While the keyboard is excellent, the trackpad is one of the worst we've used on any netbook. The buttons are integrated into the surface area of the pad, rather than sitting beneath it, as with most other netbooks and laptops. When you press on the buttons, the whole front of the pad pivots downwards. Also, when you go to click the button, the pad area around it sometimes registers your finger as having moved to that position and so moves the on-screen cursor accordingly. This quickly becomes extremely annoying.The 1101HA is part of Asus' Eee PC Seashell netbook range, all of which are beautiful to look at, but have little common with actual seabound molluscs. Like its smaller siblings, the 1008HA and 1005HA, we're impressed by the glossy finish on the lid (it's available in both black and white), the dynamic wedge-shaped profile and the general solidity of the chassis.
The 1101HA doesn't have the same portability as its smaller counterparts. It's an inch or so wider and deeper, but that hasn't put us off. The laptop remains light at 1.4kg, and will slot into most hand- or manbags without a fuss. Unfortunately, Asus hasn't taken full advantage of the 1101HA's extra girth. It still has just three USB, one Ethernet and one D-Sub VGA video output port, an SDHC card reader, plus headphone and mic ports, which is the netbook norm.The trackpad has a peculiar mottled finish, but multi-touch gesture control is handy
Neither has Asus used the extra space to install a significantly larger keyboard, but that's not a complete disaster. It uses a keyboard that -- as far as we can tell -- is identical to the one on the Eee PC 1008HA, which is a good thing, because that machine was generally very easy to type on. It also gets the same MacBook-style multi-touch mouse trackpad, which, despite the odd, mottled surface, is handy for scrolling through documents and Web browsers.
The aforementioned 11-inch display really is the star of the 1101HA's show. Not only is it an inch larger than the vast majority of netbooks -- meaning it's slightly easier to use for long periods -- but it also has a higher resolution than most netbooks. Its LCD panel runs natively at 1,366x768 pixels, rather than the 1,024x600 pixels you usually get on 10-inch devices, so there's slightly more desktop space to manipulate application windows.
Sadly, there's no point in opening multiple windows. The 1101HA uses a 1.33GHz Intel Z520 CPU, which -- despite working alongside the customary 1GB of RAM -- has only ever proven to be lethargic in our past experiences. If you're expecting the 1101HA to be faster because it's bigger, you'd better think again.The 1101HA's keyboard is very easy to type on, as you'd expect from a netbook this size
The device doesn't let itself down elsewhere. It ships with a fairly typical 160GB hard drive, which provides ample storage. This being an Eee PC, it also benefits from an additional 10GB of 'free' online storage. This isn't a great deal, but it comes in handy when you need to backup your most precious files to a location you can access from any Web-enabled computer.According to Asus, the UX series is 'an intricately crafted series of notebooks that provide both contemporary style and effortless computing on the go'. In human speak, that means they're thin and light, look awesome and have funky new components. The UX50V, reviewed here, is being sold by online retailers for around ¡ê910.
To say the UX50V is one of the prettier laptops we've seen would be an understatement. We're constantly showing it off to friends and colleagues as if it were some sort of precious newborn child, and -- like the cutest of freshly birthed offspring -- it never fails to elicit a positive response.It looks like pretty much any other laptop in the world with its lid closed, but, crack it open, and you'll be suitably impressed. We're particular fans of the screen's edge-to-edge glass, the matte black keyboard with isolated buttons, and the highly impractical, but gorgeous, mirror-effect wrist rest.
Most of the laptop's ports are located at the rear. It's a neat, if slightly awkward, solution
The isolated keyboard is particularly worthy of praise. It's very comfortable to type on and, although there isn't quite enough travel in the keys, we had no problem getting up to full typing speed. We also love the fact that the keyboard is backlit, making it easy to work at night without turning the lights on, and the presence of a dedicated numerical keypad.
The aforementioned mirror-esque wrist rest is both a gift and a curse. It's fabulous to look at, and comes in handy as a mirror. But, as with all mirrors, it's almost impossible to keep clean. You may have the cleanest wrists in the world, but it'll be filthy within minutes of use. The mouse trackpad, which sports the same finish, gets even filthier, as -- unless you're using a USB mouse -- it'll collect more fingerprints than a forensic scientist.
The UX50V's 15.6-inch, 1,366x768-pixel display does a fabulous impression of a mirror, too. It's one of the most reflective displays we've seen, so, while it provides excellent perceived contrast levels and looks great when playing movies, it's almost impossible to use without also seeing your reflection. This, in conjunction with the mirrored wrist rest, makes the UX50V annoying and somewhat uncomfortable to use, as you're always contending with unwanted reflections.
The mirror finish on the wrist rest and mouse trackpad looks great, but attracts grime
Asus has tried to keep the UX50V's ports as well-hidden as possible. The right side is home only to a slot-loading DVD drive, while, on the left, you'll find a Wi-Fi on/off switch and -- concealed behind a flap -- a memory card slot and USB port. The rear of the system is more densely populated. Two additional USB ports join a HDMI socket, D-Sub VGA output and Ethernet jack. You'll also find mic and headphone jacks, although their placement at the rear makes them slightly awkward to use.The UX50V costs a pretty penny, so one might expect it to be fitted with the latest super-fast components. That isn't the case -- it's fitted with the latest super-slow components. It uses a 1.4GHz Intel Core 2 Solo SU3500 CPU, which is designed to maximise battery life at the expense of all-out speed. Asus has thrown in a whopping 4GB of RAM, however, which helps applications launch relatively quickly and keeps the system running smoothly.The UX50V's graphics system is pretty fancy. It uses both an Nvidia GeForce G105M graphics adaptor and an integrated Intel graphics chip, and can cycle between the pair, depending on the user's needs. The latter is designed for casual use and helps maximise battery life, while the former offers -- and consumes -- significantly more power.
We were very fond of the previous version of Asus' Eee PC, the 1008HA, which represented a radical design change from the boxy Eee PCs of the past. But its high-end (for a Netbook) price, at $429, slipped just over the line for many, and its nonremovable battery wasn't as long-lasting as we've seen in other Eee PCs.The latest revision, called the 1005HA, keeps the slim, tapered design but ditches the somewhat cumbersome cover flaps on the ports and adds a more traditional six-cell battery. This means a slightly thicker and heavier system, but also one that's our current Netbook battery life leader. Add in a slightly shaved price tag, down to a more reasonable $389 (although some perfectly usable Netbooks are down to $299), and you have what may be our new go-to Netbook choice.
The design of the 1005HA is based on the (slightly slimmer) 1008HA model. There's a tapered front lip, but the new model lacks some of the space-saving features of the 1008HA, such as the angled Ethernet jack and hidden mini-VGA port. Rather than a potentially smaller SSD drive, there's a standard 160GB HDD inside, augmented by a free 10GB online data storage subscription for backing up files to a remote server.While slightly thicker and heavier than other recent Netbooks, it's still a vast improvement over the first few generations of mini laptops, which had a universally boxy, toylike feel. Our review unit was glossy black, which was prone to picking up fingerprints; blue is also available.The flat, wide keyboard, similar to what we saw on the Eee PC 1008HA, is among the better Netbook keyboards we've used, and the full-size right Shift key is one of those things you don't realize is very important until it goes missing. The touch pad is demarcated by a rectangle of raised dots on the wrist rest, and works well, although we found ourselves going into the touch pad settings and jacking up the default pointer speed.
A single quick-access button above the keyboard is for disabling the touch pad (handy if you're using an external USB mouse), and Asus' different preset power profiles are accessible by hitting the FN key plus the space bar. New to this model is a software suite that acts as a software dock popping out of the top of the screen (by default, but switchable). From there, you can access functions such as screen brightness presets and media players. Most Netbook users we talk to are no-nonsense types who just want to surf the Web or send e-mail, so learning the ins and outs of a proprietary menu bar system may not be high in the list of priorities.The 10.1-inch LED display offers a 1,024x600 native resolution, which is standard for a Netbook, although higher-end systems are starting to add 1,366x768 display options. The backlit LED allows the lid to be very thin, and also use less power than a more traditional LCD display.
The 1005HA offers a fairly standard set of ports and connections, lacking only the ExpressCard slot we've seen on some high-end Netbooks. We prefer to have our connections out in the open, rather than hidden behind hinged plastic doors (as in the 1008HA model), although we have to admit, the 1008's tiny, angled Ethernet jack was an impressive engineering feat.With Intel's N280 Atom CPU, the system was, not surprisingly, on par with other current Netbooks, even those with the slightly slower N270 version of the ubiquitous Atom. We have yet to meet an Atom-powered Netbook that vastly outperformed or underperformed the pack. The basic rule of thumb is that for basic tasks such as word processing, Web surfing, and e-mail, an Atom Netbook is more than adequate, as long as you keep your expectations modest.
The real star here is the system's battery life. Asus has always had some of the longest-lived Netbooks, and the new 1005HA got an impressive 6 hours and 51 minutes in our video playback battery drain test--about 30 minutes more than our previous leader, the Eee PC 1000HE, and more than 2 hours better than the nonremovable battery in the 1008HA model.Asus also includes its Super Hybrid Engine feature in the system, which is essentially a series of power-saving presets to further extend battery life. These are mostly power consumption tweaks one could perform individually, but it's handy to have them all in one place.Samsung has produced some of our favourite netbooks, including the NC10, which offers great battery life, and the N110, which boasts a top-notch keyboard and trackpad. The prices of the company's netbooks, however, have been steadily creeping upwards with each new launch, and the N310 continues the trend, clocking in at around ¡ê380. Samsung is obviously hoping this netbook's unique design will convince people that it's worth the extra outlay.
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