Asus N80Vn-GP011C: First Impressions/Review

How you get the 200$ cashback? 0o

I only see a max. of about 3% cashback at live.com or what do you use?

Is it also international? How does it work? Do you get the cashback directly with the order or after it?


But hey, if i can get this device around 1000$ including shipping,taxes , it is still cheaper than it is here. Also here it comes without LED-screen......

 

I looked at the best buy version of this laptop last night. I was concerned about some of the comments regarding the LCD screen, mainly that there was a lot of leakage (black is not black) and thus poor contrast. This was indeed the case in the model I looked at. While the screen was quite bright, there were two obvious problems to me:
1. Poor dark state, which can't be improved much by fooling with the brightness/contrast settings
2. Uniformity. Bottom of panel was brighter than the top.

I would like to hear some more owners weigh in on this, b/c otherwise it is a deal-breaker for me.

 

It is not something I noticed but then again, I wasnt looking for it and I had like an hour, maybe, on the computer.

and lakersfan, I'll try playing with the sensitivity. Seriously my one "complaint" if you will, of the laptop, is the touchpad.

 

yay!
"order picked and ready to be packed"
should be here early next week

 

I wouldn't call it back light bleeding.

I have noticed that if you look down at the screen from an upward angle it appears brighter than if you look at it straight on. When I look at the screen from a normal viewing angle, its not uncommon for the lower portion of the screen to appear brighter due to this effect.

As for the touch pad, I found that disabling mouse acceleration in the control panel made it much easier to use. (the option is Mouse->Pointer Options->Enhance Pointer Precision)

Overall I'm very pleased with my A1 model. Right now the toughest thing for me to adjust to is the keyboard. It's solid but I seem to type too fast for it sometimes. I think its based on the key travel being a bit longer than I' expecting.

 

Small thought..
If i was to do a recovery restore when i first get the N80, will it remove Norton and the msOffice trial? cos these will only get removed.. same with the Asus stuff, cept some of that will be staying..

 

It's not that difficult to uninstall the MS Office or Norton trials.

I do still find the touchpad to be a bit inconsistent, but it is actually getting better the more I use it.

I will say that I am having issues with the quality of video on the webcam. When using Live Messenger it comes through really dark and grainy (much worse than my external Lifecam webcam). Any advice? I do remember updating webcam drivers from Asus' website, though I had yet to vidchat with it by then, so not sure if there was a change in quality. Thoughts, anyone?

 

@Zmatin
Have you tried playing with the settingd in msn? you can configure quite a bit from quality to gamma, exposure and more..
other than that, i wouldn't really have a clue..
it is just an internally based usb webcam, so maybe there will be some other drivers..?

personally i wouldn't be too concerned, as lower quality means faster transmission, and unless you rely on sign language, the sound is what matters.. i have a digital camera for pictures, and i won't really use the webcam at all..

 

Just got mine tonight, after a really long day of dealing with the FBI and swat (work related ;( ).

The n80Vn-GP was really an enjoyment to pull out of the box and start up. Got it on my wireless network and am typing away now in my bed before I hit the sack. Just wanted to let everyone know that the screen looks amazing and I almost feel like it maybe too bright, will look at turning it down tomorrow.

Haven't tried any games on it yet, really looking forward to that. The lappy runs very smooth and quick and haven't noticed any faults other than the finger prints on the mouse buttons. The screen resolution looks very good for being low res (my desktop uses 1920x1200 on a 21" mon). I wouldn't want it any higher on this screen. I'm looking now for some good 1200x800 res wallpapers to use now, any suggestions? Went to nvidia.com to update the drivers and it stated that I had to go to asus.com to get my video drivers... wierd, figured nvidia would have the latest ;(

The keyboard works well and I haven't noticed any lag when typing. I really like the font Asus used for the key lettering. I'm typing with the lappy on my bare legs and only feel a light warm feeling, nothing burning hot, which surprised me.

I am having a little trouble with the fingerprint reader. It only seems to register 2 or 3 of my fingers and can't process the others, so looks like a feature I will do without for now. Haven't tried to mess with the settings or look at it for more than 5 minutes. I wasn't planning on using it anyway and am going to try to disable it to save resources. Anyone know how this is done?

I am actually impressed with the small mouse that came with this lappy, looking on the back I can clearly see the logitech logo My favorite company for periphials. It's compact, and comfortable to use.

For all those waiting to get their n80, you'll be happy you got it. This is my first laptop and I am very very satisfied! I am glad I waited, glad I did my research and glad I didn't go with a 15" lappy from cyberpowerpc.com like I had originally planned, whew! I only have one regret, and thats is that I didn't order this laptop sooner. Good job Asus!

Now I just need to get the zeroshock III sleeve,

 

I can't get the fingerprint to read either. Can someone who has it setup tell us what you did? I tried swiping up to down, side to side, etc but only got one of several to register. Not a big deal since I have a password.

 

Hey Guys i want to know if using the Asus Express Gate when surfing on internet I dont need any protection, like an antivirus... What are the other features of the Express Gate??? COuld you reviewed all??

 

Im curious, How many has already the n80???

 

You should be able to just force Nvidia's reference drivers to install. I can't remember if anyone's yet posted how well that goes, but it should be a smooth process. (Aside from a couple of Dell systems, the GPU companies don't officially offer drivers for notebooks.)

 

I think my webcam looks awesome. It looks better than my logitech deluxe 1.3 megapixel webcam. I usually use Skype. I don't find it grainy and dark at all and I didn't tweak anything on it since I got it.

I got it to work by accessing the ASUS logon security center at the bottom right notification area. It's not the best reader in the world. Took me a couple of tries to get it to work work but now I access my computer using that. If I remember correctly it only took my right index finger and right middle finger. I remember there being an option if you want to opt for other fingers as well. Just click on the diagram.

 

For those having trouble registering their fingerprints with the scanner, make sure to run through the whole registration process with the "ASUS Security Protect Manager" utility. Also, during the setup make sure that each swipe you make is as slow and straight as possible. I use my fingerprint scanner all the time for Vista logon, banking sites, etc. I personally set my finger with the first knuckle above the scanner, then press down as I slide it back *slowly*. I only get bad swipes if I slide it too fast or at a weird angle.

I might try reverting to the original shipped drivers on the disc for the webcam, since I feel that I might have installed the wrong ones from the ASUS website. I'm not expecting super high quality, but people on the other end complain that they can hardly see me (too dark/grainy/pixelated).

 

I just ordered this laptop through gentechpc, pretty psyched about it What kind of laptop bag should I be looking for --- the ones listed for 15" or the ones listed for 14"? Any suggestions? (I like the vertical messenger bag / regular messenger bag styles the best, nothing too flashy or with big logos that scream "laptop inside")

 

I advocate the use of a shock-absorbing sleeve (i.e. the Shinza Zeroshock III 14" sleeve) that can be combined with any combination of carrying styles that are not notebook specific. Over in the Accessories forum, you'll find a lot of information about what's available out there too. I usually start at a place like ebags.com and then go from there.

 

Great, thanks for the tip ! (Also thanks for your advice on my laptop buying thread, I took a look-see at the laptop after you had recommended it, seemed like the sweetest price/performance point).

 

I started looking at my fingers and noticed I have cuts and small scars on them so that might be the cause, dunno. Like I said, I'm not going to be using it anyway and want to disable it to save some resources, does anyone know how to do this?

I tried using in in battery save mode today. It changed my background to a white screen with the Asus logo, took away the desktop icons, unlocked the start toolbar at the bottum so it hides, and adds the language icon to the toolbar. Everytime I right click it to lock the toolbar (so it always stays up) and take off the language bar, it reverts back 1 second later and hides itself and adds the language bar. I've searched the power4gear options and don't see this anywhere, Anyone know how to fix this?

Also I did notice, they partitioned the drive into two separate drives. Would games run faster if they are on the same partition as the OS?

 

partitions are on the same disk, so it wouldn't make a difference to speed.. unfortunately..
power4gear should start with windows, and sit in the taskbar - hidden under a right click on the battery icon
If you want to get rid of the finger print scanner, and have no intention of using it.. just disable it through hardware manager (right click my computer, click manage.. find the device manager, select the scanner, and click disable.. or for a more dramatic approach you could uninstall the drivers all together.. just make sure they're on the asus support site first, in case you want to use it some time later on

 

Under the Power4Gear options (or maybe it's Vista power management) there's an option that turns off Aero for max battery efficiency, which also changes the taskbar's autohide (in my case, I still haven't figured out how to keep it from reverting to locked/showing, as I usually have it on auto-hide, and it keeps screwing up my desktop icons). Anyway, point is that it is tweakable - I changed it when I first got the laptop, but I forgot where the options are specifically. Try under display or power management.

Also, don't know if it was just me, but I had random instances where the OS would start typing in Chinese characters, and I had to disable/uninstall the Chinese language packs (happened in Firefox/IE, MS Office, etc). I'm pretty sure it had something to do when I tried to use CTRL+ (?) commands and accidentally hit the Fn key (which on my old keyboard used to be where the CTRL key is now). Also was initially having problems where when playing TF2, Power4Gear would change the power profiles intermittently (during gameplay), but that issue has since resolved itself.

 

My girl friend is Korean and she said that in order to go between two languages on the computer she has to press the right-ctrl key. I had a similar problem on my main desktop that we both used until I kicked her off and made her use the 2nd one for her korean stuff, had to uninstall all the additional languages.

 

This isn't entirely true. The OS partition should be on the outer part of the HDD, which can be considerably faster than the inner portion on mechanical drives. Also, keeping programs in one smaller area of the HDD can effectively cut down seek times since the head does not have to move far.

Point is, I would recommend installing games on the OS drive and making sure you keep it defragged.

 

So I went back into my touchpad settings (under mouse/pointer options in the control panel, then device settings, then the touchpad specific settings) and completely minimized the palm check sensitivity and boosted the overall sensitivity to max, and the touchpad works like a dream now (for me at least). Gotta say, overall I'm still loving this machine for everything I do. Great at games, on the road, in airports, and coffee shops (where I am now). Next week I'm actually taking my machine to a job interview where they have a practical exam that they said I could bring in my own machine for familiarity, and I'm pretty sure it's going to turn some heads.

Hope everyone else's experiences are similarly awesome.

PS - Also just updated to the newest Nvidia 180.70 modded inf (not DOX) drivers, and seems to be running stable and smooth as ever, if not even with a little less fan running.

 

Just loaded WoW and WotLK and tried it out for a few minutes last night. Ran pretty smooth on nearly max'd settings, I didn't have a chance to max them out and try it out.

I'm really having a problem with the language bar on the start bar, everytime I disable it, it automatically comes back on in a few seconds. I can't make it go away ;( Anyone else having this problem?

Also I have a question with my wireless network. I have full bars signal strength and am trying to transfer files from my desktop to my new laptop. I get a 2.8mb/s transfer speed and that is it. Says it'll take 2.75 hours to transfer 17gb. Shouldn't this be able to go up to 54mb/s? Nothing is downloading, so why is it going so slow? Could this be a security setting in my router?

Also Zmatin, where did you get these updated nvidia drivers? "modded inf"?

And another question, when I go into battery save mode my background is the white Asus logo, and my windows color scheme changes from the graphite that I like, to a solid light blueish white. When I go to the display settings (where you can also change the text font/size for windows) and change the colors again and I still get the blueish white.

 

You can get modded infs from Laptopvideo2go, but you don't need to. You can just install the regular drivers directly through the device manager.

 

@ DFA1 - I remember having to do some finagling to get rid of the Language Bar (you have to disable it, and then modify your startup process using run > msconfig and also check your startup folder under the start menu), but I got it to go away completely.

Regarding the battery saving mode change in graphics, etc. you have to go under the Power4Gear Hybrid settings (ASUS utility app, not Vista), and go under battery saving mode and turn off "Battery Saving Desktop". I've managed to get the Aero theme to stay, as well as maintain my normal desktop background. As stated, still having a problem with the taskbar displaying locked and not auto-hiding as I usually have it.

Not sure what to tell you about file transfer between computers on your nework. I've achieved over 1mbps easily just downloading off the internet. I usually do file transfers via an external harddrive or USB thumbdrive. Might be a bottleneck within your network or on the original computer you're transferring from.

RE: Drivers update, this is the site that provided really clear and easy instructions on how to do a painless driver update (modded inf is only necessary because of the original drivers not "supporting" mobile GPUs).

 

the 9650 GT isn't in the list of supported cards on that driver's site..
what's the advantage of the forceware drivers? would i be better to stick with the asus support site's or go for the forceware?

 

You mean Nvidia's regular drivers? The advantage is just compatibility. Sometimes you need newer drivers for games or other programs than what the computer maker provides.

 

so you'd reccomend the forceware over nvidia drivers..?
is compatibility worth it?

[edit]
ok, i'm reading up on this stuff, OEM's INF's.. all the above
thanks for the help though wolfpup

 

I'm not sure what you mean...Nvidia's drivers are called "Forceware"...those are the Nvidia drivers. I'm just saying there's no reason to get modded ones, or use third party stuff when you can just install Nvidia's drivers directly from their site.

 

intresting laptop. It took me some time to work myself tru the thread

This thing looks nice, is very portablefactor, has awesome cpu, very nice gpu (which can only be beaten by bulkier, 15 or 17 inchers for a higher price), excellent pricetag, LED-screen which is decent enough I think...

If I would need a laptop right now, this thing would be first on my list!

(is the live.com rebate still active and possible in EU too?)

 

live.com is dead for the moment. Hopefully it comes back soon though. And no beans, only US from what I read.

 

@Wolfpup:
yer, i had no idea what i was on about. i thought they were different things.
After reading up on it, I now understand that their is just 1 driver, updated from time to time, and the difference is how this is installed, which can be modified via the .inf file.
After thinking about it, i realised my g1's driver was from 2006, so i updated with the modded inf, and it runs a heck of alot better now.. i think..
one thing i did notice: before the update the resolutions supported by my gpu that were close to the N80's native 1280x800, were either 1280x760 or 1280x900. It would not allow me to go 1280x800. After the update i could, i also had a whole lot more too.
So i'm trying out my screen at 1280x800 atm, and really, i'm not missing the extra space. sure it's a bit fuzzy (ie, not native) but it's a really good resolution, especially for a smaller screen.
lol, after going back to 1650x1080, i was shocked at the amount of space and the text sizes.. i really don't know what i did with all that space!

 

I use the 180.70 driver with the modded inf (on laptopvideo2go) for the 9650M GT on my N80. I can see the difference. Gaming has got even better with the 180.70 instead of what was installed.

 

Just tried Far Cry 2 on this lappy with the standard drivers (no modded ones) The game automatically set itself at max settings and it ran pretty smooth. I did have the usb mouse that came with it plugged in and it and the touch pad felt a little laggy, about .5 seconds lag from a mouse movement. Not sure why this is, since the rest of the game runs smoothly and all the other NPCs are moving around fluidly, why is the mouse and input devices sluggish?

 

I got the lmagg from mouse movement too with G1s! It actually so bad and frustrating that I just stopped playing!

 

How can you game with a touchpad anyway?

BTW, i've found something interesting about the trackpad buttons. On a typical notebook i think most people click them right in the center. I think these buttons were meant to be clicked right on the edge like a mouse button. The movement is easier and smoother.

 

If you're getting a little input lag like that, you've probably got your settings a bit too high.

 

@DFA1 - Try using a different mouse that has higher input resolution/frequency. I've never really tried to use a trackpad for gaming, and the included mouse, while a nice travel companion, is not a model that I would find ideal for gaming (ergonomically and performance-wise). Even try using an older standard desktop mouse (USB, obvi), and see if it helps.

 

I don't see why the settings would effect the input lag, the game runs fine. Also WoW and Battlefield 2142 run perfect with max'd settings and with no input lag. I'll try reducing the settings though.

@zmatin, I'm using the mouse that came with the laptop, and the touchpad has the same problem.

 

its seems that were not alone with a mouse- lagg issue here:

http://www.overclock.net/pc-games/401734-far-cry-2-mouse-lag-3.html
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1358625&page=2

apparantly going to DX9 helps alot but does only bad to your gaming experience (grfx ofcourse)

 

Thankfully, however, it's not the laptop, but the game.
I'm sure if there's enough discussion and open critism of this bug, then ubisoft will patch it up

 

Oh! I do have one complaint about the laptop I was noticing last night. The left Ctrl button was switched with the FN button. So those use to having l-ctrl the very last bottum left button corner, it's been switched with the FN key.

Sometimes while playing shooters I'll accidently hit the FN thinking I'm crouching. This either causes me not to crouch and shot in the head by the enemy, or the FN key starts another function which may minimize the game or change volume or display settings. Bummer there. I'm seeing some other newer laptop chasis like cyberpowerpc.com 's also switching the ctrl with the fn.

 

My N80 just got in today. Does anyone else have issues with the keyboard on the left side? It sounds like it isn't set properly or something and the "clack" sound it much different from the right side.

 

I don't exactly know why, but I've seen a slight input lag on many of my systems when the settings are slightly too high. When I've dialed them back a bit things run at full speed.

WoW wouldn't be good to judge by because it's requirements are so low. It runs at max settings on my Geforce 4 (with no AA).

 

hopefully there's something that can be done to turn off the left hand Fn key, and just use the right one..
Just called customs.. gotta pay tax before they'll let me have my lappy ..
Oh well, least it'll be here before the end of the week

 

So I figured out the keyboard issue. The right side of the keyboard is connected via a screw on the back of the laptop. The left side of the keyboard is not and is only supported by this metal grove so that is why one side feels less secured than the other. Crappy design Asus...

 

I spent some time over at the german laptop review site linked earlier in the thread. This site is way better than any English professional review site by far. Why? Because they actually measure the brightness and contrast of all the displays (with like, OMG, actual numbers!). Why is it that this is not routinely done, as the display is a major differentiation factor for most people? Anyway, the previous poster is right. This display had crap contrast... in fact every 14" LED-based laptop (T400, samsung x460) was bad, which is probably an indication that they all get the panel from the same place. The contrast certainly appeared poor to me with the best buy sample I viewed. I just point this out to warn people interested in this laptop by virtue of its LED display: just because they have LEDs doesn't mean they are better. The macbook pro display, on the other hand, is very nice indeed.

 

do you have a link to that german site?