Bamboo Grove Notebook
ASUS is not averse to pampering its users - in order to be able to choose, they consistently release something interesting. That something unusual, something fundamentally new, something just exclusive - yes, anything can happen.
The hero of this review was no exception - it seems like a laptop is like a laptop ... but in such a design that the hands involuntarily reach for the cherished box. Therefore, I warn you - be careful, because the laptop can be very like)
So, the new series of devices “ Bamboo collection ” is the pinnacle of engineering, which rather suddenly and boldly diluted (or harmoniously added?) The existing UL-series on the market (thin laptops with a stylish metal cover). Among the devices of the new direction - several laptops with different diagonal (from 13.3 to 15.6) - I did not hesitate to take the most “adult” piece of iron for the test. More precisely, a piece of wood.
')
Laptop ASUS U53Jc is primarily interesting because in a fairly compact package the manufacturer could fit, I’m not afraid of this word, a serious stuffing. For example, the basis is taken from the most powerful mobile processor Intel® Core ™ i7-620M - it is dual-core and has a clock frequency of 2.66-3.33 GHz. Yes, the same processor that was introduced at the beginning of this year - made on 32-nanometer technology and with a huge number of different technologies on board (Turbo Boost, Hyper Threading and others). The chipset is Intel® HM55, on the spaces of which two strips of RAM of 2 GB each fit - a total of 4 GB (DDR3, 1066 GHz). Speaking of gigabytes, not to mention the video system, consisting of a tandem of NVIDIA GeForce 310M and Intel® HD Graphics .
Even a hard drive is one for 500 gigs. In general, all this, as well as the relative "freshness" of the model, make this notebook a worthy candidate for review. Let's get started.
I, as always, got an engineering sample - without the Cyrillic layout and with some minor differences. And this time it all started with a non-standard box - instead of the usual cardboard it was a black lacquered box with a pattern and a convenient pen. What will be in the box at the time of sales, I do not know - most likely, the usual gentleman's set: the laptop itself, the battery, the power adapter, the carrying case, the mouse, and the paper disks.
Before meeting with this device, I had practically no idea about bamboo - well, yes, I heard that somewhere there is something growing, someone there is extracting something - collecting - planing ... but when you open the laptop box, to understand that “yeah, I wouldn’t definitely refuse bamboo!”. At least, it is in the case of U53Jc that it is VERY appropriate. Stylish cover made of matte brown wood - if it were not for the metallic inscription ASUS, I would not have thought that this is a laptop at all. See, it turns out how little we know about bamboo :)
By the way, bamboo in this case is the most real - this material is very reliable and practical, environmentally friendly and, as I wrote above, it is incredibly beautiful. Well, or at least much more original than in the case of the finish of soulless plastic and aluminum in many other devices. And there are interesting facts about him in Wikipedia - for example, some varieties of bamboo can grow at a “speed” of 120 cm per day!
The lid of the device is entirely made of bamboo, and along the perimeter it has a stylish metallic contour of golden color.
The same bamboo is used in the decoration of the entire panel, located under the keyboard - including the touchpad and the only button underneath the wooden ones. Matte surface, completely non-marking, very smooth and pleasant to the touch - I do not exclude that this is one of the most pleasant touchpads that I had to use. By the way, it is from Elantech, multitouch - supports up to three touches simultaneously.
The keyboard deserves the highest praise - these are all the same convenient split keys, but this time they are made on a solid metal backing with a fine polishing texture. Pleasant coolness, pleasant appearance ... convenient layout (if you close your eyes to the right Shift that was reduced due to the arrows), the digital unit ... just a magic! They can when they want.
Just above is the metal part of the body "to the point" - there are two unobtrusive status LEDs and two power buttons. The first one just turns on the laptop (in Windows), and the second - in the “instant boot” mode of ASUS ExpressGate is a small Linux-based operating system, which is pre-installed on all recent ASUS laptops.
4 more LEDs are located below the front, under the touchpad - they are already brighter. If you work behind a laptop, they are not visible; and it is worth a little step back or lean back and they can already be seen clearly (especially at night).
Above the display is a webcam eye with a maximum resolution of 1600x1200 photos.
The screen has a diagonal of 15.6 '' and the resolution is 1366x768 - maybe you would like at least a little more points, but for such a diagonal it is, you might say, standard. There is no hinge - everything keeps on fairly strong hinges. By the way, the screen and the frame around it are completely glossy, very branded. Tired of talking about it ... just tired.
With ports, everything is fine - on the left there is a power connector, a card reader, a hardware button on-off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, HDMI, two USB 3.0 ports and two audio jacks; on the right, the drive door, D-SUB, RJ-45, and another USB port, but this time version 2.0. In general, it is easier to see in the photo:
The dimensions of the device are 386x260x34 mm - all this with a weight of 2.6 kg with a battery.
Windows 7 Ultimate was preinstalled on the laptop - it boots in exactly 40 seconds. I think this time can be reduced by 20 percent, if you remove all unnecessary from autoload (and there is enough excess).
On the desktop, a couple of new shortcuts - Syncables Desktop and eDriver synchronization software - a utility for updating firmware and drivers. Among other things, an Intel TurboBoost Monitor widget and a SuperHybrid Engine mode switch appeared on the desktop.
The laptop is very quiet and the keyboard during operation is practically not heated. But in the load, as one would expect (with an eye to the configuration), quite hot air flows from the “gills” of the cooling system. For example, if you put a laptop on your lap during a game, it will not be very comfortable - it is better to enclose something. And ideally - to use some kind of stand, combined with the cooling system - the good, such is complete, even at the most modest prices. And in the “idle” mode (and in tasks like writing texts), as I said, everything is fine - the temperature mode will not bring surprises (the temperature of the GPU in this case is around 50 degrees).
Screen? For him it is not a pity a separate paragraph, because he is really good. Bright, with excellent color reproduction and wide viewing angles. If it had not yet been edged with a frame ... then it would have been possible to put up with the glossy finish; and so no - it will be inconvenient to wipe, especially in the corners.
The Intel® Core ™ i7-620M processor has a clock speed of 2.66GHz, although to solve resource-intensive tasks, Intel TurboBoost technology can change system parameters up to 3.33GHz as part of the heat pack. For example, in the case of the SuperPi program, which is designed to measure the performance of processors (unlike wPrime, it does not support multi-core), TurboBoost technology increased the core frequency to 3.3GHz, thanks to which the Pi number to one million decimal places is considered only 13 seconds is a very good result.
The performance index of the processor is 6.8 points out of a possible 7.9, the rest of the scores look like this:
Like some other models from ASUS, the U53J model is equipped with NVIDIA Optimus technology - this means that there are two video cards installed inside which you can switch between them automatically, on the go - depending on the tasks and without rebooting. One video card (and this is Intel HD Graphics) is integrated and will allow great battery saving; the discrete NVIDIA GeForce 310M card with a gig of memory is turned on when applications require it - games, media player or something similar (for more information about the capabilities of this video card, you can find out in this test).
During the load (for example, with the Furmark program), the GPU chip did not heat up more than 75 degrees, but even this figure had practically no effect on the heating of the device case.
Inside installed a 500-gigabyte hard drive from Hitachi, the speed of which was pleasantly surprised (compared to its competitors in this form factor). It supports all technologies known to the HD Tune Pro test program, including AAM technology.
Disk temperature - 45 degrees in idle and 55 with a long load. Line reading speed:
Despite the large screen and quite voracious entrails, the battery (Li-Ion, 5600 mAh, 84 Wh) with a Wi-Fi enabled laptop runs for about 4 hours.
It looks really unusual and very cool.
Nice materials, flawless build
Excellent image quality screen
Comfortable keyboard and touchpad, there is a digital block
High performance and good battery life for it;
Availability of USB 3.0 ports, Blu-ray-drive, Wi-Fi b / g / n;
For complete happiness, there is not enough keyboard backlighting;
Hot air from the video card in load mode;
Glossy screen - visible reflections, brand;
Testing this laptop, I involuntarily remembered the model ASUS UL50Vt , which I already wrote about - the same charm, the same performance and about the same price order. But then they are the model lines, so that the user has a choice - someone will like the metal cover more, and someone, like me, will get rid of the bamboo. I subjectively liked the “wooden-green” version more - perhaps due to the fact that all this is somehow unusual and, as it turned out, very beautiful - even with the most careful consideration. However, this is not a debut for ASUS - in 2007, at Computex, the company first presented to the general public the options for applying elite finishing material, which was present, for example, in the U2E and U6S models.
The performance of this machine at a very good, high level - rendering a three-dimensional model with millions of polygons may take some time, but with everything else (Internet, office tasks, photoshop and even toys) - absolutely no problem. Accordingly, the laptop is suitable for solving very many problems, for a very wide audience - from students, to guys in jackets and Lexus.
The recommended retail price is $ 1350, which in translation into our language means about 40,000 rubles. For many, the resulting figure is more than the amount they are willing to pay for a good laptop, but if you take into account the exclusive finish and the wealth of the laptop’s capabilities, take a look at the competitors ... then the price tag turns out to be quite adequate - it is on the basis of these thoughts that I did not rate the price , not to the minuses (by the way, the previous “bamboo laptops” were sold at a price of 2-2.5 thousand dollars). Although, of course, a little expensive ... but damn, the laptop is beautiful!
If I had an unscheduled forty thousand, I would take this particular laptop. And I would try to get rid of the gloss at least the frame of the screen. How? I'll write soon;)
Do not hesitate to join the ranks of fans of the company on Habré and participate in the anniversary photo contest !
Successes!
The hero of this review was no exception - it seems like a laptop is like a laptop ... but in such a design that the hands involuntarily reach for the cherished box. Therefore, I warn you - be careful, because the laptop can be very like)
So, the new series of devices “ Bamboo collection ” is the pinnacle of engineering, which rather suddenly and boldly diluted (or harmoniously added?) The existing UL-series on the market (thin laptops with a stylish metal cover). Among the devices of the new direction - several laptops with different diagonal (from 13.3 to 15.6) - I did not hesitate to take the most “adult” piece of iron for the test. More precisely, a piece of wood.
')
Laptop ASUS U53Jc is primarily interesting because in a fairly compact package the manufacturer could fit, I’m not afraid of this word, a serious stuffing. For example, the basis is taken from the most powerful mobile processor Intel® Core ™ i7-620M - it is dual-core and has a clock frequency of 2.66-3.33 GHz. Yes, the same processor that was introduced at the beginning of this year - made on 32-nanometer technology and with a huge number of different technologies on board (Turbo Boost, Hyper Threading and others). The chipset is Intel® HM55, on the spaces of which two strips of RAM of 2 GB each fit - a total of 4 GB (DDR3, 1066 GHz). Speaking of gigabytes, not to mention the video system, consisting of a tandem of NVIDIA GeForce 310M and Intel® HD Graphics .
Even a hard drive is one for 500 gigs. In general, all this, as well as the relative "freshness" of the model, make this notebook a worthy candidate for review. Let's get started.
Appearance
I, as always, got an engineering sample - without the Cyrillic layout and with some minor differences. And this time it all started with a non-standard box - instead of the usual cardboard it was a black lacquered box with a pattern and a convenient pen. What will be in the box at the time of sales, I do not know - most likely, the usual gentleman's set: the laptop itself, the battery, the power adapter, the carrying case, the mouse, and the paper disks.
Before meeting with this device, I had practically no idea about bamboo - well, yes, I heard that somewhere there is something growing, someone there is extracting something - collecting - planing ... but when you open the laptop box, to understand that “yeah, I wouldn’t definitely refuse bamboo!”. At least, it is in the case of U53Jc that it is VERY appropriate. Stylish cover made of matte brown wood - if it were not for the metallic inscription ASUS, I would not have thought that this is a laptop at all. See, it turns out how little we know about bamboo :)
By the way, bamboo in this case is the most real - this material is very reliable and practical, environmentally friendly and, as I wrote above, it is incredibly beautiful. Well, or at least much more original than in the case of the finish of soulless plastic and aluminum in many other devices. And there are interesting facts about him in Wikipedia - for example, some varieties of bamboo can grow at a “speed” of 120 cm per day!
The lid of the device is entirely made of bamboo, and along the perimeter it has a stylish metallic contour of golden color.
The same bamboo is used in the decoration of the entire panel, located under the keyboard - including the touchpad and the only button underneath the wooden ones. Matte surface, completely non-marking, very smooth and pleasant to the touch - I do not exclude that this is one of the most pleasant touchpads that I had to use. By the way, it is from Elantech, multitouch - supports up to three touches simultaneously.
The keyboard deserves the highest praise - these are all the same convenient split keys, but this time they are made on a solid metal backing with a fine polishing texture. Pleasant coolness, pleasant appearance ... convenient layout (if you close your eyes to the right Shift that was reduced due to the arrows), the digital unit ... just a magic! They can when they want.
Just above is the metal part of the body "to the point" - there are two unobtrusive status LEDs and two power buttons. The first one just turns on the laptop (in Windows), and the second - in the “instant boot” mode of ASUS ExpressGate is a small Linux-based operating system, which is pre-installed on all recent ASUS laptops.
4 more LEDs are located below the front, under the touchpad - they are already brighter. If you work behind a laptop, they are not visible; and it is worth a little step back or lean back and they can already be seen clearly (especially at night).
Above the display is a webcam eye with a maximum resolution of 1600x1200 photos.
The screen has a diagonal of 15.6 '' and the resolution is 1366x768 - maybe you would like at least a little more points, but for such a diagonal it is, you might say, standard. There is no hinge - everything keeps on fairly strong hinges. By the way, the screen and the frame around it are completely glossy, very branded. Tired of talking about it ... just tired.
With ports, everything is fine - on the left there is a power connector, a card reader, a hardware button on-off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, HDMI, two USB 3.0 ports and two audio jacks; on the right, the drive door, D-SUB, RJ-45, and another USB port, but this time version 2.0. In general, it is easier to see in the photo:
The dimensions of the device are 386x260x34 mm - all this with a weight of 2.6 kg with a battery.
Turn on and work
Windows 7 Ultimate was preinstalled on the laptop - it boots in exactly 40 seconds. I think this time can be reduced by 20 percent, if you remove all unnecessary from autoload (and there is enough excess).
On the desktop, a couple of new shortcuts - Syncables Desktop and eDriver synchronization software - a utility for updating firmware and drivers. Among other things, an Intel TurboBoost Monitor widget and a SuperHybrid Engine mode switch appeared on the desktop.The laptop is very quiet and the keyboard during operation is practically not heated. But in the load, as one would expect (with an eye to the configuration), quite hot air flows from the “gills” of the cooling system. For example, if you put a laptop on your lap during a game, it will not be very comfortable - it is better to enclose something. And ideally - to use some kind of stand, combined with the cooling system - the good, such is complete, even at the most modest prices. And in the “idle” mode (and in tasks like writing texts), as I said, everything is fine - the temperature mode will not bring surprises (the temperature of the GPU in this case is around 50 degrees).
Screen? For him it is not a pity a separate paragraph, because he is really good. Bright, with excellent color reproduction and wide viewing angles. If it had not yet been edged with a frame ... then it would have been possible to put up with the glossy finish; and so no - it will be inconvenient to wipe, especially in the corners.
Performance
The Intel® Core ™ i7-620M processor has a clock speed of 2.66GHz, although to solve resource-intensive tasks, Intel TurboBoost technology can change system parameters up to 3.33GHz as part of the heat pack. For example, in the case of the SuperPi program, which is designed to measure the performance of processors (unlike wPrime, it does not support multi-core), TurboBoost technology increased the core frequency to 3.3GHz, thanks to which the Pi number to one million decimal places is considered only 13 seconds is a very good result.
The performance index of the processor is 6.8 points out of a possible 7.9, the rest of the scores look like this:
Like some other models from ASUS, the U53J model is equipped with NVIDIA Optimus technology - this means that there are two video cards installed inside which you can switch between them automatically, on the go - depending on the tasks and without rebooting. One video card (and this is Intel HD Graphics) is integrated and will allow great battery saving; the discrete NVIDIA GeForce 310M card with a gig of memory is turned on when applications require it - games, media player or something similar (for more information about the capabilities of this video card, you can find out in this test).
During the load (for example, with the Furmark program), the GPU chip did not heat up more than 75 degrees, but even this figure had practically no effect on the heating of the device case.
Inside installed a 500-gigabyte hard drive from Hitachi, the speed of which was pleasantly surprised (compared to its competitors in this form factor). It supports all technologies known to the HD Tune Pro test program, including AAM technology.
Disk temperature - 45 degrees in idle and 55 with a long load. Line reading speed:
Despite the large screen and quite voracious entrails, the battery (Li-Ion, 5600 mAh, 84 Wh) with a Wi-Fi enabled laptop runs for about 4 hours.
Check weighing
It looks really unusual and very cool. Nice materials, flawless build Excellent image quality screen Comfortable keyboard and touchpad, there is a digital block High performance and good battery life for it; Availability of USB 3.0 ports, Blu-ray-drive, Wi-Fi b / g / n; For complete happiness, there is not enough keyboard backlighting; Hot air from the video card in load mode; Glossy screen - visible reflections, brand;The end
Testing this laptop, I involuntarily remembered the model ASUS UL50Vt , which I already wrote about - the same charm, the same performance and about the same price order. But then they are the model lines, so that the user has a choice - someone will like the metal cover more, and someone, like me, will get rid of the bamboo. I subjectively liked the “wooden-green” version more - perhaps due to the fact that all this is somehow unusual and, as it turned out, very beautiful - even with the most careful consideration. However, this is not a debut for ASUS - in 2007, at Computex, the company first presented to the general public the options for applying elite finishing material, which was present, for example, in the U2E and U6S models.
The performance of this machine at a very good, high level - rendering a three-dimensional model with millions of polygons may take some time, but with everything else (Internet, office tasks, photoshop and even toys) - absolutely no problem. Accordingly, the laptop is suitable for solving very many problems, for a very wide audience - from students, to guys in jackets and Lexus.
The recommended retail price is $ 1350, which in translation into our language means about 40,000 rubles. For many, the resulting figure is more than the amount they are willing to pay for a good laptop, but if you take into account the exclusive finish and the wealth of the laptop’s capabilities, take a look at the competitors ... then the price tag turns out to be quite adequate - it is on the basis of these thoughts that I did not rate the price , not to the minuses (by the way, the previous “bamboo laptops” were sold at a price of 2-2.5 thousand dollars). Although, of course, a little expensive ... but damn, the laptop is beautiful!
If I had an unscheduled forty thousand, I would take this particular laptop. And I would try to get rid of the gloss at least the frame of the screen. How? I'll write soon;)
Do not hesitate to join the ranks of fans of the company on Habré and participate in the anniversary photo contest !Successes!
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/95088/
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