Asus M5N or S5N?

I've been looking into both of these systems for a little while now, so I guess I'll chime in.

As far as which one is better, well they're both ASUS and both great machines from what I've seen.

You've already pinpointed the main differences between the two - about 1lb in weight difference, a diff. in thickness, and the optical drive.

I guess the thing to ask is, do you need the optical drive on the go?

If the answer is no, you might be better of going with the S5N as it is certainly lighter and smaller (JFVegara owns one and says he sometimes forgets it is in his bag because of how light it is - I can attest to this, I had the pleasure of seeing one in person and picked it up and felt its weight, or rather, lack there of, and I can see how it would just be forgotten about in a backpack or other type of bag - it feels feather light).

I should also mention a couple more things:

-The weights you mentioned are with each laptops smaller, 3-cell battery (around 2hrs battery life). If you get either one, I am sure you will want their 9-cell batteries as well, which offer the battery life you mentioned. This does of course increase the carrying weight (not by a lot though) and the battery does have a hump that sticks out the back (ask JF for more about that or look for pictures).

-The S5N is available to configure on a few sites, just like the M5N. Agearnotebooks.com has a configurable model.

-This brings me to my next point. The S5N you mentioned is the "ready to sell" one from Asus (i.e. non-configurable) and thus comes with Asus' GLOBAL warranty (which I think is 2yrs). The M5N and the configurable S5N come with the standard 1yr parts and labor from ASUS and then whatever warranty your reseller offers. On the "ready to sell" S5N, if you get it and aftermarket mod it (e.g. put in more RAM) I believe Asus will still cover it (minus the added RAM) - though I'd call them to make sure.

Well done, my young Jedi. . Looks like you've been doing your homework.

-Both are aftermarket customizable provided you have the right parts/know how. The M5N's warranty is probably more liberal with after market customizable.

-The S5N is also carbon alloy. I forgot to mention, the external drive for the S5N looks pretty snazzy (not that that matters much, but hey, always a plus).

-JFVergara is Canadian (I'm American), so he can probably help you more with that.

-I have seen a couple of pictures of the M5N in white - though I am not sure of its distribution in this color.

Both are carbon fibre. There are a couple of places where you can get it in Canada, I bought mine at www.bytewizecomputers.com

The M5N white is only available in Australia. It will be super expensive to get that imported, I tried looking into it.

I've been looking into this so called fan problem for a few days now and here's what i can tell u:

For many people (possibly all) the M5N fan never goes off. Regardless of whether its plugged in or on battery power it simply doesn't go off. It has been verified that the fan will go off if the chip gets to be 20C (i think 68F) - someone accomplished this by putting the computer in their fridge.

For S5N, the status is that when the laptop is plugged in, fan is almost always on. When S5N is on battery, fan is rarely on.

For both of these situations, the chips were relatively normal (i.e., not 2.0Ghz dothans, more in the 1.5-1.7 range). However, in terms of what power settings people were using and all that, i can't really be more specific. In other words, your mileage may vary -- this is simply what i've surmised after 2 or so days looking at various msg boards.

If anybody has more info, feel free to add.
thx
w

Ok, so the fan never turns off....does this mean that it's always running at a noticeable volume (in a quiet room)? Or is it just running at a low rpm that allows it to be quiet? And for that matter, when the fans are at top speed, are these laptops loud at all?

Alright, after digging through the web, here is all the info i can find about fans on the M5N and S5N.

The general story is that I certainly would not purchase an M5N until this problem is fixed. The S5N sounds like fan noise is not more of a problem then it is on a random notebook (i.e, could be less loud and on less time, but nothing horrific).

S5Ne - aka ULV 1.1 Ghz chip:
http://notebookforums.com/showthread...ht=S5N+M5N+fan
If your running on batteries, u will rarely hear the fan go on at all. When plugged in and doing intensive applications, the fan will kick in. Its not very audible unless u were in a really quiet place.

1.7Ghz S5N
http://www4.tomshardware.com/mobile/20040225/index.html
"The fan could be a little quieter, too: although barely audible when using standard Office applications, it kicks up a lot of a acoustic fuss when handling processor-intensive tasks such as playing a video stored on the hard drive."

M5N uknown Ghz:
http://notebookforums.com/showthread...ht=S5N+M5N+fan
"they certainly can't be worse than the M5N that whines along at all times regardless of whether the CPU is in need to any cooling or not. It's really bad :-( "
And....
"From my experience with an M5N the processor is only on when your plugged into the AC, when you let the Asus Power4Gear handle it on battery the fan is rarely on."

1.6Ghz "M5Ne" (I don't know what the hell model that is but whatever)
http://www.notebookreview.com/forums...ms=S5N,M5N,fan
"This is the ideal notebook for travelling, it is very fast, quiet and light. It also does not appear to get too hot as the fan works quite effectively. I do not use notebooks for games, due to current limitation in graphics cards and screen response times of notebook's."

S5Ne with ULV Pentium chip 1.1Ghz
http://www.notebookreview.com/forums...ms=S5N,M5N,fan
"s5n with a 4200rpm HDD here. the fan kicks in about 50 degrees, which is very rare when i am running on battery power.
but when plugged(full performance mode) the fan rarely stops."

M5N Unknown Ghz
http://www.notebookreview.com/forums...ms=S5N,M5N,fan
"But it's quite loud, especially in a quiet room, and gets on my nerves loads."

General griping about how the M5N fan never shuts off...
http://www.notebookreview.com/forums...ms=S5N,M5N,fan

I should get my S5N on Monday. I am getting the 1.5Ghz Dothan, but will have a faster/bigger HDD than standard and increased RAM. I will make sure to include in my review a section dedicated to the fan.

I am pretty sure Justin at ProPortable is running an S5N with almost everything maxes out (2.0 Dothan, 7200rpm HDD, 768mb RAM) and he never really said anything about increased fan noise/activity - though the battery life does take a huge hit with that setup.

greetings, I have the s5n I am making a big post on thursday, hopefully I can answer any questions for you..

A while ago, there was an ASUS representative on the forum and I asked if the white m5n was available here in the US, but he said no so I would assume it won't be in Canada either.

There are no white M5Ns available in the US.

However, PROPortable has the chasis kits to make like 9 or 10 white M5Ns - they will be the only of their kind available to US consumers. They come at a premium - but they will build you a white M5N, I guess, while supplies last. So if you want one, I'd get on it.

The W5, is, as far as I know, not yet available and when it is it will definetly be more than 2k Canadian.