Zenbook Introduction
Features
- Incredible 3mm at the front and 9mm at the rear
- Spun metal and hairline aluminium for incredible beauty
- ASUS exclusive Super Hybrid Engine II with instant on 2-second resume, four to five times the standby time, automatic data backup and recovery, and 25% longer battery life!
- SATA Revision 3.0 solid state drive and UsSB 3.0 incredible speed of data transfer rates
- SonicMaster technology co-developed with Bang & Olufsen ICEpower increases audio performance with lifelike surround impact
- The latest Intel Core processors
CPU Support:
- Intel Core i7 2677M Processor
- Intel Core i5 2557M Processor
- Genuine Windows 7 Professional 64bit
- Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
- Genuine Windows 7 Home Basic 64bit
- This version contains all product updates (SP1)
- Intel QS67 Express Chipset
- DDR3 1333 MHz SDRAM, OnBoard Memory
- 13.3" 16:9 HD+ (1600x900) LED Backlight
- Integrated Intel HD Graphics 3000
- Graphics RAM Type: DDR3 SDRAM
- SATA3
- 128GB SSD
- 256GB SSD
- 2 -in-1 card reader ( SD/ MMC)
- Integrated 802.11 b/g/n / Built-in Bluetooth V4.0
- 1 x Headphone-out jack (Audio-in Combo)
- 1 x USB 3.0 port(s)
- 1 x USB 2.0 port(s)
- 1 x micro HDMI
- 1 x Mini VGA
- 50 Whrs Polymer Battery
- Asus UX21 notebook
- Battery
- Power Cord
- User Guide
Asus Zenbook UX31 Design
The Asus UX31 Zenbook maybe very similar in design compared to its predecessor and even another specific product from a company named after a fruit, we know who and what I’m talking about, but you can’t get away from that fact that it is what it is, and what it is, is super sleek, refreshing, with a very respectable about of power. The Zenbook is very elegant with that brushed aluminium finish. The Zenbook sports just a 3mm in front and a 9mm thin body in the rear, that 3mm acute angle is magnificent t look at, and really does give more of a feeling of weightlessness. The weight of the Zenbook is a again tiny 1.3 kg which is 315 grams. The Zenbook is one of those rare things in this world that to judge the glory of it for yourself, you really do have to feel it for yourself, the quality of the materials are great. One of the best things about the Zenbook is no fingerprints are visible except for the screen of course. The metal surface, which has a concentric circles design, making it extremely eye-catching.
To note: The UX31 Zenbook is the thinnest of all its competitors, the Macbook Air is 13.3-inches.
Taking a look at the Asus Zenbook with the lid up we see it looks as good quality visually and in build as it does on the outside. The Asus UX31 has a glossy coated 13.3-inch display which sports a high native resolution of 1600 x 900 pixels. The usual screen resolution that most notebooks around the same price and size as the Zenbook UX31, would normally offer a small screen resolution of only 1366 x 768 pixel resolution.
Moving onto the Keyboard, the metal key on the keyboard are very simple and again I use the word sleek, because this notebook is nothing but. The keys have a great look to them but unfortunately they just don’t have full comfortability while typing than on other notebooks, however this is personal preference and if you buy the Zenbook you may find your experience different, buy as you can imagine I do a lot of typing and reviews, so I would like to be able to say my opinion on the keys alone is a 60% solid argument. When pressing the keys to quickly while tying you get that uncertainty every time whether you have pressed it or not, looking up at the screen every two seconds. On the other hand, this does allow typing to be almost silent, so you will not be annoying anyone in first class on the train, which I found travelling to London.
Note: The Asus Zenbook Keyboard is not LED backlit unlike the Macbook air.
It’s very hard to not see the similarities between this Zenbook and the Apple Mac series, but it’s fair to say Asus have done a lot better than Apple for this style that is welcomed to anyone company to try and design a series that has these kind of aesthetics.
The track pad is nice and big with that smooth material brushing nicely across your finger, it is a delight to use. Unfortunately at first the trackpads performance was just slightly on the laggy side, but this was instantly fixed after a quick Zenbook driver update, which you can find in the specification of this review. Updating now to the version 9.1.7.7 the performance highly increase, and the functionality and usability in terms of tracking speed was a nice improvement from most notebooks of this calibre.
The track pad has multi-touch gesture functionality and can be used for two finger scrolling and pinch-zooming, of which the pinch-zooming seems to not pick up as fast as i would have liked, but I’m sure a few more updates shortly will improve this feature past the benchmark just like the initial laggy trackpad. So after the update the trackpad is definitely passed the mark, performing at the same high standard as its looks does.
Asus Zenbook UX31 Continued
The Zenbook UX31 is equipped with either a Intel Core i7 2677M or a Intel Core i5 2557M Processor, which are both second generation processors, so power is also there with its spectacular exterior design to match. The clock speed of the i5 2557M at stock is 1.6 GHz of which can be accelerated by the turbo boost and the clock speed will boost to 2.7GHz. Obviously the i7 version will offer better performance, with a clock speed of 1.8 GHz which can turbo boost up to 2.9 GHz.4GB is normally enough for a non-gaming laptop, and you can upgrade the RAM is you feel necessary. This ultrabook has a solid state drive which you can choose the capacity out of either 218 or 256GB, but with this high end ultrabook, it as a special feature of shock resistance added to safe guard the SSD. With the Zenbook offering Intel Core i7 processor and high ram plus SSD support makes this ultrabook one of the fastest on the market.
Asus could have made this model thinner most likely but has been restricted but the mini-VGA port, which of course has to be a certain size limit it has to be.
Extras
The Zenbook UX31 has a surprisingly small power adapter and a slim brown laptop bag included, which is almost the same as you get with the UX21. In addition, there is a USB to RJ45 and also the mini-VGA to VGA adapter, but unfortunately no adapter for HDMI in the box. For such a large investment into your notebook, I expected a few more adapters and possibly a small external mouse supplied.Performance
This CPU inside the UX31 model is the same processor that is used in a Macbook Air. The UX31 processor has integrated Intel Graphics HD 3000 discrete graphics solution. You will not be able to play the latest PC games on medium or high settings with the Zenbook UX31, so don’t try. The GPU is clocked in idle to 350MHz. All users will be able to upgrade and remove RAM due to the main boards memory being soldered directly on to the motherboard which enables even more weight and also size to be reduced.Sound Quality
“Another ASUS exclusive, SonicMaster technology was co-developed with Bang & Olufsen ICEpower to deliver breathtaking, lifelike audio that far exceeds the limitations of conventional notebook PC sound performance. Deeper, more impactful and wider in range, SonicMaster delivers four times the sound output of other ultrabooks without increasing the size or weight of the form factor.”The sound quality is good, often many notebooks lack in clarity. The Zenbook doesn’t give bass that I’m going to write home about as you would exact, but what it obviously lacks in bass, it makes up for with great audio clarity in movies and in music, with a nice dynamic range.
Battery Life
Let’s get into one of the most important things that we like to know the battery life. The battery life Asus claim that the Zenbook can run 25% longer than the generic notebooks, last a maximum of 7 hours. Normally during run time we often find the amount of hours is quite often, much lower than the claim. But the Zenbook UX31 did well, last a full 6 hours and 10 minutes, however this was with the brightness level set to just 70%, but we were running constant Wi-Fi and ran one films for 1 hour and 45 minutes of that time. The Macbook Air, which we are enjoying comparing the Zenbook as they are similar, only runs around 5 hours.Operating System
The Zenbook Asus UX31 is sold with Windows 7 pre-installed on 64-bit Professional, Home Premium or Home Basic. Asus also include number of various programs for hardware management, increasing or decreasing performance.Conclusion
The Asus Zanbook UX31 has left a great impression on me, not only does it offer you plenty of performance but it does it in a attractive brush aluminium metal with good structural integrity for its size, but due to its thinness you are going to have to be care with handling it though. With the 13.3-inch display at a great resolution of 1600 x 900 pixels, the Asus Zenbook UX31 offers you get a enjoyable experience with this notebook, never did my eyes get tired while using for long periods at a time.The Asus Zenbook UX31 its fair to say is the latest ultimate super thin notebook available. It is sleek and has an ergonomic design, fitting power hardware in a very slim-line compact size, with low heat output and is also very user friendly. We expect the Zenbook UX13 to become very successful, setting itself at the top of the laptop market.
For the elegant look and great performance offered to you with a very long battery life, we can’t see the Asus Zenbook UX31 be awarded with anything other than the below.
Price
Now price is at quite a high cost, as mentioned before the Zenbook really is an investment. The ZenBook Asus UX31 is currently available in three different specifications.Basic Model: $1099
- Intel Core i5 2467M @ 1.7 GHz
- 4GB of RAM
- 128GB Hard Drive SATAII SSD
Mid-Range Model: $ 1349
- Intel Core i5 2467M @ 1.7 GHz
- 4GB of RAM
- 256GB Hard Drive SATAII SSD
High-End Model: $ 1449
- Intel Core i7 2677M @ 1.8GHz
- 4GB of RAM
- 256GB Hard Drive SATAII SSD
source:www.hardwarelook.com
