU, with its current drivers, rely on the Intel integrated graphics to handle screen scaling. Meaning if you connect this to a larger monitor, in my case an Acer 21.5" 1080P native res widescreen LCD, scaling works well when the GPU running is the Intel IGP, but when you switch to games, you are forced to use the 1080p resolution through the in-game settings, which will be taxing on the framerates. I know the native resolution of the laptop does not match the monitor's, but with the "normal" geforce drivers, scaling to fit the screen works well and allows the laptop's native res to stretch the image onto the monitor. My ASUS 1201n netbook does this easily through it's Nvidia Control Panel, with the same native res as this laptop. I hope NVidia releases this capability with the next driver update.I still do not trust the current Nvidia driver for this GPU just yet. Once it is properly optimized and up to date, the fps will increase. I'll update this entry if the graphic drivers are updated through NVidia or some modding website.NVidia Optimus: This technology sounds great but I'm having a little problem with it. See, when my laptop is plugged in, the Optimus technology works just fine: the intel switches to the nvidia GPU when loading a 3D game. But when I load a 3D game while this laptop is unplugged (regardless whether battery is full or low charge), the GPU does NOT switch. It stays on the Intel GPU and I get low framerates. This problem occurs even if I use "High Performance" mode on the power settings, even if my preferred GPU is NVidia, even if I assign the game profile to load with Nvidia GPU, even if I right click and "run with graphics processor: High performance Nvidia processor". I do notice that if I suddenly plug the laptop to the outlet, the frames will go up fast again (as if the Nvidia GPU was suddenly turned on). There needs to be a better software-based of forcing the GPU on since the NV Control Panel is faulty at this point. Isn't the whole point of Optimus to provide performance when necessary and lengthen battery life, when available? Here is NVidia's claim: "Watch a HD movie, surf the web or play top 3D games knowing that you'll get the long battery life you need and the performance you expect from NVIDIA." This technology should work even on battery, as stated there. I would like to know if this is just my laptop doing this- comment if you can help.Update 1: there is a fix that works. Make sure your HDMI is in digital mode and not analog. This allows your monitor to do the scaling. Although, if you only have analog mode for HDMI, you can try using a DVI to HDMI cable. Or just wait for Nvidia to update the driver and you won't have to go through all this.Update 2: March 15, 2010. Well it seems that Nvidia actually listened. I opened a technical ticket on their website and though I can't take credit for them actually solving this, I can tell you that they have put up a solution. New Optimus drivers are out on their website: version 189.42. The highlights of this release is eerily accurate to the issues I was having with my N61JV. It fixes the incompatibilities with the Intel IGP driver and corrects the Optimus Profile system. The sad news is I have already returned my N61JV almost 2 weeks before the release of this driver so I cannot personally test its reliability. I have since gotten a replacement laptop (Gateway NV5925u) or I would have loved to test this out.Update 3: April 29, 2010. Another GPU driver is released on the Nvidia website: Driver 189.79. Although the main highlight is, "This is an Optimus driver update that fixes an issue with the beta release of StarCraft II."Hope this review helped those who may be thinking of buying this notebook!More pc and electronic reviews at mycoretechs*com. Subscribe to my YouTube channel: JaymarkTech. If you found this review helpful, please rate it Helpful. Thank you!
21 of 21 people found the following review helpful.
Great laptop for the price!
By Preeti
I've had my laptop for over 3 weeks and not experienced any problems. Guess my mine was manufactured on a good day compared to some others. It started fine, no problems burning the recovery dvds, no problems waking up after the lid is closed --just hit the power button. It wakes up exactly where I left off ---internet, word document, etc. An earlier reviewer mentioned the screen brightness then dimming after a few minutes but you can easily adjust the settings to your preference.The i5 processor is fast, the laptop runs quiet even when the fan comes on. The laptop does not heat up much. I use it on my lap while sitting on the couch and even after 2-3 hours, my lap is fine (not warm or uncomfortable). Guess I'm a couch potato! The multi-directional touchpad is pretty cool but really sensitive. It takes some getting used to but that's because I'm a die hard mouse person. However, I do like the touchpad and may be converting. Sound is crisp and clear. Battery life depends on what you're doing. I get about 2.5-3 hours when surfing the web. It's around 2 hours if watching a dvd. There's a lot of bloatware on it which I haven't removed since I need to brush up on how to remove it.Warranty: There is only one warranty card in the box, it's for the Accidental Damage Warranty. The 1-year global warranty is automatic. Amazon was going to let me return it because it was missing info on the global warranty but I called Asus to see if I was supposed to get a separate card in the box. Asus said only the ADW card is in the box because the global warranty is automatic. Asus confirmed by running my serial number. Anyway, you can register your laptop online at Asus and register your ADW online too. But you still have to mail a copy of the invoice and ADW email confirmation to the address they tell you.Comments on Asus: Asus's website is challenging to navigate but eventually you find what you're looking for. Their customer service was very helpful. I did not have any technical issues so I cannot speak about their tech help.I hope this review is helpful. I did a lot of research on this site and others before buying this laptop and I'm very happy with my purchase. $899 for a quality 16-inch i5, 500 GB hard drive, NVIDIA graphics, and a warranty that includes free ADW too. The only improvement would be if the laptop could play blu-rays but no biggie.UPDATE 6/28/10: After having the laptop for 3 months, it just froze at the Asus logon. I tried the hard reset several times per Asus Tech help, but since the computer did nothing, Asus said to send it in for repair. I was not pleased since i had to take it a repair shop for data recovery (which cost me $95) before sending it to Asus. Once I get it back, I'm going to be sure to save all things to an external hard drive on a daily basis. Thank goodness my old Toshiba is still working while I wait for Asus to fix this one.UPDATE 7/20/10: Asus failed to repair my computer on the First try. They replaced the hard drive and sent it back to me. Once I turned it on, I got a black screen with instructions to insert a boot device. Called Tech Help again, tried to use Bios menu but did not work, told to send it back to Asus for the Second time. This time it went to Asus HQ in Fremont, CA. Turns out there was a screw missing when the first place replaced the hard drive. Got the computer back and it actually works. This time system recovery requires 3 dvds instead of 4. Wondering if I'm missing files but Asus says the files are just compressed. In total, I was without a working computer for 6 weeks during the 4 months I've owned it. Will I buy Asus again? Probably Not.
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful.
Ideal Performance/Battery Life Machine
By Anthony
First off, the Nvidia Optimus technology is GENIOUS. Asus is the only brand I know currently utilizing it, but I am sure others will quickly change to it. I changed the default video card to the nvidia 325, and I noticed with only using the nvidia 325 video card, and playing games, battery life is around 2 hours. This is of course with the core i5 doing it's thing and turbo-booosting to 2.53ghz. I know you're probably wondering about game performance. Alright, so after installing the update for the nvidia drivers, I ran tf2 COMPLETELY maxed out on highest resolution, and it ran at about 100fps. And remember that TF2 doesn't utilize multi-core processors as well as some of the even higher end games that have come out after it. I am anxious to see how this machine will handle BF:Bad Company 2. Anyways, the great thing is that I don't have to change anything with the cards. Optimus defaults to the integrated and then switches to nvidia 325 when needed. This, partnered with the smart i5 that adapts based on system needs, allows for a respectable battery life of about 3 hours with only a 6-cell lithium battery! Not too shabby. Next is the mousepad. Oh wow. I love it! It's quite intuitive, and once you get the hang of it, you will be DISAPPOINTED when you go to your friends' laptops without the multi-touch pad. It has almost 10 actions that are possible through the multi-touch pad! I know I caught myself trying to 3-finger swipe to go back a webpage. Needless to say it didn't work on theirs. Ha. Finally, for now, the Asus Software and Windows 7. Asus REALLY set the bar INCREDIBLY high with the production of this laptop. The Asus software that comes with it has some really cool features such as facial recognition. If you want, you can set the laptop to lock out whenever your face is not in front of the webcam for however long you want. Kinda a cool trick to play on your friends when they are facebook. Just give them time to login and them BAM, locked out. Ha. Funny stuff. Windows 7 really just tops the cake with the laptop though. I have loved everything about windows 7, and I learn new things almost daily as to what it can do. oh yea. the ONLY complaint I have with this laptop is that the 500gb hard drive came partitioned. The (C:Drive), or OS drive, comes at 100gb, and the (D:Drive), or Data drive, comes at 330gb. This can be useful for some, but I didn't care for it. However, with Windows 7, I am EASILY able to just stretch the size of the (C:Drive) as long as nothing is on the (D:Drive), without losing ANY data from the (C:Drive). Love it! And lastly, this thing comes with USB3.0! So this laptop is the PERFECT compromise of performance/battery life and all for less than $1k. Stop reading and buy already!
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