Review: Asus V6Va

Just got my V6va today. I have been searching for the perfect laptop for a while. Went through the SOny s580 and the Toshiba Tecra M4 (returned them both) before I resigned myself to the fact that I wasnt going to get the laptop that I wanted. However, then I saw the v6v and I can tell you after the first few hours of having it that it is as close as one can get to the perfect laptop. I will post a full review in a few days.

Cheers!

Asus V6va:

2 ghz Pentium M 760
2 gigs of Ram
100 gig 5,400 rpm drives (1 60gig and 1 40 gig)
4x super multi DL DVD burner
15.0 glare type (glossy) SXGA+ screen
ATI Radeon x700 VGA pci-express with 128 Vram

Okay, here's the short version:

I am on the road and very busy with work right now, so I do not have the time to write a full, in depth review right now and post pics. I will work on expanding my comments and taking some pictures, but I am in the middle of a very important case and giving lectures, and I just dont have the time to give a review the attention that it needs.

However, I will give you a bit more background and some more commentary on my machine.

I have needed a laptop for over a year now. My wife was working on an old Compaq Armada (crap) until I got her an HP zd5000 series. The ZD is very nice for a desktop replacement, but weighs almost 8 pounds and has weak graphics (fine for her, but not what I wanted).

In my searches, I was looking for a true "thin and light" notebook (14" screen max and 5 pounds max) because I travel a LOT and carry a bag (or backpack, depending) with many books, notes, folders, tape recorder, mp3 player, etc. Without the laptop, I regularly carry around 7 to 9 pounds of gear, so keeping the size and weight down were really a HUGE priority for me.

However, I also needed a LOT of computing and graphics power. I needed the ability to run my games (yes, I am both a lawyer and a gamer...when I am on the road and done with my work, instead of watching a movie or the news, I will play an hour or two of FARCRY or FEAR or MORROWWIND, etc.) I also run and tinker with some pretty beefy Chess databases and C++ algorythm programs that search through patents for confluent features.

Another important feature was battery life. I needed something that I could underclock, turn down the brightness, and while running MS WORD, EXCEL, and WIFI, expect to get at least 3.5 hours of running time.

Tall order...and virtually impossible to fill. Here were my tries:

My first shot was the SONY VAIO s580. Yes, it was small (13.3" screen and 4.8 pounds), and with the extended battery running under my criteria explained above gave just about around 4h 45min of running time. However, the screen was too small (although beautiful), the battery rattled in the back, it was loaded with bloatware that you couldn't remove or disable through MSCONFIG without screwing up the entire OS, it ran HOT (scaldingly so), and its graphics performance was mediocre at best with the nvidia 6400go with 64mb. I had some problems running the DVD player at times, and it was a bit buggy. A great machine for a lot of people out there, I am sure, but not what I wanted in a 2,500 dollar laptop.

My next try was the Toshiba Tecra M4. 5 pounds, 14" screen, Nvidia 6600 go with 128 mb. I don't even know where to begin with the problems with this machine. Cheap plastic case that flexed, creaked, and felt like it was going to break every time I opened it or turned it on...a dull, lackluster screen (although at an outstanding resolution), fans that sounded like a 747 flying over that were on ALL THE TIME, the entire chassis would vibrate even if the fans were running at slower speeds, very hot to the touch, and very lackluster performance from the video card. The bloatware issue was 100 times worse with the TOSH than the SONY, and for the first week I couldn't even boot the thing up and work without having to wade through 10 minutes of prompts to install features, update drivers, register components, etc. I was tempted to overclock the 6600 card to get the performance out of it that it should have been capable of, but I just dont trust TOSHIBA's craftsmanship or support to risk it. At the end of the second week it bluescreened on me twice and I very happily rid myself of the M4 Albatross by returning it to toshiba.

Then I started looking around at the ASUS w3v and doing the "size versus power" comparison with the new Alienware Area51 m5500 and the Acer Ferarri 4000. I had pretty much just resinged myself to the fact that it would have to be one or the other (that I'd have to settle for a 15.4" footprint and 6.5 pounds, 3" thick machine (slight exaggeration for dramatic effect). Both Asus and Acer made 14" and 15" machines that carried x700 cards and weighed in at around 5.5 pounds, but only in Europe and not in the US. I must say that, whatever our differences may have been, I have to give credit to Eddie for advising me towards an x700 card instead of an x600. He warned me that I might not be satisfied with the x600 (and thence the w3v), considering the performance that I wanted to get out of my GPU, and his advice was a major reason why I waited...and am glad that I did. Ultimately, I did not buy from him for other reasons, but he was right about this one point, and I wanted to give thanks and credit where it is due.

Well, the v6v came out just in time. It was the perfect compromise to my dilemma, and I am very glad that I held out. It is 1.2"-1.4" thick (very slim), has this great brushed carbon fiber body that is SLICK and elegant, looks great, and feels sturdy and strong despite being very light. It has a 15" screen (I don't like widescreen both for footprint and aesthetic viewing reasons), the glossy "glare type" kind, which is fine. I like both types, and the matte screen is actually better for the environments that I work in, but this screen is very beautiful and when it's time to game, it ROCKS. It sports an ATI x700 card with 128 mb. I am very happy with its graphic performance, and it renders FARCRY at medium-high settings flawlessly.

The keyboard is excellent, and, surprisingly, the speakers are AWESOME for such a small and light laptop. I was not expecting good speakers, and if you're a true audiophile looking crank on serious headphones, I doubt that you'll get a lot of power, but when I play CD's, the speakers sound better than my brother's Quosmio that weighs 9 pounds and has a 17" screen. I, quite simply, have never heard speakers on a lappy that are so good (but I don't have the experience that many of you do.)

The machine comes with NO BLOATWARE AT ALL!!! All you get is windows and the attendant programs for monitoring system performance, energy profiles, processor heat and speed, etc. THERE ARE NO THIRD PARTY PROGRAMS INSTALLED AT ALL!!! HALLELUJAH!!!!!!!

I ordered mine from Agearnotebooks.com. They are a certified ASUS vendor listed on the ASUS website and will customize the machine any way you want it. I got mine with a 2.0 gig Pentium M processor, 2 Gigs of Ram, Arctic Ice thermal paste, a 100 gig hard drive, x700 ATI with 128 mb, and it weighs in on my mail scale at exactly 5.72 pounds. However, it does not feel like it weighs that much and it does not look like it is a 15" screen. Both its weight and size are surprisingly light and slim. Agear supplies it with 2 year warranty through them, and I felt very confident in talking and ordering through them. I ordered the machine on a Friday night (online) after talking to their rep. With next day shipping it arrived on Tuesday morning, the week before Christmas. THAT"S FAST!!!!!

Underclocking the processor (i'm still fiddling with the exact settings) around 6x multi into .87 using CHC and setting the power scheme to max battery with screen brightness at 25%, WIFI off, running MS WORD or MS EXCEL gives me about 4 hours of battery life. Sometimes its 3h 45min, a couple times it was in the 4h 2min range. I ordered and carry around an extra battery, but I have not needed it as of yet. Even when I fully volt the processor and set it to super performance setting, the palm rest does not get particularly hot. When the processor is cranking on FARCRY at 70 degrees C, the palm rest is warm, but not hot.

The only down sides to this machine: The hard drives come formatted in Fat32. You can convert to NTFS, but it's going to be a little hectic and involve reormatting and repartitioning the drive. For most people this wont be an issue. The second thing is that the processor does run hot. expect, even undervolted, to be in the 50-55 degrees Celcius. Expect, gaming, to exceed 70. I would have also liked a few more multimedia control buttons on the button bar, but that's just a preference and a little nit pick. The 4x super multi DL DVD burner runs great once it gets cranking, but sometimes can be a little slow getting started. My last nit pick is something that nearly all of the computer manufacturers do, so I can't fault ASUS specifically, but WHY do they put ALL of the cords and connection spots (modem, CAT5, Power cord, USB, Firewire, headphone and mic, etc) on the RIGHT SIDE OF THE MACHINE!!?!!?! As 90% of people are right handed, i fyou want to (for example) go to a cafe or hotel, plug your laptop in, connect to internet through DSL, connect a USB mouse, put your earphones in, and cruise the internet while listening to music or game, then having all those cables on the same side of the machine that your mouse is operating on makes it a royal pain in the ass. It would make much more sense to put the DVD drive and card reader on the right hand side and connect all the cables on the left, leaving the right hand side of the board free for human interface devices.

The touchpad takes a bit of getting used to. It moves smoothly, is easy to adjust, and works very well. I actually like it very much. However, it is different than any other that I have used, and has a bit of a learning curve to it. (On standard setting, the touchpad is not sensitive enough while the scroll bar is too sensitive). The buttons are satisfying to press, easy to click, and don't present any issues for me.

This machine is a keeper. Thus far it is operating flawlessly. Not a hiccup, and I am thrilled that I have a machine that has all of the features that I wanted. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS LAPTOP!!!! This is all that I have time for right now, and I will work on a full review with picutures in a few weeks. Please feel free to ask any questions you want of me in the mean time.

Peace

Thoughts after 3 months

Hey all, I know I have not been around here for a while, and I am sorry that I have not posted pics, but I am involved in a huge case right now and have virtually no time. If someone could give me a basic tutorial/ rundown on exactly how to post pics on the forum, I would be grateful.

I just wanted to update my review after 3 months of running the machine and give you all the lowdown.

I still think that pound for pound this mahcine is the best in its class. I did a more precise measurement of its weight, and I have to re-adjust that number to 5.67 pounds. This thing is AMAZINGLY light considering the power that is inside of it.

The screen does not have any of the ghosting that the other review noted. I dont know why, but it just doesnt. However, the gloss does have a tendency to scratch and smudge easily, so I have to keep a lens-cleaning cloth and some spray cleaner on hand to regularly wipe the screen down. Addtionally, the body, although it looks great, gets dirty easily as well. It seems like I spend half my time cleaning the damn thing, but that's okay.

I have experienced a few minor problems withe DVD drive. Sometimes it just hangs on disk boot-up. I can hear it running, but it wont boot...it just cycles up and down, up and down. If I restart the machine, it fixes it, and its only happened 4 times in 3 months, but I have a feeling that if a part of this machine is going to need replacement within the 2 year warranty period, that the DVD drive is going to be it.

If I put all the settings on Battery Saving and underclock using CHC to the lowest multiplier and voltage setting and then run it with screeen brightness at 23%, Microsoft Word open and writing, wifi off, I can get battery life of 4 hours 36 minutes. If I put in a dvd (still in battery saving mode) and run a dvd at 80% brightness, I can get a solid 3 hours. I keep a spare battery in my bag and usually have to swap the battery out at mid day. I am majorly impressed.

Slight issue with ccApp and Explorer.exe not shutting down properly in windows, but that's a windows issue (it does it on my desktop, too). The wifi works great, but once you turn it on, you have to open the connections and tell it to refresh in order to get it to detect. For example, if Istart up the machine with wifi off and then once it boots up, turn the wifi on, it wont automatically detect and connect. I have to open up the connection box and tell it to refresh networks before it will. Is this a driver issue or a windows settings issue? Can anyone advise?

I love that it has an infra-red port built in on the side. I have a c-pen, and it can beam directly to the machine through the IR port without an extra USB attachment. I must say that was a pleasant surprise.

I am amazingly impressed with the gaming performance. I put it on Super performance, shut down all other programs (including NIS and NIV and Counterspy), and run FarCry at medium-high settings like a dream. This thing renders Call of Duty 2 amazingly well. It has a little bit of trouble with Splinter Cell Choas Theory, but it still looks and plays incredible for a 5 1/2 pound laptop. I can game on it for an hour at super speed and only run the processor temp to 68-70 degrees celcius. I know that's not "cool", but if that's the absolute max temp at the high end of pushing the processor, I'm very happy. In addition, I can run C++ in multiple windows while telling my algorythm to crunch through a couple hundred thousand patent applications and it just chews through it with no sweat. There is a bit of lag in executing functions and cross-referncing applications when this is happening, but that's to be expected. I'm very happy with it in this regard as well.

What bums me out is that the primary partition upon which the operating system is installed is in FAT32. It comes with an NTFS converter, which allowed my to take the second partition (100 gig drive with 1 40gig and 1 60 gig partition) and convert it to NTFS, but I can't convert the primary partition because the OS is running on it. I guess they do this because somehow the system restore disk to set it back to factory settings needs to be in FAT32 (this is what I heard...is this right?)

What I am going to do is in a few months, back everything up and reformat the primary partition to NTFS. If I can't use the manufacturer disk, I'll just install Windows from my own disk and use the recovery disk for drivers. If there's anyone out there who has an idea as to whether this can be done without physically dismounting the drive, I'd love to hear from you.

All in all, having tried HP , Sony , Toshiba , Dell , I must say that the ASUS is head and shoulders above anything that either of these companies has to offer. If you are looking for a lappy and you can afford this one, I can say that you can't go wrong.

Peace

In terms of comparison to Thinkpad, here are a few thoughts:

At the time that I bought, the T60 was unavailable. From what I can see, it looks like a sweet machine. It certainly has the ports on the correct (left) side. It is also available in 14.1" to make it more portable. However, I kind of think of Lenovo (or IBM) as like Toshiba in several ways. First of all, the creaky, boxy, lame looking black plastic case is ugly as hell. Second, they are packed with features, and do have matte screeens (which I would have preferred). However, I bet it's loaded to the gills with bloatware, and I'm not certain how much actual graphic performance youre going to get out of the x1300 or x 1500. Sure, its the newest generation card, but I remember my experience with my Toshiba where it had an Nvidia 6600, but the darn thing was so underclocked that it's actual graphic performance was horrible and the thing had this terrible fan that sounded like a jet engine.

In other words, Lenovo is known for making ultra light, super portable business notebooks that are geared towards professionals, and not people who want graphics power. I love to game, and I want the graphic power. The advantage of the ASUS is that you get this ultra slim, super sleek, awesome looking, ultra sturdy carbon fiber casing along with NO BLOATWARE and really true gaming graphic punch. Once again, I havent seen the T60, but looking at it, I wouldn't be surprised if the card is underclocked or preconfigured, making gaming difficult, or if there's huge, noisy fans and tons of software crap you can't get rid of without screwing something up....and on top of that the thing is god aweful ugly.

I may be wrong, and it may be the best thing since sliced bread. I do know that their keyboards are incredible. However, I really do just love ASUS. I use their motherboards, graphic cards, and other components in my desktop or when I'm helping others to build. They are just straight up quality in what they do.

Hope that helps.

I'm not exactly certain which model is the z62f/j that you refer to. I only know that at the time of my buying, what I really wanted was a 14" screen, but didnt' want the x600 video card or the 15.4" widescreens. When I looked at all the models that Asus offered, I had to compromise with a 15" screen, but the v6v was the only model available (at the time of my buying) that had 15" screen (NOT 15.4 ... I don't like the widescreen), x700, and was less than 5.5 pounds. Every other model that had x700 was either over 5.5 pounds or had a 15.4. They may have come out with better since then, but at the time, this was the only one.

Heating is not an issue. Some people have had issues, but I think that they are too sensitive. It doesnt bother me at all. In addition, it is very quiet and undervolts like a champ. I mean, I can put it on Super performance and run Call of Duty 2 at medium-high settings for like 2 hours and the Processor never goes over 68-70 degrees and the HDD never gets up to 55 degrees (Celcius, of course). I think that is great in terms of heat management, considering that you can't even really hear the fan at all (although you can feel it blowing air over your hand if you're using a mouse).