10 responses so far ↓

• 1 Cao

  Great laptop for the price. Really fast – Battery lasts a really long time. keyboard takes a bit getting used to. All in all a great buy

• 2 Ma

  I went through a long, 6-month search before I finally settled on the ASUS UL80Vt. As a college student, I had many seemingly contradictory criterion. I wanted:
  - Core 2 Duo processor and 4GB of RAM, for general productivity
  - Long battery life, for working on campus and in class
  - Decent portability, for carrying it around all the time
  - Discrete graphics, for the occasional game
  - CD Drives, USB ports and HDMI, because connectivity is important

  Like any college student, I looked at MacBooks, Dells and the idea of a netbook/desktop setup, but for the net $720 I got this computer for, the ASUS UL80Vt blew them away. On to the review…

  PRODUCTIVITY SPEED: 8/10
  A little technical note: At stock speeds, the Core2Duo SU7300 is a 1.3 GHz processor with a 800Mhz FSB. Asus overclocks this to a 1.73 GHz on a 1066Mhz FSB, matching the 4GB of DDR3 DRAM. For those who, like me, were deciding between this and laptops with faster processors, you will not notice the difference with most software. Microsoft Office works like a charm, even on massive Excel financial models and graphic presentations. Web browsing is quick even with the 11 tabs I have open right now. The only time I’ve noticed faster Core 2 Duos matter was on extracting large RAR files, and even then the difference is less than a minute for a 4GB file.

  PHYSICAL PORTABILITY: 7/10
  Definitely heavier and larger than I expected. The 14-inch screen is balanced with a decent bezel on the top and bottom. The 8-cell battery weighs a lot more than it looks. However, it is definitely smaller and lighter than the MacBook Pro. It is also very thin, topping at slightly more than 1 in. It weighs in at 4.74 lbs., and I would say is actually light for its power. However, this is not as much a Thin-and-Light as others in its class, so do adjust your expectations.

  BATTERY LIFE: 11/10
  Incredible battery life. On integrated graphics, I regularly get 9 hours with 30% brightness, overclocked and WLAN on, surfing the web and taking notes. 11.5 hours may actually be realistic without the overclocking or WLAN. I’ve watched two full-length 720p movies and still had 25% left. On the discrete graphics, you can get 3 hours of solid gaming before you’re drained. This blows netbooks, MacBooks, Dells, etc. away. Simply unbelievable.

  GAMING: 8/10
  This laptop has both integrated Intel graphics and a discrete nVidia G210M with 512MB of memory. I have mine slightly overclocked, and it gets 4000 points on 3DMark06 with the discrete card. Can play Dragon Age, Civilization 4, Sims 3, NBA 2K9, Warcraft III and WoW with at least medium settings at native resolution. This is probably not important to most people but I love having the flexibility to play games or play movies more smoothly with the discrete graphics. This is not a gaming rig, but can play most modern games well enough.

  PORTS AND CONNECTIVITY: 8/10
  It has a DVD SuperDrive (burns DVD-R/RW, DVD+R/RW, Double-Layer), 3 USB ports, an Ethernet port, a 4-in-1 memory card reader (MMC, SD, MS/MS Pro), and HDMI port, a VGA port, a microphone jack and a mic jack. It also has a 0.3 megapixel webcam and mic integrated. There’s an integrated b/g/n WLAN solution, although it is not as strong as the Intel ones. A solid selection, especially on such a thin laptop. The only gripes here are the lack of eSATA and Bluetooth.

  WARRANTY & SUPPORT: 10/10
  2 year limited warranty with 1 year of accidental damage protection. Most laptops just come with 1 year of limited warranty. In general, extended warranties are not worth the cost, but in this case it’s a welcome plus. Asus has also been very helpful with a solid support site and staff who answer questions even here.

  TEMPERATURE: 10/10
  Does not burn your lap. Stays very very cool. Right now the CPU is at about 98F, hard drives at 104F and the ACPI is at 118F. On load, CPU hits 130F and the GPU’s have hit 180F, but still feels very cool to the touch. Can get a bit warm near the fan area on full load, but normally the fan doesn’t even need to turn. The fan is also very quiet; even on max load it only has a soft hum.

  Finally… to address some common gripes

  BUILD QUALITY: 6/10
  Definitely the weak point of this computer. Quality is not as subpar as most reviewers would have it–most laptops not called ThinkPads have some flex and give–but definitely give. The bezel is not entirely cemented to the screen, and there’s a lot of give right below the screen. Keyboard flex is fine by itself; it seems extreme when you’re on a desk, but that’s because the entire chassis flexes when it’s slightly raised. That in itself is the bigger problem. On the bottom, the two chassis halves are not cemented well together, and there is some give there. I bought a padded laptop sleeve which seems to protect it fine. I would not put too much weight on the keyboard when it’s on a desk (as opposed to on your lap).

  DISPLAY: 8/10
  To be fair, it’s a standard 1366×768 screen, plays 720p videos fine. It’s a very bright LED screen, and can outshine the outdoors even though the screen is very glossy. The noted contrast problems are really a device driver problem; on integrated graphics, contrast will sometimes decrease noticeably, perhaps in a play to reduce necessary brightness. On discrete graphics, great contrast, sharp screen.

  AUDIO: 7/10
  Altec Lansing speakers located on the bottom of the front of the chassis. By no means audiophile-quality at all, but much better than most laptop speakers. You will sometimes block the speakers while it’s on your lap, but in general distortion is lower than in, for example, ThinkPads, and volume is better than a Mac’s.

  In conclusion, I am highly satisfied with this purchase. If there were better speakers and better build quality, I would award this product 10/10, but as of now I am willing to rate it a 9/10 and round up. Amazon was also very helpful; I was allowed to still purchase through the $100 Gift Card promotion even after the link stopped working.

  For those interested in the next generation, the UL80Jt incorporates a low-voltage dual-core Core i7 overclocked to 1.73 Ghz and an nVidia 310M with 1GB. It promises even better performance and battery life, but will clock in at just over $1,000.

• 3 Kilroy

  Great laptop. The 8 sec boot into WEB is great for airport emails & surfing etc. Also sufficient power/ memory to run a complete 3 tier PeopleSoft 9.1 VM including Oracle database. Good compromise between small and lightweight for travel and a full blown desktop for heavy hitting database apps.

  Screen is very clear. Long battery life, just keeps going. Nice touches with the switchable graphics card and auto boost of the overclocking CPU. Why don’t the others do this trick – very sweet.

  Improvements?
  8 gig ram.
  Solid state disk with USB 3.0 drive for apps.
  Better customer support (email not answered after 6 weeks).
  Remove crapware being installed – allow a user option upon first boot to install or not. Removing this unwanted software is a pain!

• 4 Dorazio

  Anyone know of a fix or driver update fo the elan trackpad on this laptop?

  When using the trackpad, it:

  1) automatically clicks on items when I did not click or touch the pad
  2) the mouse location in in-accurate (it moves around by itself and is hard to make fine movements
  3) the mouse pointer stutters. it moves, then stops for bit, then moves again (hiccups)

  It’s a pain to use. Other than that, and some sharp edges near the led light in the front because the top/bottom case is not aligned well, the laptop is a good one. But the trackpad is so painful to use daily that it’s the real reason for the low rating.

  UPDATE: found a solution, just uninstall the crappy elan driver and software using the control panel’s programs and features section. After the reboot, you’ll get the default microsoft ps2 mouse drivers and now it’s working fine. No two finger gestures but that was gimmicky anyways. At least now the trackpad works reliably.

• 5 Dodd

  I purchased the 80vt after carefully reading several reviews on it, with most of them being positive.

  My take on the Asus 80vt-

  Screen: 4/5 Very bright, pretty crisp.
  Keyboard: 3/5 Good tactile feel, some flex if you type hard on it, very usable although the chicklet type of keys don’t stick up very much so it takes some getting used to from a regular type of keyboard.
  Construction: 3/5 I’d say average. One thing which some users have noted is the flex in the screen/case. This is due to the design of Asus notebooks and the way the screen is hinged without rigid support, not so much being poorly constructed.
  The battery life is incredibly long, I reached 10 hours over a 2 day period before needing a charge.
  Battery: 5/5 Excellent battery life!
  Appearance: 5/5 Nice looking design

  Touch-pad: 1/5 Man o man,……when I read users’ complaints about the touch-pad, I could not imagine something so simple could be so much of a nightmare. I have never experienced a touch-pad so frustratingly bad. It is enough to make you want to take out a hammer and smash the whole computer. It is glossy plastic just like the hand rests but with tiny pin hole type of perforations. When trying to move the mouse across the screen, the touch-pad selects every link in its’ path. Changing the sensitivity settings did not seem to help. I tried for hours at a time to change the settings as suggested by other users to make it more functional but it remains the Achilles heel of this laptop. It is so bad it renders the laptop almost unusable without an external mouse. I would have gone the external mouse route but I plan to use it on the plane and with the limited space it wouldn’t be practical.

  The computer is well worth the money, but I am returning it after a week of touch-pad hell. If I read that Asus changes the touch-pad or fixes this problem, I will purchase the 80vt or the 30vt in a heart beat.

  To sum it up, it is a very good lightweight notebook with exceptional battery life, good speed and power, with the worst touch-pad on the planet. I’d highly recommend it if you can use an external mouse.

• 6 Conroy

  I purchased this laptop a month ago for school, and so far it has proven to be an amazing computer with few flaws.

  Pros:
  - Amazing battery life, I cannot say enough about this. I regularly push 10 hours of use with Wifi on and screen at 40%.
  - 500gb HD is huge. I tossed it into an external case and installed an OCZ SSD w/ Windows 7 Pro before ever booting it up. Therefore I did not experience any bloatware. Performance with the SSD is breathtaking, same as the SSD in my desktop. I can’t stand to use a computer with conventional spindle drives as boot disk anymore. I do still use them for cold storage though.
  - HDMI of course, this was a requirement for me.
  - 4GB of RAM.
  - Very cool computer. The fan hardly ever kicks on, and with an SSD this computer is literally completely silent. It makes my desktop sound loud, which is very hard to do.
  - No problems with Wifi, reception has so far been perfect.
  - The keyboard is amazing, once you get used to the odd spacing between the keys. Makes for fewer errors when typing, at least for me at 70WPM!
  - Super thin and pretty light, I barely notice the weight in my backpack.

  Cons:
  - Glossy screen, but hard to find a laptop without one nowadays.
  - Integrated graphics. Thankfully I don’t play many games, and the few I do play (Jedi Outcast, Jedi Academy, the Battlefield 1942 series) can manage.
  - No backlit keyboard. The one thing I really wish it had, but in light of all the pros this is a small fault. Still worth 5 stars to me.
  - Webcam isn’t terribly great, but at least it has one.

  I use this laptop mostly for office use, coding at school, and a fair amount of remote desktop. Could not ask for a better computer for the price.

  Overall, I cannot recommend this laptop highly enough provided that you don’t play newer games with any regularity.

• 7 Johansen

  This is what I wanted in a laptop:

  - something light enough to use around my apt and for travel
  - enough power for web browsing, watching youtube and avi’s, and word processing

  In essence, it sounded like I needed a “netbook” – or so I thought. After some experience using a netbook, the tiny screen, the mediocre battery life, and lack of “umph” to do basic tasks in Windows eventually pushed me away. They just wouldn’t cut it. Then I came across Asus’s UL line of laptops while doing some online research. From reading the many reviews across the web, I gathered that this laptop had all the aspects of a netbook minus the shortcomings. Even though I’ve used this laptop for only two days now, I am happy to report that this laptop has got it all. Here are some highlights:

  - a screen with enough real estate so you don’t have to scroll down to see an entire facebook picture.
  - ridiculous battery life
  - a great keyboard with a nice layout and no noticeable flex
  - snappy Core 2 Duo processor paired with Windows 7 makes for a speedy laptop experience
  - lighter than my wife’s macbook

  And to address some concerns raised in other reviews:

  - not only is the trackpad not as bad as some people make it seem, but I actually find it quite good. As I mentioned earlier, my wife has a macbook so I think I have a good baseline for comparison. With a little tweak of the sensitivity settings, I couldn’t be happier. It’s still no macbook trackpad but it’s pretty darn good. Sure you’ll wander off the dimpled trackpad area once in a while, but honestly, who cares? Then again maybe I’m not that picky when it comes to my trackpad.
  - the trackpad uni-button is stiff, thin, and awkwardly recessed making it cumbersome to use. I’m a keyboard shortcut kinda guy so the tap-to-click, two-finger-tap-to-right-click, and two finger scrolling are sufficient for me.
  - my wifi card is connected and with good strength.
  - fingerprints are only visible on the black screen bezel. The silver hides the fingerprints much better than the black version.

  I won’t be editing videos or photos, burning dvd’s, or building complex financial models in excel while running Bloomberg simultaneously. This laptop will be used to check my fantasy teams, reply to some emails, chat, and to show funny youtube clips to my family and friends. And this laptop will do these tasks really really well. The key is to figure out what you need and adjust your expectations accordingly. If you’re looking for a laptop to do the same things as me, then look no further. Sure netbooks are cheaper, but spend a little more and you’ll own a laptop that you’ll actually use. You won’t regret it.

• 8 Elkins

  This laptop took me time to decide….when I took the plunge I wasn’t disappointed at all. The screen is just much brighter than the older generation LCD’s because this is an LED screen hence uses less energy adding up to more than 10hrs of use without having to charge the battery. This unit is simply awesome….I am planning to get the 12.1″ screen as my travel companion. If there is anything that needs to be improved….it’s the webcam…the resolution is not as crisp as I would want it to be….

• 9 Neuhoff

  I wanted something I would take with me everywhere, all the time, but something still very functional. I also wanted battery life that was so long I wouldn’t need to think about it. I looked at netbooks; I looked at the HP Pavilion DM3-1040US. The netbooks were more portable, but less capable. The HP was heavier, had less battery life, and (I think) an inferior processor. I chose this Asus, and have no regrets. The battery life is fully as advertised. I take it with me everywhere. Windows 7 works well. Very satisfied. No wireless problems either.

  It is a bit flimsy. The plastic wrist-rest creaks and buckles. My other computers include a desktop Dell with XP PRO; a Dell 17 inch notebook with VISTA; a Macbook Pro unibody 15, and this Asus. The trackpad is irritating, but anything would be compared to the Mac. I tried the Samsung Go netbook, the HP 1040, and others. All trackpads (except on the MAC) will make your wrist lock up. The HP trackpad was especially bad. The Asus will win no prizes, but I just use a mouse when I feel the need.

  The most important consideration for an ultraportable is that you want to take it with you. If it’s too heavy, you’ll leave it home. If it’s too slow, you won’t want to use it anywhere. If the battery depletes to soon, there’s no point. This Asus is the perfect balance, at least for me..

• 10 Henson

  Overall this is a great little laptop. The battery life is incredible. It boots up fast and the display is brilliant. My only complaint is with the touchpad. It is impossible to make fine movements with the touchpad. The pointer jumps and skips when making fine movements. Very annoying!!! I’ve updated the touchpad driver but that didn’t eliminate the skipping and jumping. Others have recommended using an external mouse but that defeats the purpose of a “lap”top. Also, the bar that controls the left/right mouse buttons is so firm that it is practically unusable – but the tap features of the touchpad work quite nicely to replace the need for left/right buttons.

  If you do a lot of photo editing or other tasks that require precise pointer movements avoid this laptop. Or look on eBay to find a good deal on a used one (mine). I may be selling it soon if I can’t overcome this very annoying problem.

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