Asus N80Vn-GP011C: First Impressions/Review

Initial Unboxing Pics:​

(Originally started in this post, but consolidated here)

So I just just JUST got home and found this on my doorstep (stupid FedEx should've gotten a signature, but whatever - it's in my hands safe and sound). These are taken with my 2.0mp camera-phone, so bear with the quality for now. There's a slideshow/link to a Picasa album where you can see detail (as much as there is).

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First Impression:​

My first impressions are very good, if not great, with the packaging and everything being immaculate and the utmost attention paid to making sure that the laptop arrived as glossy and shiny as possible. To this end, they included a microfiber wipe (tasteful brown color with Asus embossed on it) to maintain the gloss / wipe smudgy fingerprints. Build quality is solid all-around, and the 14.1" form-factor feels immensely lighter and more portable than my old 15.4" Acer, which weighed in a little under 7 lbs.

Included are a small optical usb wheel-mouse (with Side Scrolling tilt wheel - nice bonus feature), and a moderately padded laptop bag with shoulder strap. I'd personally recommend getting a nice laptop sleeve (I.E. the Zeroshock III 14") and your own choice of mouse for everyday use. Also included are a Quick Installation guide, User Manual, and Express Gate manual. Discs included are a recovery DVD (clearly stating 32-bit O/S only), a utility/driver disc (32-bit Vista only, specifically stated), and Cyberlink's Power2Go 6.0.

According to the battery packaging, this battery is "For use only with models: F8xxx, L80xxx, N80xxx, A8xxx, PRO80xxx, Z99xxx, X81xxx, X80xxx" for what it's worth. The A/C adapter is a nice size, standard issue, though slightly bigger than my current Acer's power brick (though not scorching hot - only warm to the touch).

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User Experience:​

LED backlit display is incredibly bright and vivid. I actually had no idea how dim my 3.5+ year old 15.4" WSXGA+ CCFL display was until I put the two side by side. At 50%, the LED display is still brighter than the CCFL display. Also, the various display profiles are really nice, with presets for various uses/gamma/color levels. There is a hotkey to swap through them, as well as an Asus utility. Also similar in utility are power/performance profiles controlled with Power4Gear and its own hotkey. Asus utilities work well so far, with the facial-recognition log-in being the most useful/interesting that I've used so far. Haven't gotten the fingerprint scanner up and running yet, but that's mostly because I've yet to even glance over any of the literature included with the package. The UI for Asus apps, such as power/display/wifi/bluetooth profile changes, is visually smooth and well integrated with Vista's Aero graphics.

The keyboard is definitely very new and clickier than I am used to on my 3.5+ year old Acer laptop. The key travel is deeper, with a lighter action than I am used to. I'm not really sure what you mean by keyboard flex, unless you mean how stable the keyboard is during typing, to which I would say that it is definitely higher quality than the Best Buy versions (the X83vm/vb), with a light texture to the keys. It'll take a tiny bit of getting used to typing on the Asus keyboard after being used to the curved keyboard of the Acer for so long. Also, I'm getting used to the "Fn" function key in the far left bottom corner, where I was used to having the "Ctrl" Control key. Just a small note for people to be aware of. I also haven't noticed any keyboard lag that has been reported in the Best Buy versions, and I type on average between 55-65 wpm.

I will confirm that reports of the touchpad's buttons being stiff and "harder" to click, but I normally use an external mouse or just tap-click on the touchpad itself. The drivers/software with the touchpad allow a lot of customization with 4 corners of tap hotzones with various actions that can be customized, and horizontal and vertical scroll. If these seem basic/mundane, I'll just say that these are new features for me, and I dig them. It's the details that count for me.

Noise levels are minimal, with the fan being slightly noticable above ambient noise when its been benchmarking. The notebook doesn't pump out heat as extremely as my old notebook (my only other reference). Right now, with the refrigerator humming lowly in the background, I have to put my ear down to the side vent to hear the fan run, with light internet usage and HDtune running. During heavy use, the fan is audible but not loud enough to bother me (personally). The switch in sides for the fan is new to me too. My Acer is running at about 75% fan right now, and is louder than the Asus right next to it which is running heavy full system benchmarks. Overall, I'd say I don't mind the right-side vent, because it doesn't pour out heat like my Acer is used to doing. My natural position is to keep my (external) mouse closer to the front of the laptop anyway, so heat isn't an issue.

This notebook is definitely more portable than my old 15.4", but it's still not dainty, which I really like. I was really wanting a 13.3" but nothing was available that had the performance value, and I'm not sorry about it. I've uploaded pics of my old Acer TM8104 15.4" alongside my roommate's Macbook 13.3".The difference in brightness levels between the CCFL displays and the Asus's LED backlit is very apparent . All displays in the pictures are at max brightness and on the same webpage (nytimes) for reference.

The screen/lid is solid. It wobbles only with an unusually vigorous shaking that wouldn't happen in everyday use. The closure was something I was wondering about too from pictures - it actually has no physical latch system, but there is definitely a firm closed feeling where the lid wants to close at about a 20-25 degree angle. The tab you can see on the lid in pictures is a solid extension that allows you to easily open the lid. The hinges on this are 5.5cm/2.125" each, relative to the 34cm/13.5" width of the whole lid, so the hinges measure out to about 1/3 of the whole lid's edge, with solid support.

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Hardware Specs​

Display: 14.1" WXGA (1280x800) LED backlit Glossy
CPU: Intel Mobile Core 2 Duo P8600 2.40GHz
Chipset: NorthBridge - Intel PM45 | SouthBridge - ICH9M LPC Interface Controller
RAM: 2 x Infineon 2048 DDR2-SDRAM PC2-6400 [DDR2-800] (8GB RAM Max)
HDD: 320GB Hitachi HTS543232L9A300 (Partitioned into C-149GB/D-139GB/Hidden Recovery-9GB)
Optical: MATSH ITA DVD-RAM UJ870BJ
Video: NVIDIA GeForce 9650M GT 1024MB DDR2 DX10
Audio: Realtek HD (Azalia) Driver version: 6.0.1.5699 Codec: ALC663
Wireless Atheros AR928x 802.11 B/G/N | Bluetooth 2.1+EDR
Card Reader: MMC/SD/Mini-SD/XD/Memory Stick/MS Pro/MS Duo/MS Pro Duo
Ports: 5 x USB 2.0 | E-SATA | VGA | HDMI | Express Card | Audio In/Out (S/PDIF) | IEEE 1394 (4-pin) | Gigabit LAN
Other: 1.3mp Webcam | Fingerprint Scanner | Kensington Security Slot
O/S: Windows Vista Home Premium (32-bit) | ExpressGate Instant-on Splastop
Battery: 6 cell - 4800mAh
Carrying Case & USB Optical Wheel mouse included.

Physical Dimensions: 26cm x 34cm x 3.6cm | 10.25" x 13.5" x 1.5" - Personally measured!
(no promise of ultra accuracy - this thing has so many rounded corners it's kind of tricky to measure)
Pictures in slideshow of size and screen brightness with Acer TM8104 and Apple Macbook 13.3" for comparison.

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Benchmark Stats: ​

Windows Hardware Experience Index: Overall 5.0 - CPU: 5.3 | Memory: 5.9 | Graphics: 5.0 | Gaming: 5.3 | Disk: 5.3
wPrime 2.0: 32M - 33.07 sec | 1024m - 1054.611 sec
SuperPi 1.5xs: 32M - 19m 40.015s
PCMark05: 5645 PCMarks
3DMark05: 8380 3DMarks | CPU 12394
3DMark06: 4654 3DMarks | SM2.0 1921 | SM3.0 1720 | CPU 2137
Screenshots of benchmarks in slideshow.

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Battery (of) Tests:​

Light Tasking (Battery Saving Mode w/throttled CPU and screen at 20% brightness): 3 hours
(Internet surfing, Flash video playback, Word processing, Downloading lots of stuff over WiFi, and Installing programs)
Heavy Graphics (High Performance mode w/full CPU and screen at 100% brightness): (TBD)
Express Gate (Instant-on "Splash" OS): (TBD)

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Software & Warranty:​

This ASUS comes with the now-standard 2-year manufacturer warranty with FedEx overnight shipping and a 1-year Accidental Damage Warranty ( make sure you register!), which is awesome for the price of free (compared to the Best Buy versions X83vm/b which are stripped down to 1-year manufacturer and you have to buy Geek Squad's protection - more like geek mafia!)

Pre-installed software is at a minimum, with a well-intended trial version of Norton antivirus/protection and a trial version of MS Office 2007. The rest are ASUS utilities that make good use of all the notebook's features. As already stated, I love the facial recognition for log-in via the webcam, and the fingerprint scanner is nifty too. Also great for quick surfing/checking files on the fly is the ExpressGate SplashTop OS, which is true to its name.

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Thanks for any advice/tips/comments, and I look forward to sharing my experience with this shiny, shiny, new notebook with everyone.

Here's some links to other people's reviews/benchmarks of the N80Vn-GP011c:
N80Vn Benchmark - Vista vs. XP | N80Vn vs. 3 other laptops - general observation

 

Great. Thanks for the quick reply. And yes by keyboard flex I mean the stability of it while typing.

Everything sounds good so far. I don't use the touchpad as I have a small notebook mouse I carry everywhere so the harder toucpad button doesn't bother me at all.

 

Thanks for the quick review and photos. I'm sure people will be interested in numbers (GPU and CPU benchmarks, battery life, WEI etc.) as well as usability aspects such as those that you have already included in your review.

 

Can you clarify what WEI is please?

 

Windows Experience Index. Not a reliable benchmark, but people like it.

 

Having problems running wPrime (both 1.55/2.0) - it crashes on execution, saying "Unexpected Error; Quitting". Anyone have any advice?

 

I ran into this problem before Make sure you run it as administrator and that should solve the problem.

 

i agree with the comment about finding out how much battery life it has. I've seriously considering getting this laptop, but since its so new, not much info is available on it

 

I emailed Gentech, and they said around 2.5 hours in battery saving mode. *I don't know how they arrived at these numbers though.

I'm a current owner of the Asus z70va, and looking for a replacement and really considering this one because I want something a little lighter but has adequate power for games. I'm cautious about buying another Asus machine. I think their quality and service is great overall, especially compared to my POS Compaq 2568cl (hate that thing with a passion), however I encountered these problems with the z70va. I don't really look forward coming across these flaws again:

-the original optical drive had to be replaced because it made coasters
-tapping the laptop on or the near the optical drive cause it to eject
-the hinge is wobbly and loose (no matter how much I tighten the screws and use Loc-tite) *my biggest annoyance
-battery that won't hold a charge anymore, last like 15 seconds now (maybe that's to be expected after 2.5 years)
-dead pixels after like a year of use (to be expected I guess?)

However, I dropped this laptop at least three times and it's still going strong. I hope the battery does last longer than 2.5 hours. But anyway, I'll probably get a $200 netbook next year for taking notes in class so it's not that big of problem. Hopefully a netbook that last like 5 hours (I have two 2-hour blocks of classes back-to-back each day).

 

Wait!!! The windows experience index is the same as ASUS X83Vm-X1 @ BB !!!!!!!!!!! That $699~899 model at best buy. HardDisk score is worse.... -_-

N80VN
CPU: 5.3 | Memory: 5.9 | Graphics: 5.0 | Gaming: 5.3 | Disk: 5.3

X83Vm-X1
Processor: 5.2
Memory (RAM) : 5.9
Graphics: 5.0 <---- 9300 M GS
Gaming Graphics: 5.3
Primary Hard Disk: 5.5


How come the graphics score is only 5.0 with 9650M GT

 

How does it actually perform in benchmarks-I mean REAL benchmarks, not donut mark, and not Windows little thing here?

I woudln't worry about it unless it's not performing 2x+ in real games.

 

Thanks for all the pictures and info. I hope you are enjoying your new laptop, dont worry too much about getting an incredible review just do as much as you can.

 

That's because WEI is a very inaccurate and unreliable benchmark, made only for marketing purposes. For benchmarking graphics performance, 3DMark06 is going to be a much better tool.

 

zmatin, thanks for posting your impressions and pictures. They are extremely helpful.

However, I'd like to know how loud this laptop is when started, and how loud is it when idle? How about when doing GPU intensive tasks?

My current laptop is unusable due to its noise level. I won't even take it out of the house. When started up, the fans kick on at 100% for about 4 seconds.

 

Hey all - sorry for lack of updates/benchmarks, but had to get myself out of the house for a few drinks. I'll be right back at it in the morning. I too was surprised with the WEI, but I also estimate it as a level of bullsh*t. I've been running superpi and will run pc/3dmark benches tomorrow.

In regards to battery life, I was going to do a battery rundown test, but I felt like running benchmarks was more important, and doing so on undervolted processor/graphics was inaccurate. By estimation, it should be at least 3 hours, with various power-saving settings.

 

Instead of double-clicking on the wPrime icon to run it, right-click on the icon and select "run as administrator".

 

Thanks emporiumboutique - figured that out when I right-clicked. Still not 100% familiar with Vista, but I'm figuring it out quick. wPrime is running right now.

 

Sorry, I posted here before I saw your post in the other thread.

Yes, that case looks identical to the F8. Matter of fact if someone didn't tell me, I would think it was an F8.

You dont actually have to pull the case apart. There is an inspection plate right above the battery bay. 4 screws and it will pop off. It wont brake any seals. I will take a pic of the bottom of my F8 and post it here.

I'm anxiously awaiting a 3DMark06 score.

 

Here it is



Its the same panel you would remove to upgrade the memory so I'm almost 100% positive it wont void your warranty.

 

So... The battery is shared with the A8? Does that mean that I can stick this 8 cell battery in it?

(sorry can't link yet)

ANyway its an 8 cell battery for the a8. It should work, right? I need a bit more than 2.5 to 3 hours battery life.

 

Minh, I had similar problems with the Asus z70va. My optical drive needed to be replaced immediately, hinge was wobbly, but in addition, I had a stick of RAM go bad, the GPU fan died after less than a year, and then to finally seal the deal, a drop off my couch onto the floor (barely more than a foot) shattered the LCD screen and shook enough of the components loose to basically ruin the computer.

So I don't think I'll be getting another Asus notebook, although they are some of the best looking and best priced out there...

-me

 

^^^

hmmm.. You two seem to be the most unlucky. ASUS notebooks are generally more reliable and solid than any friggin computer maker out there..

 

howz the 3D Vantage going?

 

I have to point out Panasonic's ToughBook

 

"are generally more reliable"

 

Can you please measure/post the physical dimensions of the N80?? It would help heaps
I don't trust those on asus' site..

ty, and enjoy your new laptop

 

Mine's supposed to arrive today, a day early. Can't wait..... arrrrggghhh.....

 

Snapple37 - Bet our shipments went out together, but yours has to travel a little further to the East coast. Hope you'll love it as much as I do.

I think I'm getting/have gotten pretty much everything that everyone has asked for, from fan noise and build quality, to physical dimensions and keyboard feel, to processor and hdd benchmarks. 3D is coming ASAP - just finished downloading and installing pcmark05 and 3dmark05/06/vantage. Oh, and battery rundown will happen last, because it'll presumably take the longest.

Also, pico1180 - I unfortunately don't have any tools small enough to get the bottom panel off, sorry.

 

Mine was shipped last Friday as well with an ETA of tomorrow. However, there has been no update on the Fedex website since last Saturday. It says it left Sacramento, CA and there has been no update since. I'm down in Miami but hopefully it will arrive tomorrow. I've been tracking it this whole week and it's been dissapointing that there is no update on the tracking. Did this happen to any of you guys?

 

My shipping only updated once from the initial shipping info, but I also live pretty close to Cali where they shipped from.

So I've been trying to run 3dmark 05/06/vantage, and it doesn't seem to be running properly, and I'm not sure what the problem is. They are the free trial versions, so I can't tweak any settings or anything, and can only view results online. Any tips/advice?

So far PCMark05 yields a score of 5645, 3DMark06 scores 4654, and 3DMark05 scores 8380, and 3DMark Vantage yielding a score of "N/A". Do these scores sound right or terribly wrong to anyone? I'm running these benchmarks with no tweaked settings in the OS, stock drivers that shipped with the laptop, and no special cooling or OC'ing. Also, 3DMark benchmark results aren't listing the videocard as the 9650M GT, but instead only showing "VGA". I've posted the screencaps in the slideshow. Any help would be appreciated.

 

The benchmarks are in the range of what we expected, but I'm not sure why you can't run Vantage. Vantage is a Vista only 3dmark, so I have never run it before.

Gentech's 3dmark on N50Vn-A1 was 4,216, which seemed low to me so maybe they just guessed a number... Your '05 and '06 numbers match Notebookcheck.net's very closely.

.... this is my last post before I can start posting URLs... haha.

 

http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-9650M-GT.10764.0.html

 

Thanks for the reassurance Snapple37 - I was kind of bummed watching the single digit FPS scores in the 3d stress tests, and was worried that I had some defective hardware or something. I got some advice and am going to run all the benches again, with maybe some more accurate results.

Anyone have any comments on the other benches posted (wPrime, SuperPi, HDTune, etc?) I'm not sure what kind of scores I should be expecting or comparing to.

 

I also have the TM8104 and thinking about buying this lappy. Are you happy with the size of the Asus compared to the Acers? Could you post a picture of the two together? I'm having problems with the picture of my Acer.. it's like the LCD connection is failing and can even touch it or the picture will go all red and it'll flicker..you wouldn't for any chance been experienced the same and solved it hehe?

Thanks!

 

I noticed that it has a vent on the right side...that sucks for right handers

 

Hey nice to meet a fellow owner! Yeah my travelmate is still holding up pretty well, though it has been repaired under warranty 3-4 times over a 3 year period. My warranty just ran out this past spring. My notebook has ALWAYS had problems with overheating when running any sort of games that used the vidcard, from starcraft to oldschool fallout/2. Other than that, my display just developed a vertical green line of dead pixels about 1-2 pixels wide. It goes away when pressure is applied to the lid, but as soon as you let go it comes back. It's irritating, but I expect my Acer to last another year or two just for internetting and basic use. I usually run video out via S-video to my TV for movies and stuff too, and no problem there. It's still the original chassis, case, screen, and battery, and battery life is still pretty consistent right under 2.5 hours with throttled cpu and dimmed screen.

The switch in sides for the fan is new to me too, obviously, and I already commented on the deeper keypush with the keyboard. I do still feel more comfortable on the Acer keyboard with the arc swoop, but I feel that more time on the Asus will fix that. Back to the fan though. My Acer is running at about 75% fan right now, and is louder than the Asus right next to it which is running heavy full system benchmarks. Overall, I'd say I don't mind the right-side vent, because it doesn't pour out heat like my Acer is used to doing. My natural position is to keep my (external) mouse closer to the front of the laptop anyway, so heat isn't an issue.

 

Wait...notebookcheck's benchmark for the 9650m gt shows an average performance of 27 fps for f.e.a.r (max settings 1024X768) while their benchmark of the 9600m gt shows 38 fps at same settings. That must be a typo.

 

Notebookcheck's GPU comparison has been notoriously inaccurate.
They also fail to mention the type of video ram that is being used (ie DDR2/3).
I would take their information with a grain of salt. Their laptop reviews on the other hand are done quite well and usually very detailed.

 

So I've got benchmarks posted in the main review now, and a reason for 3DMark Vantage not working - it requires a minimum 1280 x 1024 resolution to run the benchmark properly.

And now begins the battery test. I'll be doing a few rounds: with internet/word processing usage, throttled down cpu and graphics and dimmed display. Then I'll do a heavy usage test with full graphics/cpu and playing video/dvds/games.

 

Sweet man, thanks for the dimensions!
I was a wee bit disappointed there for a bit when i realised my current G1 was almost the same size..
Hows the screen stiffness? Does it wobble around when you shake the desk, and how is it opening and closing (does it lock closed or just sit there)?
And how does the expressgate run on this model - is there a pecial button or startup menue option etc..?

I apologise for all the questions, but this stuff is more important to me than the details on benchmarks -i know its gonna be a very significant improvement on my G1, and the smaller resolution will allow more ouput from the gpu and cpu.
Will hopefully be getting my own N80 in the next few weeks, as soon as it's out here in NZ I'm guessing..

Thanks again!!

 

This notebook is definitely more portable than my old 15.4", but it's still not dainty, which I really like. I was really wanting a 13.3" but nothing was available that had the performance value, and I'm not sorry about it. I'll be posting size comparison shots of my roommate's 13" Macbook next to the Asus and also next to my old Acer.

Screen is solid. It wobbles only with a vigorous shaking that wouldn't normally happen. The closure was something I was wondering about too from pictures - it actually has no physical latch system, but there is definitely a firm closed feeling where the lid wants to close at about a 20-25 degree angle. The tab you can see on the lid in pictures is a solid extension that allows you to easily open the lid. The hinges on this are 5.5cm/2.125" each, relative to the 34cm/13.5" width of the whole lid, so the hinges measure out to about 1/3 of the whole lid's edge, with solid support.

 

you can use an external monitor for the Vantage benchmark.

It would be good to know 3dmark '06 benchmark under 1280x1024 also, since that is the most used resolution for benchmarking this particular program. It would be easier to compare the score to other GPUs.

Also, what nvidia driver version came pre-installed? You can try using better drivers for better numbers - I'd recommend 177.92 or 179.13
http://laptopvideo2go.com/drivers
Woohoo I can post URLs.

 

Unfortunately I don't have an external monitor. I've seriously toyed with taking the larger higher-res screen off my old Acer, but I've reconsidered and decided that it gets to live. Hopefully some of the other near-future owners will be able to do so.

Drivers are listed as "Forceware 176.23"

 

How about heat and noise, sorry I might have missed them in your previous posts. I usually bring my laptop to silent room, so I'd like to know about the noise level during normal use (word processing). Also, does this laptop run Crysis at medium smoothly? Thanks

My is arriving tomorrow but I might return it unopened if the heat and noise is not acceptable.

 

I think the noise part has been covered under User Experience in the review.

 

Check the first page of this thread and read under the "User Experience" section. I've been trying to consolidate all of my responses to people's questions into the main post if I feel it'd help more than just that person. Benchmarks are also under the appropriate heading, but I haven't had a chance to go buy any games yet (probably tonight).

I don't find the fan noise to be unreasonable at all, if not much quieter than I am personally used to. Under load, the fan does run but not loud enough to disturb anyone - not any more than your average ambient noise +10%

 

I'll do more extensive testing with 3dmark with different driver versions, and with external displays. I do want to see how good the HDMI out is, so I'll hook it up to my 52" LCD. In my experience, NVIDIA cards failed miserably as an HTPC solution so this will be interesting.

It's 4:30PM and Fedex hasn't come by yet Where's my laptop?!

 

Check your backdoor. That's where they left mine, out in the open right on the steps. Signature required, nonetheless!

Looking forward to your take on the laptop - never quite sure if I'm seeing things the same as other people, and consistency/build quality across multiple laptops. Trying to Figure out a way to make some sort of super-thread combining people's reviews - any ideas from the forum gods?

 

HDMI was one of the thing that lured me to this laptop and the E-Sata as well. I do not have a HDTV yet but it's a good thing to have since it came with it. I'll look forward to that.

My box just got logged in at the Orlando station so I guess it will arrive at work tomorrow. First thing in the morning would be good.

 

Thanks for your reply, zmatin.

I am still deciding if I really want this laptop or if I want to keep my VAIO Z. Overall, would you say you are happy with the N80Vn?