Whats up all. Finally got my hand on the Asus M5N.
I was looking for a small laptop to carry around easily in college with good battery life. It was pretty much a decision between the Dell 700m, Uniwill N223ii0, and the Asus M5N.
The 700m was bulky, the uniwill looked sort of weird with the widescreen and the speaker strip below the screen. After some very tough deciding, I went with the M5N.
Finally ordered from www.geared2play.com after hearing great reviews of them, and after they responded to all my emails really really fast. Shipped out in 2-3 days (forgot) and arrived 7 days later because UPS ground is really slow from New York to California.
Specs:
1.5ghz Dothan
512 ram
40gb 5400rpm hdd
Extra 9 cell battery
I didn’t go with the 7200rpm hdd because I was bringing a desktop to college as well and so there is no need to have a super fast laptop.
First Impressions: Wow it’s small and light and sexy. 1 dead pixel on the top left of the screen stuck on blue =(. I only have a toshiba laptop to compare this to, so bear with me.
Build Quality: Excellent, very solid. No squeaks and creaking anywhere, lcd actually stays in place when you move it up or down unlike some laptops where it moves a little after you move it. There is only a tiny bit of keyboard flex, not noticeable to me. Much better quality overall than the Toshiba.
Lcd: Pretty good, non glossy (I really don’t like glossy screens, which is why I turned away from the 700m). The screen is clearer and better imo than the Toshiba laptop.
Sound: Just like every other laptop sound, not too great.
Keyboard: Maybe I’m just too used to full sized keyboards, but I definitely need some time to adjust to the keyboard. The numbers on top are really small and so are the arrows. My biggest complaint is the Fn button where normally the Ctrl is. I used copy/paste a lot and it really bugs me. Otherwise, the keys are nice and crisp when typing.
Others: 3 usb ports, 1 firewire I think. Excellent size, perfect for my backpack. The included carrying bag is pretty nice, fits into my backpack, canceled my order for the shinza bag. Very light, a little heavier using the big battery.
Battery life: The standard battery lasts like less than 2 hours. I had to have the extra 9 cell battery. It does stick out quite a bit but it’s fine for me. The big battery lasted around 7 hours or so.
Heat: The palm rests and stuff stays cool. The biggest heat generator is the hard drive under the left palm rest. Gets pretty hot after being on my lap for a while.
Performance: I havn’t tried to play any games yet, but probably the most I’ll play on it is some CS once in a while as I have my desktop to play doom 3 and stuff. Everything seems fast.
Wireless: Wireless performance was excellent, better than on the Toshiba using a dlink super g card.
In the end, I love the computer. I would definitely recommend this to anyone looking for a really thin and light computer. The price was $1450 ish shipped.
Maybe I’ll get some benchmarks someday.
Here are the pics: CLICK ON THE PICS FOR THE FULL SIZE
If you have any questions feel free to post here or IM me.
I was looking for a small laptop to carry around easily in college with good battery life. It was pretty much a decision between the Dell 700m, Uniwill N223ii0, and the Asus M5N.
The 700m was bulky, the uniwill looked sort of weird with the widescreen and the speaker strip below the screen. After some very tough deciding, I went with the M5N.
Finally ordered from www.geared2play.com after hearing great reviews of them, and after they responded to all my emails really really fast. Shipped out in 2-3 days (forgot) and arrived 7 days later because UPS ground is really slow from New York to California.
Specs:
1.5ghz Dothan
512 ram
40gb 5400rpm hdd
Extra 9 cell battery
I didn’t go with the 7200rpm hdd because I was bringing a desktop to college as well and so there is no need to have a super fast laptop.
First Impressions: Wow it’s small and light and sexy. 1 dead pixel on the top left of the screen stuck on blue =(. I only have a toshiba laptop to compare this to, so bear with me.
Build Quality: Excellent, very solid. No squeaks and creaking anywhere, lcd actually stays in place when you move it up or down unlike some laptops where it moves a little after you move it. There is only a tiny bit of keyboard flex, not noticeable to me. Much better quality overall than the Toshiba.
Lcd: Pretty good, non glossy (I really don’t like glossy screens, which is why I turned away from the 700m). The screen is clearer and better imo than the Toshiba laptop.
Sound: Just like every other laptop sound, not too great.
Keyboard: Maybe I’m just too used to full sized keyboards, but I definitely need some time to adjust to the keyboard. The numbers on top are really small and so are the arrows. My biggest complaint is the Fn button where normally the Ctrl is. I used copy/paste a lot and it really bugs me. Otherwise, the keys are nice and crisp when typing.
Others: 3 usb ports, 1 firewire I think. Excellent size, perfect for my backpack. The included carrying bag is pretty nice, fits into my backpack, canceled my order for the shinza bag. Very light, a little heavier using the big battery.
Battery life: The standard battery lasts like less than 2 hours. I had to have the extra 9 cell battery. It does stick out quite a bit but it’s fine for me. The big battery lasted around 7 hours or so.
Heat: The palm rests and stuff stays cool. The biggest heat generator is the hard drive under the left palm rest. Gets pretty hot after being on my lap for a while.
Performance: I havn’t tried to play any games yet, but probably the most I’ll play on it is some CS once in a while as I have my desktop to play doom 3 and stuff. Everything seems fast.
Wireless: Wireless performance was excellent, better than on the Toshiba using a dlink super g card.
In the end, I love the computer. I would definitely recommend this to anyone looking for a really thin and light computer. The price was $1450 ish shipped.
Maybe I’ll get some benchmarks someday.
Here are the pics: CLICK ON THE PICS FOR THE FULL SIZE
If you have any questions feel free to post here or IM me.
