MSI Wind U160 Review Discussion

The Wind U160 is the latest Intel Pine Trail based-netbook from MSI boasting an impressive 15 hours of battery life. Like its sibling, the U135, which we reviewed in February, the U160 is equipped with the Intel Atom N450 and Intel GMA 3150. With a slightly larger battery and nearly identical parts configuration, can this new model beat the U135's battery life of six hours and 30 minutes? Read our full review to find out.

Read the full content of this Article: MSI Wind U160 Review

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Another explanation: Asus has set the 1005PE to a very low maximum brightness (114 cd/m). 70% brightness on the Asus is not as bright as 70% on the MSI (max. 162 cd/m).

http://www.notebookjournal.de/tests/netbook-review-msi-wind-u160-4516w7s-nkst-1144/4
http://www.notebookjournal.de/tests/asus--eee-pc-nkas-1005pe-1095/2

This trick Asus uses artificially inflates battery life scores. The way to see through it would be to start measuring brightness of screens.

 

I don't see how they can possible justify a claim of 15 hours of battery life. It wasn't even close. Flat out lies are always nice.

 

Wow... that keyboard looks EXACTLY like the one in a ASUS netbook.

 

I don't either. The battery life claims are getting ridiculous.

I would love to see the industry agree to a standard for measuring battery life. They're just going to alienate consumers if they keep this up.

 

Trick or no trick the ASUS wasn't too far off from the claims in a light load battery test. They advertised 14 hours and it managed 12 hours. MSI claimed 15 hours and got about 8.5.

Since we DO have a light meter in the office now, I would love to get these two models side by side both set at the same nit rating and take a screen shot of the power consumption in BatteryMon. My brother could ship his to us, or I could also have him load up batterymon with my power profile settings in place with the screen cranked to max brightness. Then I just lower the MSI still in the office to ~120cd/m2 and see how they compare.

I just find it very hard to believe that a difference of 50-80cd/m2 would cause the power consumption to increase on average 2-3 watts. That is the type of power increase we see comparing standard notebooks to those with outdoor/sunlight visible panels (200cd/m2 vs 450-500cd/m2).

 

I really hate how the battery sticks out like that. It looks way worse than other netbooks with larger batteries.

 

I was going to make a stink about it, but when compared to the side profile of the 1005PE the MSI appears to stick out more since the body is thin and rectangular. The ASUS is wedge shaped which lets the battery blend into the back.

 

Definitely prefer the 1000PE fatter style/wedge over this. I also prefer the Thinkpad style where the bottom is flat, but the battery sticks out horizontally from the back. This just looks awkward (IMO of course).

 

Yea I never understood the whole battery sticking far out the bottom. Going out the back might make finding cases a pain in the rear but from a design standpoint it looks much cleaner.

 

The claim of MSI is probably based on Wifi disabled, Energy saver profile and lower brightness.

No I think it wouldn't. It would just make the difference a lot smaller.

Asus seems to be doing the same with many of their netbooks. The 1201N for example only gets 105,30 cd/m max.

 

Agreed about Asus notebooks being at least near the ballpark of their claims for battery life. This is nothing close to what the Asus machines can actually crank out (even if one disapproves of how they come to those figures they at least DO come close to the figures).

Still not too crazy about the 1024x600 res ... and also agree that the performance on these things is still not worth it. Spending a little more allows for a culv machine that performs much better.

I personally do not mind the battery sticking out of the back of a machine and even lifting it up at an angle off of a flat surface. Better heat control perhaps? Especially in a case like this. I was kinda surprised that this machine seemed to run a little hot for a "netbook" style machine....

 

One of the bigger complaints with this notebook outside of battery life is the $100 price jump for what amounts to a 7Wh battery increase.

Also quick notes about screen brightness and power consumption.

At 70% it is just under 70cd/m2 at the center of the screen. Lowering it down another notch on the rough scale brings it down about 40cd/m2. Even at that low backlight level it is still drawing 6.8w at near idle.

Turning the backlight to its lowest possible setting it still draws 6.2 to 6.3w. At this setting its about 3 cd/m2.

Even with the screen so dark that it can barely be viewed in a pitch black room it would only get a few minutes over 10 hours of battery life, still drawing more power than the ASUS 1005PE at 70% backlight. Turning the wireless card off brings it down to 5.6w, with an estimated 11 hours of battery life.

At this point it is easy to argue that even under the *best* conditions it is still drawing a heck of a lot more power than the ASUS and still not getting anywhere near the 15 hour claim. Switching into power saver does little to help... giving it maybe an advantage of 0.05w to 0.1w.

EDIT: Brightness to backlight level scale for the MSI U160

0/8= 2 cd/m2= 5.6-5.7w on power saver, wireless off
1/8=9
2/8=15
3/8=20
4/8=40
5/8=74
6/8=110
7/8=145
8/8=179cd/m2= 7.0-7.1w on power saver, wireless off

 

Indeed, I hate huge batteries that lift the bottom of the laptop. I'd rather have it stick straight out.

I also wish higher res options were more widespread.

 

Bigger batterys are awesome, i think its quite cool they make the netbook stand up in some cases,

Have you guys checked the battery condition/rating? it seems rather odd they claim this much and you guys getting so little, hwmonitor i think can read the batteries.

 

BatteryMon lists a fully charged capacity of 64436mWh so it isnt oddball low or anything.