| Brand: | Asus | ||
| Average Rating |
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The new ASUS UL20A is a harmonious blend of form and function. Powered by an Intel Core 2 Duo ultra-low voltage processor, it boasts an impressive 7.5-hour battery life for all-day computing. It also sports user-centric features such as a multi-gesture touchpad and provides an impressive multimedia entertainment experience with Altec Lansing speakers and SRS Premium Sound. All of these features and more are shrouded in a robust brushed aluminum lid that not only looks magnificent, but also helps in maintaining the notebookâs stylish exterior day after day. This notebook comes with a 1 year global warranty, one month zero bright dot guaranty, free two-way standard overnight shipping and twenty-four hour tech support seven days a week. Plus it comes with a FREE One Year Accidental Damage Warranty protecting your notebook from drops, fire, spills and surges. more info
The Almost-Perfect Ultra-Portable
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I just upgraded to this laptop from an 8.9″ Atom-powered netbook (an Asus EeePC 900HA). Here are my thoughts after using the UL20A for a few days:
Pro’s:
1. SMALL FOOTPRINT & LIGHT WEIGHT. The footprint of the laptop is similar to an 8.5″x11″ sheet of paper (just slightly narrower and slightly longer), and at 3.3lbs, putting it in your briefcase or backpack is no more burdensome than an extra book or binder.
2. EXCELLENT KEYBOARD. The relatively large “chiclet” keyboard makes for an effortless typing experience.
3. PERFECT SCREEN SIZE. With a 12.1″ 1366×768 screen, you’re getting the resolution of a 13.3″ laptop in a smaller package. At 130 pixels per inch, text on the 12″ screen is often pretty small, but still acceptable. I would however advise against smaller screens (e.g. 11.6″) at this resolution.
4. EXCELLENT PERFORMANCE. Despite the low clock speed, the UL20A’s Core 2 Duo is MUCH faster than any Intel Atom. HD YouTube videos play flawlessly at ~67% CPU utilization, and general performance seems much smoother than on my old netbook. I especially notice the difference when scrolling through PDF’s, which was often very slow and jerky on my EeePC.
5. EXCELLENT BATTERY LIFE. After 4.5 hours of mixed light web browsing, email, and PDF viewing, I still had 40% charge left. If the battery continued to be depleted at that rate, you’d end up with–that’s right–exactly the quoted 7.5 hours! I used Windows 7’s “Balanced” power scheme (not any of Asus’s Power4Gear modes). After some testing, I can confirm that the processor will ramp up to max frequency during heavy usage with this mode, so there’s no reason not to leave it in “Balanced” all the time.
6. VERY QUIET. Even when using it in a quiet room, it’s nearly impossible to hear any fan noise.
7. EXTRA WARRANTY. The UL20A comes with 1 year of “accidental damage” coverage.
8. LITTLE THIRD-PARTY BLOATWARE. The only (non-Asus) bloatware was an anti-virus software trial and some silly games. I uninstalled these in minutes (and replaced the A-V trial with Microsoft’s free Security Essentials program).
9. WINDOWS 7 HOME PREMIUM. Unlike most netbooks, which ship with either Microsoft’s ancient Windows XP or the crippled Windows 7 Starter Edition, this laptop comes with the full “premium” version of Microsoft’s brand-new OS.
Con’s:
1. ANNOYING TOUCHPAD. The texture of the touchpad causes way too much friction, which irritates your finger. The pointer also periodically freezes, placing a strange gray circle near the cursor (this is probably some stupid Synaptics feature I haven’t figured out how to disable yet).
2. GLOSSY SCREEN. This causes annoying reflections, but in fairness most laptops have these nowadays.
3. ABSURD JUMBLE OF ASUS UTILITIES. Asus includes nearly a dozen separate utilities for various functions. Most have weird names, and it’s not apparent what they do until you click on them. They also each seem to have their own distinct (amateurish) user interface. At the very least, Asus needs to cut the number of included programs in half (both through consolidation and elimination of pointless and redundant functions).
4. DISAPPOINTING LCD QUALITY. As was the case with my EeePC’s screen, the contrast is too high, and there’s a significant blue-ish hue by default. I do NOT recommend this laptop for SERIOUS photo editing (i.e. not for professionals). It should be fine for most users though.
Summary:
This notebook seems to hit a sweet spot between netbooks and full-size laptops: You’re getting an almost full-size keyboard, adequate screen resolution, snappy performance, and Windows 7 Home Premium, while retaining much of the portability, low-cost, and battery life of a netbook.
CRAZY GOOD LAPTOP
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
Current laptop is the Dell XPS M1330, a 13.3 inch laptop which seemed very cool to me in terms of build and weight (about four pounds). But even that started to feel big and heavy so when this one came out– at this price!!!– I pre-purchased. I have been tracking discussions here and on the notebook review forums, and have some immediate answers to various concerns:
1. it’s 3 pounds six ounces with the battery. Feels like carrying a book.
2. the wireless is intel 1000 bgn and has held steady and been very fast since I first got the computer.
3. there’s only one memory stick (2G) so you can easily pop in a second (which I did, before I even booted up the computer, for a grand total of $35.00) to bring the total memory to 4G.
4. The keyboard is full sized, or, if it’s smaller, the difference is so minimal I can’t tell. It does seem to me that some of the edge keys (delete, tab, function keys) are smaller.
5. It’s crazy fast. My Windows Experence Index is:
Processor 4.1
Ram (with 4G) 4.8
Graphics 3.5 (I’m not bothered, but I’m not a gamer)
Gaming Graphics 3.3
HDD 5.8
6. Touchpad does pinch zoom and is very responsive.
Have not installed all my software yet, but three hours of removing bloatware with the computer set on “high performance” and using WiFi leaves me with close to three hours of battery left.
It’s incredibly cool, meaning, in this case, temperature.
In sum: I am in awe.
Very impressive: light and kind of fast
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I got one of these to replace my ASUS 1000HE netbook.
I love the smaller form factor of the netbook (more than I like this much larger notebook) but the low resolution and slow processor made me want more.
Pros
The UL20a weighs about the same as the netbook: amazing.
Putting the UL2a thru its paces it plays YouTube videos without a hitch (where the netbook struggled to keep up.
I am still loading the UL20a but it feels like a full size notebook; just weighs a bit over 3 pounds.
I love the dual core processor and its apparent speed.
The touchpad is very responsive after being set to its maximum speed.
this is a keeper.
Cons:
I do wish it had bluetooth.
Great computer!
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I received this computer this morning and so far i love it!! I did a lot of research while trying to decide what computer to buy and this is the one I decided on. So far i am not disappointed!! It is thinner than i thought it would be which is a plus. It is very light and the performance is amazing! The keyboard is very comfortable and easy to type on. Probably the ONLY complaint that i have is the way that the hard drive is partitioned. There is an OS partition, which is 58.2 gigs, and a DATA partition, which is 160 gigs. All of your programs automatically install to the OS partition so i am trying to figure out how to get them to save things to the other partition.
So far i am extremely pleased with this purchase, and i would definitely recommend it to anyone who it looking for a very portable and affordable laptop!!