Ordered my new Asus W2V

I just ordered my new Asus W2V and it's set for August 11th! I'll be exchanging it for my Sony Vaio A297XP. When I get it I'll be sure to make some comparisons between the two laptops.

The laptop I ordered have the following specs:

- Pentium M 760
- 2GB DDR2-533
- 100GB 5400 RPM
- Slot loaded DVD (sweeet, I don't care if it's noisy, I will barely use it anyway. It has a high bling-bling factor though )
- ATI mobility X700 128MB
- 17" WSXGA+ Glossy Screen
- WinXP MCE (I'm not sure what to think about this, but there was no option to change it to WinXP Prof)

And all of that in just 3.3kg (7.2lbs) and just 25-32mm thick! That'll be quite a shock now I'm used to this somewhat larger Sony Vaio. I do hope it looks as good as the Sony however and I also hope that the screen can compete with the Sony (I think I'll like the lower resolution though).

Well, still two weeks to wait...

All Asus W2V's have the X700 by default if I'm not mistaken. I do have the RAM and HD changed however. I ordered the laptop at http://www.laptops4u.nl (Netherlands).

Are you referring to the review about the bad sound quality? I think this is a temporary issue only as the W2V uses Intel HD Audio. It has been thouroughly tested and while it's not as good as the newest creative audigy soundcards it's still way better than the AC 97 chips most notebooks have/had. I'm very confident that this will be resolved (also because the sound quality coming from the SPDIF output was actually very good).

Well, as I already said, I don't think the sound quality is a permanent problem. You can follow the progress on www.notebookreview.com (as that is where the thread is really coming from).

As for the DVD drive being noisy, well they always are aren't they? If you don't like it you can always use software to limit the RPM. I myself don't really mind, because I barely ever use it and if I do I usually make an image from the CD/DVD.

As for the warranty, in the Netherlands we get two years pick-up & return by default. You can of course always upgrade it through a third company. The W2V also falls under the Asus' "Zero Bright Dot" program, which is basically a pixel-error free TFT guarantee. I think that says something about the quality of their products.

As for the DVI out, I don't think it is -always- better than VGA. It very much depends on the monitor if I'm not mistaken. Nevertheless, maybe Asus will release a port replicator (I have one for my Sony Vaio with DVI out).

As for the review, of course I'm going to make one

I don't even consider the XPS Gen 2 (and most other Dells for that matter). I think it's so ugly I would actually feel emberassed around my friends. It looks like a toy to me.

Yay! The laptop is being released sooner than expected. It's getting shipped as we speak and should arrive next monday!

This caught me a bit by surprise however as now I have to rush to get the funds

If you would have bought it at http://www.notebook-shop.de you could have opted for a different keyboard layout right away.

The Dutch version of the notebook doesn't have the hybrid tuner either unfortunately. I could have bought the german version, but I don't think that the hybrid tuner is worth another 400 euro's (which is around what you'd have to pay extra for that model). I'll use the laptop as desktop replacement and not as media centre anyway.

I received it at monday and I'm working with it for over a day now. I will try to post a review when I have some more spare time.

A few things I have to say after using it:
- It looks absolutely stunning!
- The DVD-player is not loud at all, it's just like any other DVD-player
- This laptop has no hotspots at all, though the hot air gets blown out at the right, but it's not hindering your mouse movements
- The DVD-player is between the AC-in and an USB port (which I use for my mouse). This means that it's rather unhandy to use the DVD-player. However this totally depends on your setup (as the right side of the laptop has another 3 USB ports and you might just have your AC-cord running another side)
- When the fan turns on (and this is quite often), it's pretty loud (as in a couple of times louder than the idle noise of the Vaio A297XP). The amount of time the fan runs might be tweaked a bit with CHC however (haven't tried that yet). The laptop also runs ocassionaly with the fan completely turned off however, which is naturally very silent.
- The battery life was around 3 hours when doing the installation (with WLan turned on). This is in fact higher than I expected (also higher than that which was claimed I think).

Well that's all for now. If you have any questions about it, just ask. If you want specific pictures, just ask as well