Asus N80Vn-GP011C: First Impressions/Review

Sorry for asking so many questions but this (should) be my last one. What is the highest resolution that the Laptop can give out?

Thanks,
Mr Mook Mook

 

Display: 14.1" WXGA (1280x800) LED backlit Glossy

 

I think he was referring to the max output resolution. Per nVidia's website:

Maximum Digital Resolution 2560x1600
Maximum VGA Resolution 1920x1200

I know for sure you can do at least 1920x1200 out of the HDMI as I had it set at that on my external monitor for a while. On a regular basis I have it at 1680x1050. The 9650 ran Medieval II:Total War at Medium settings at 1680 at fully playable rates, which I found pretty impressive. It also runs TF2 maxed (no AA) at that res. with dips into the 40's at worst.

 

@Mide, that has not happened to me, and I've typed on it a pretty good deal (took a 3 hour essay exam on it yesterday). I've just got that problem with the "4" key that I mentioned earlier - I'm going to warranty it once school is over.

 

No problems with missed keys here - only issue I've had is the already mentioned "catching" of my fingertip every so often on the edge of the keys surrounding the one I am pressing.

 

I have a GateWay XHD3000 (30" Monitor), so how well would that work with the laptop? Stuttering and being very, very slow I imagine!

Mr Mook Mook
(the laptop's now in the post coming to me!)

 

Well, you can always lower the resolution. Even a desktop with a Geforce GTX 280 you'd want to lower the resolution for most games.

 

Have you guys removed the two big stickers to the right and left of the trackpad? I figure they're meant to be removed, and shouldn't leave residue, but I wanted to check before peeling them off.

 

Thanks for the responses guys. Ok, I'm going to get back to my normal standard of comparison being XP x86 and seeing what things are still being problematic. I went to Vista x64 to take advantage of the 4GB RAM but have not seen/noticed any real improvement over the dependable standby.

 

I've removed all the stickers with no residue issues - just take a bit of rubbing alcohol and it'll clear it off nice and easy. I actually relocated the C2D and Nvidia stickers, because I kinda like the geek chic (and miss building my own desktops).

@ Mide: It was discussed before that Vista 64-bit is more of a resource hog and has other issues that aren't existent in 32-bit. I know a number of people have swapped back to XP, but I honestly don't think it's a necessary downgrade. My machine flies under Vista 32-bit, factory installed. Just stating, my experience is good without all the issues of finding the right drivers, etc. Win7 will be out in a year and that'll be the only upgrade I plan on making.

 

Ah I didn't know that x64 was already plegued with other issues. I normally would just stick with what the computer came with but I discovered that "Peerguardian 2" does not have a stable build and I use that program a lot when I torrent. Yeah I'm waiting for Windows 7 too. Hopefully a lot of improvements will be made with it.

 

wow, without the POST sound during startup, it's like heaven!!
starting to appreciate how quiet it is too.. and the bluetooth stuff preinstalled is great for quickly coonecting/disconnecting with my stereo, not to mention the improvement in terms of range! (g1=2m to my bed it got jumpy. n80= i can leave my room!)

RA3 and assassins creed run great!
RA3 is on medium with AA x2 (30 fps -fraps), high gives ~20fps, and extreme settings take me right down to ~12fps..
AC is at medium settings, vsync on, shadow 1/3 detail 2/4 graphics 3/4 1280x800 res. multisampling 1/3. at this it runs between 23 and 34, average of 28-29. At full, it gets right down to 10, and avg at like 18. lowest it gets up to 43
still, looks superb no matter what its running

 

Lack of PeerGuardian is a big minus for me as well. I wasn't aware of this problem. Besides that I have found Vista works just as well as XP with a few bonus features, such as Performance Monitor Utility and the ability to re-size partitions.

One thing I definitely miss from my desktop is the optical drive. It's become clear that laptop drives are much much slower. I also need to add an external HDD. I haven't run less than 2 drives on my machine in a good 4 or 5 years.

 

I have just got this laptop for myself, and I completely agree with what you say! I was actually surprised by the speaker sound quality... its SO much better than the Dell I'm upgrading from. Still cannot compare to normal speakers, but for something built in, they are nice

 

I've been debating between basically a Macbook Pro, Sony AW, or Asus n80nv for ages...I had been leaning towards an AW until 1) Nvidia's new drivers don't support them, and 2) Nvidia's reference drivers work fine for everything...except Blu Ray playback. So...I guess that's basically out.

So I need to know, can anyone tell me about Blu Ray playback on the Asus n80nv with an external drive and Nvidia's newest drivers? I'm pretty sure people are playing Blu Rays on the n80nv, but I don't know what drivers they're using (whether Nvidia's updated drivers work) or if it works okay to an external monitor, or that type of thing.

Anything anyone can share would probably be helpful as I'm confuzled

 

Where's the best place and price to pick this baby up?

 

Ugh...question 9 billion. You guys are probably just ignoring me at this point

How's the sound quality from the headphone jack? Any hiss or anything? Seems like Dells, and even Macbook Pros, some of the units can have hiss

 

no hiss.... its a nice change from the dell i had

 

no hiss at all
i was on c&c generals all night.. lan.. and the sound was great though my earbuds.

my g1 used to have pretty bad humming, i'm not sure why, but the N80 has none of that

about the blu-ray, i would think that being external, and both running on similar nvidia drviers, the quality would be extremely similar. the card on the N80 can handle things very well. Last night on lan, i had foobar pumping out some acid and generals on full, running without a hitch (i was server too).

i'm afraid, unless i magic up a blu-ray player, there isn't much more support i can offer.. if there is another thing i could do/app i could run to test it out, i would be more than happy to help (as long as it isn't as big as auto cad, as good as that program looks to be)

 

Thanks! No I don't know how to test it without...err...testing it, since that HDCP stuff or whatever is so weird. The lack of driver support that handles Blu Ray on the Sony has me back to either the n80 or the Macbook Pro. Maybe I'll finally actually order something next week!

 

anyone installed the nVidia 181 drivers yet? Trying to decide whether to do it

 

I heard that nvidia is offering direct driver support for their mobile GPUs now. I'm sure that if it's up on their site that they'll be stable, although every set of drivers optimizes things slightly differently.

 

Hi, my display which I mentioned back in one of my previous posts is the Gateway XHD3000 which can only accept a 2560x1600 resolution via DVI-D. According to the NVIDIA website it says that the GeForce 9650M GT which is in the notebook can give out a 2560x1600 resolution via HDMI. But whenever I look at HDMI to DVI-D none of them can handle a 2560x1600 only 1920x1080 resolution. Does anyone know of an adapter for HDMI to DVI-D that can handle 2560x1600 resolution.

Thanks,
Mr Mook Mook

 

I've been running into a problem playing HL2. It seems to pop up after a random amount of time playing. It will play normally for a while, then I start getting a problem when I hit any keyboard key. It causes a stutter in-game and makes a beeping noise. Basically it makes it unplayable. Any ideas on what would cause this problem?

EDIT: Thought I had all the friggin accessibility options turned off, but it seems that is not the case. I turned off all sticky keys and other things now and will see if that was the problem.

EDIT2: Disabling the acc. options DID NOT fix the problem. Still looking for help on this.

 

i thought the N80 was suppose to have 1440x900 resolution...

 

guys, i have an M50Vm-X1... and well my friend wants me to get two laptops for his children. They both are in College and are in similar years with me.

Are there any problems with the N80Vn-G?

In my system, there was a slight lag in the keyboard but i totally loved my system. Im thinking of taking one of these and giving them mine .

Anyway, my only question is whether these have any problems?

thanks in advance

 

Hey!

Thanks for the helpful review!

Anyways got a question.

Was wondering how is the build quality and reliability?

I mean when you first receive it and only used it for a week you cant really determine the build quality and reliability.

I'm thinking of purchasing this notebook also!

 

Yeah no hiss from the headphone jack, although when audio stops there is sometimes a little "pop". No biggie though.

I've also installed the Nvidia notebook drivers and they are ok, but for some reason higher level details enabled via Eve = bluescreen. I'm not sure if it's Eve or the drivers. More testing will be needed.

 

neither the N80-x, N80-a or N80-gp have 1440x900 resolution. There may be other models available down the track with this option. However, i believe it is unnecessary, and will only reduce overall performance of the machine.

@wickedestman:
This is a great lappy, there was talk of keyboard lag earlier in the thread, though it was put down to being the distance the key must travel (must be pushed down slightly further)
the screen imo is too bright.. i've had it on 0% brightness since i got it. though this is good for work in the car, sunday morning i was jamming out in VS C++ and the refection was making it hard to see.. just turned the brightness up a bt, and problem was solved
In terms of being a good lappy for college, I'm not sure if you mean tertiary education, in nz college is secondary.. But for secondary (age 12 - 18) no, there are cheaper options, much more suitable for them, though if they want power, for sure. tertiary, if they need multi tasking or running 3d apps, then definately, if they game yes cetainly. the size is also very good for travel (very light too ) the battery can also be pushed to ~4hrs, again while i was in the car, wireless and bluetooth off, screen around 15%, running MS visual C++ 2008 and a pdf file in sumatra, on max battery saving, camera and ODD off, it was reading 3hr 45min, at 92% battery.

@IDK312:
build quality? Asus' slogan "Rock solid, Heart touching" really suits this lappy. lifting it around with 1 hand, balancing on my knee/lap/crossed legs, and it feels so very strong, not plasticy like most laptops i see.
Reliability? dno yet, but so far no qualms

@ everyone:
The only real issues i can muster with this are the key flex around #3 and #4 keys, and the really clicky touchpad mouse buttons. the finger scanner hates me so drivers are gone for that
All these relatively small issues are easily adjusted to with time, and i think the mouse button clickyness has started to wear in a bit thus reducing.
The Fn and Ctrl key issue (castled) is now my norm, and when i go to our family desktop, i end up opening start menu an awful lot, lol.

Really, with a bit of tweaking and customisation, combined with time to adjust, this lappy is really well suited for either casual+ game (=iddy) or typing/coding on the go. the resolution really is suited for a 14", and i would deter people from trying to go any greater.

Hope this helps everyone

 

Hey everybody what is the difference of the 9650m GT DDR2 against the 9600m GT DDR3 in terms of game performance??? There is a guy on Utube that test a lot of games on an aspire 5930g with 9600m GT DDR3 and I want to know if the n80 could do the same with the 9650m GT DDR2

Fallout 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_GB0sxLgWs&feature=channel

Call of Duty World at War: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygeDlk-Hvk4&feature=channel

Pure: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GG31k0NEqac&feature=channel

Tomb Raider Underworld: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwqWvbxg8XU&feature=channel

Need for Speed Undercover: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4P3OYol2QLc&feature=channel

GTA IV: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ygbkk44QEY&feature=channel

Dead Space: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhbodJm2vpo&feature=channel

Mass Effect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCMdSe2cVuc&feature=channel

Red Alert 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPmrRJLGM84&feature=channel

Crysis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5zPIqFgrZ0&feature=channel

IMO there are excelent titles and for me they look very playable on that laptop. The Performance is great I hope that the n80 could match that

 

thanks a lot bro, its tertiary level i feel i will take it and give them mine and whoawww 4hours.. thats a dream lol

 

Hey do you guys know what bloatware to remove? I dont want to go gung ho on this machine and then have a ton of problems. Today I just uninstalled Norton and installed Avast. When Avast was doing the boot up virus scan (after you install it), the computer wouldn't turn on afterwards making me freak out. I tried probably a dozen times to get it on and i would just stare at a screen of black. Anyways I pulled the battery and popped it back in and it started up great.

So anything that you could recommend me to remove would be great. Also anther thing annoying me is this asus credentials thing that pops up everytime I go on a site. It makes me want to punt babies.

 

Related to that, can you reinstall Vista clean from the included discs? Norton is nasty, at least recent versions... Every computer I've uninstalled the corporate version of 11 from won't shut down without blue screening. (Among other issues...hopefully our company will switch away from them...)

 

Yeah the only real negative with this laptop is its horrible keyboard. I usually keep it hooked up to an external monitor, mouse, and KB so that I'm not constantly reminded of it but yeah it is the loosest, loudest, and most "clicky" thing I've ever typed on. If I go to Best Buy and try to type on a Sony it's just a world of difference between that and what I come home to.

The LED LCD is very very bright. I usually only have it a few notches above min. It's a good thing though..having an antiquated screen that's too dark is the other side of that spectrum.

The battery life is very good as iddy stated. If you manually disable everything from the NIC, WNIC, Camera, etc. and keep the brightness at the lowest level you can get very close to 4 hrs.

 

Thanks for clearing up the "disable everything but the processor" thing.. normally it can get up to 3.5 hrs, which is still impressive.
Note, the time is also taken from the start bar's time on the battery icon, not a tested time. but it still is impressive.
I was outside recording my cello yesterday, for a good 2.5 hrs, (fighting with audacity and turning the wireless on to get support + download the v3 beta) with the machine on moderate battery consumption + switched to max to try and fix my audacity issues..
So the battery is impressive, just don't base your purchase on it.. i would hate for someone to expecting a miracle thing from something i say..

Still, i love it! and it does everything i could ask of it. It certainly won't let me down next year at Uni

 

a little off topic but by any chance is this amazing LED screen in any other asus notebooks outside the N series? What about this LED screen in other manufacturers notebooks?


thanks and great review

 

Yeah in order to see many LED LCDs in action you would have to have a side-by-side comparison and I'm not sure if anyone can get their hands on all of the competition. If you do find a site please do post because I would also love to see how the different LCDs stack up.

 

yer, lcd comparrison photos would be pretty cool

Merry Christmas everyone!!
(well, it's like an hour into boxing day.. but it'll do )

 

Took this baby down with me to my parents for Christmas. It played Need for Speed Undercover flawlessly on maxed settings, I was very pleased. I also played Battlefield 2142, WoW:WotLK, Warhammer Online on maxed settings too. Battlefield 2142 was amazing!

Still been using the carrying case that came with the laptop, it's good for being free. Now I looking at buying a car adapter to power it in my vehicle, anyone know of a good one at a good price? What wattage/volts do I need?

My girl friend has already gotten jealous of it, especially when I tell her I'm in bed with Asus lol

 

Is there a larger battery option for this laptop? I need a bit more than 3-4 hours.

 

As far as I know, no. I don't know if they will produce one either since the battery is not located on the rear of the chassis like other laptops with an expandable battery.

 

Just got this notebook in a couple of days ago. Coming from an old Asus Z70V notebook I think I like it.

It feels as sturdy as its predecessor. It doesn't look nearly as elegant or as subdued as the Z70V, but it feels a bit more rugged even with more plastic in the design. The bottom has a nice grippy texture similar to one of those budget Acers you can find in a B&M store. Top is glossy and far too garish for my tastes, but it seems fairly scratch resistant.

Keys feel a bit less firm than on my previous notebook. I feel like I have to push harder and make doubly sure that everything registers correctly. I'm not sure if I have a faulty keyboard even with the flex, as nothing is falling out or wobbling out of control. I suspect there is some degree of the keyboard lag problem that has plagued earlier Asus models, and I'll try uninstalling the touchpad drivers tomorrow. Keys are mostly full size, but the arrow keys can be a bit cramped if you need to use them regularly.

Screen is bloody beautiful. I hate glossy screens, but at half brightness I couldn't even tell in room lighting, and the gloss would be all but invisible at full brightness even outside I think. Backlight seems to come up from the bottom and it looks like the screen would have light leakage, but it doesn't seem to affect the image quality beyond that uneven startup lighting. I've watched a few DVDs and caught up on the latest episodes of Heroes on Hulu, and the screen performs admirably under those simple uses. Speakers are great and the headphone jack's doubles as a S/PDIF digital out for people who want to connect it to an external DAC.

Wireless seems better than the Z70V for some reason. Probably a placebo, or maybe even better configurations in Vista, but the Atheros wireless adapter seems better than the Intel one.

I'm only getting 4632 in 3DMark06 (compared to 4654 of the OP). Is that something to be worried about? I haven't tried downloading the new drivers on NVIDIA's site, but I am curious about the drivers on Laptopvideo2Go. I'll try to test both later to figure out which one (if either) gives a decent performance boost.

Comes partitioned into two partitions with already mentioned bloatware. If you reformat it you can do so as one partition, or another split. There's a recovery partition I'm not sure how to get to since I've only tried using the factory disks. If you use the factory disks you can choose not to install Norton or Adobe Reader at startup. I've also found little use for Asus Mult, and their sign on startup application is a bit annoying. Unfortunately I think that it's tightly wound with the fingerprint reader software and I'm not sure how to use the reader otherwise. Once you get your prints registered it works well.

Overall I like the notebook, but there are quite a few nitpicks here and there.

 

i want to try and use this screen outdoors. fn+f7 turns off the lcd backlight, and it seems like the display is reflective as in if you use it outdoors on a sunny day you don't need the backlight, which is a big way to save battery power.

to use the partition system restore press f9 during the bios screen. but using the cd allows you to choose not to install the bloatware? i'll try that out next time

 

The performance of the 8600m GT DDR3 is near of the 9650m GT DDR2, right???

 

Ok, I think I've settled on this for my next laptop. Now, I'm just waiting on a good deal/coupon or something to lower the price to near $1000. It's currently at $1100 + shipping on newegg, which could be lower considering just less than a month ago people bought it at less than $900 using all that crazy cash back stuff.

So, please post if you know of a good place/price for getting this.

Thanks!

 

I took 3DMark06 scores with 3 different drivers:

4632 with Asus stock drivers
4650 with 181.00 from Laptopvideo2go
and 4692 with NVIDIA's own 179.28 beta notebook drivers

I know that's just one benchmark on one system but hopefully that helps.

Also, the Live Cashback thing doesn't seem to work anymore...

 

I received an N80Vn-X1 for xmas and I had a few questions, should this laptop be able to run Left 4 Dead and Fallout 3 at max settings? I get 20fps in Fallout 3 on High(max is ultra high) and in Left 4 Dead my recommended settings are Highest for shaders but medium for effects detail and that slows down/locks up and eventually freezes into a sound loop when horde comes at me.

Does the T5800 vs the P8600 make that big of a difference in gaming? I feel kind of let down by this laptop. I'm running Vista Ultimate 64bit with 179.14 drivers installed with a custom INF file.

Another question, before installing a new version of windows my GPU would clock up when gaming in High Performance mode even on the battery but now it is stubborn and wants to stay at 160/100 unless it is plugged in, how do I fix this?

 

FWIW, I stayed on the preinstalled OS and no customizations other than the 180.xx drivers installed from laptopvideo2go. I haven't installed the official nvidia drivers yet. It appears that everyone who's gone through the trouble of installing a 64-bit OS has had more trouble/performance issues than it's worth. I have no problem running games, with no OC'ing or any other tweaks. I play TF2 (obviously not the newest game) at full settings, full AA, etc. and it runs flawlessly.

Your issues with down/up clocking probably has to do with the custom drivers and loss of ASUS's power2go power profiles. I have the P8600 and I have no problems.

 

The 179.14 custom drivers I downloaded were Asus specific and the only ones that listed support for the 9650M GT.

I guess the performance difference between the T5800 and P8600 must be massive but the X1 was already breaking the bank for Christmas, I never tried installing Fallout 3 on the fresh OS but seeing as how my L4D framerates are the same I as the factory OS I'm guessing Vista isn't causing me performance issues other than the GPU clock throttling.

I figured going to Vista 64bit would have wiped out all the bloat and given me access to that locked away gig of ram I was missing, sucks that it stops me from gaming on my battery alone.

 

Why did you buy 64-bit Vista though? That money would be much better spent on the faster CPU. 64-bit Vista isn't as compatible, and isn't very useful unless you have more than 4GB.