Granted, I have only owned one other laptop, but that is not to say that I have not used many other ones. I am quite a tech-guru and take pride in my chosen devices. I searched for a very long time to find a laptop this thin, with this many features and I can firmly say that this is the best you're going to find. Closest thing to it would be the MBPr 2.3 GHz for $2200... So quite a bit more expensive, then again you're paying for the operating system.Anyways, on to my review...
First off, this thing is fast. Very, very fast. The full-voltage core i7, GeForce GT 650m, and 8 GB of RAM make this laptop great for anything you throw at it, be it gaming, video editing, Photoshop, or just browsing the web. I have come from a gaming laptop, (Toshiba Qosmio x505-Q896) fully assuming I was going to be downgrading a bit in performance. I WAS WRONG. This thing is faster than my gaming machine. In every way it is better. More efficient, lighter, faster, and COOLER. (temperature wise, and just because it's badass)
The battery life, when compared to my gaming rig, is awesome! So for me this is great on battery life; I am aware that this machine is about average to low-end in it's category though. Runs for about 5 to 6 (if you're lucky) hours depending on what you're doing and what setting your brightness is on. Keep in mind, this machine packs a punch in a small package, so I think this is very reasonable. Should be plenty for most people.
Almost forgot, this laptop is BEAUTIFUL. It has great build quality and feels very sturdy in hand, considering it has an all metal body. The screen looks amazing. It has an auto-brightness feature that can be turned off by pressing fn + A which is kind of annoying for me, but helps battery life. But other than that it looks great!
This laptop also has the best sound out of any laptop I've heard so far. It has Bang & Olufsen speakers with an external subwoofer which for me, is essential. It also comes with Waves MAXXAudio which makes it sound even better.
Now to my gripes about the machine. Keep in mind these are mostly minor annoyances, not deal breakers. This laptop still deserves five-stars all the way.
1. I love Windows 8 and I love the natural scrolling that is supposed to come with Windows 8. (inverted scrolling) but Asus has taken this away from me and I am desperately wanting my inverted two finger scrolling back. I don't believe they use a Synaptics touchpad so I don't believe it would do any good to install the Synaptics driver that has this, so I'm just awaiting a software update to their Smart Gesure Suite that adds this feature.
2. My model came with an outdated, or just faulty wifi card driver that caused my laptop to disconnect from wifi and not reconnect until reboot after a while of use. This was fixed with a simple driver update from the intel wireless cards site, so I didn't have to send it in or anything.
3. REVIEWERS. Many reviews of this laptop have stated that the fan is too loud and complained about it constantly running. This laptop has a full-voltage quad-core i7 and a beefy graphics card in a very small chassis. Both of these things in a small space = HOT. The fan needs to be running to cool it down. Reviewers have also complained about the price. Yes, it is quite expensive. But it's more than you're getting from any other company and I've seen laptops with lower specs with around the same price. I'd say the price is about right.
Synopsis: Best laptop I've ever used. I love it. If you've got the cash, buy it. It won't disappoint. Works for gaming and any other application.
Finally, I settled on this ASUS Zenbook, and I'm extremely happy. The machine is fast, sleek, and lightweight, and I haven't had any problems with connectivity that other users reported with other ASUS machines. (I was also impressed with this vendor's offer to immediately assist with any problems but I haven't had any.)
I especially like that this laptop has a 15.6" screen and is wide enough for a numerical pad on the right. I use this laptop primarily for work, and both of those elements are major pluses. Staring at a smaller screen for 8-12 hours can get really tiring.
The only time I noticed any fan noise was one time in a very quiet room in my house; I really don't notice it 99% of the time. The laptop also doesn't seem to get hot at all.
The screen is BEAUTIFUL, and it's matte, so you get reduced glare (or none) when working in an office. I had never considered watching a movie on my laptop before, but this machine really makes me want to try it.
The laptop comes with Windows 8, which turns out to be not such a big deal. It was pretty easy to figure out (compared to when Microsoft moved to the ribbon in Office 2007, which was a nightmare), and really hasn't given me any problems. I'm fine with it, even though I don't use any of the swipe features. As a nice added feature, ASUS provides a little training feature app to show the user how to do certain things. Very thoughtful.
While this is an expensive machine, it gives me everything I need in a laptop in a sleek, fast package. I am so thrilled to have a fast start-up and close-down I'm doing a happy dance!
One note: this machine has two drives of 128 GB each, so the C drive is 128 GB, where you will need to put all your applications. While this is one of the largest SSDs available (within reasonable $$), it fills up remarkably fast, so plan accordingly.
I've never had an ASUS before, but it probably won't be my last. Nice, nice laptop.So far the best laptop I've ever owned. Which it should be given the price.
Chews through all the PC Games I've thrown at it so far. Which is a tribute to both the Core i7 & the 2GB Nvidia 650m.
My only complaint I screwed up on the order & got the separate 2 128GB SSDs. Don't make this mistake... get the single 256 or 512 if your wallet permits.I have had only 1 laptop in the past a Dell that I have had since 2006. Needless to say it was time for a major upgrade. Being in college a fast computer, and multi tasking was difficult to do with my old laptop and my new ASUS has kept up with all my demands thus far. I bought this computer as a recommendation from a friend who got the 13in zenbook a year ago. I love the 2 sec start up and so far the battery life is as expected (can get a full charge from 10% in about an hour). I am still getting used to windows 8 but any complaints about that are not by fault of ASUS. I have always idolized the look of Apple's Macbook Pro, and this computer has that professional yet simple look. The only thing I can complain about thus far is a trackpad that is a little over sensitive. Because of the beefed up specs and 15 in screen, the laptop is a bit larger than other ultrabooks but to me it is still worth the money. In reviews I had read prior to buying this laptop, some people complained about the fan being too loud. I don't think this is a problem at all, there are plenty of other noises around the house that distract me rather than the noise of the fan... Overall, this is a great computer that I would recommend to anyone searching for an upgrade if you are like me, get ready to experiance and experiment with windows 8I like this machine. It is going to replace my older gaming desktop (even though I didn't buy it for that purpose). It performs just as well as my old gaming desktop and is portable. The 2GB video card is great and the battery life is good when you are not gaming.
There are some wifi issues that arise but this is mostly due to the power management system. There are multiple websites out there that can show you how to fix this. It works perfectly once I adjusted the settings and I haven't been dropped since. I play Hawken (online fps in mechs) on this machine and it runs great! It also handles all the apps I need (word/excel/photoshop/etc.) with no problems.
I recommend this ultrabook with no reservations.
