The good: Svelte and light; multitouch touchpad; nice screen.

The bad: 32-bit Vista Business can't utilize the full 4GB RAM; stippled touchpad isn't pleasant to use; battery life isn't great; covers over ports are inconvenient.

The bottom line: The UX30 gets oh so close to what it strives to achieve. But small design choices like the stippled touchpad and port covers, and large issues like the low battery life prevent it from achieving greatness.

Read full review of the Asus UX30 »

By Craig Simms, CNET.com.au
Sep 22, 2009

The Asus UX series is the Taiwanese maker's first foray into the Intel CULV segment, which seeks to offer sleek thin-and-lights at an affordable price point. Another vendor from the same island, Acer, was one of the first to offer consumer ultra-low-voltage machines via the Timeline series. The latter was known for its solid metal chassis and exceptional battery life. So will Asus be able to compete successfully in this segment with its UX laptops despite being a latecomer to the game?

Editors' note : This review is based on tests done by our sister site CNET.com.au. As such, please note that there may be slight differences in the testing procedure and ratings system. For more information on the actual tests conducted on the product, please inquire directly at the site where the article was originally published. References made to some of other products in this review may not be available or applicable in Asia. Do check directly with your local distributor for details.

Design and features

Asus' slim, 13-inch laptop does quite a few things right. The brushed aluminum lid is stylish, and the edge to edge, 1,366 x 768 screen is great. It's slim, it's reasonably lightweight, and yet it still manages to pack in three USB ports, a headphone out jack, Gigabit Ethernet, SD/MMC card reader, HDMI out and through a mini-adapter, VGA out. It does forgo the optical drive, and you lose an external microphone jack, but for its size it's acceptably featured.

What is annoying is that most of these ports are hidden behind flaps, which can frustrate connections. There's also a hot air vent on the left, meaning that any external left-handed mouse users will likely get their digits warmed.



The touchpad is Elantech's multitouch pad, meaning you can scroll by swiping two fingers, right-click by tapping three, and middle-click by tapping two. Interestingly, the fancy multitouch gestures that are usually inaccurate on the PC, from the pinch-zoom action to rotating, to magnification--have disappeared from Elantech's control panel--perhaps an admission they need some work. The surface of the touchpad itself is stippled, almost like Braille--but this doesn't translate to an enjoyable experience.



There are two dedicated buttons that are above the keyboard--on the right, power, with an obvious white LED when the laptop is on, and to the left, Asus' ExpressGate quick launcher, with the exact same style of light. There are a pair of white LEDs under the lip, but are rendered functionally useless as they can't be seen when using the laptop.

The UX30 runs off Windows Vista Business, but sadly only the 32-bit version--meaning that the 4GB RAM included can't be completely used, limiting the laptop to 2.96GB. A Norton Internet Security 2009 trial is bundled, as is a re-branded PowerDVD (to "AsusDVD"), CyberLink's Power2Go, Picasa 3, Microsoft Office 2007 trial and Google toolbar.

Asus bundles in a re-branded Logitech mouse too, but it can be best described as "functional" because it has difficulty with some surfaces and feels a little cheap.

Performance And Battery Life

Internally, the UX30 features an Intel Core 2 Duo SU9400 1.4GHz processor, 4GB RAM, a 500GB hard drive, 802.11n and Bluetooth support.

In 3DMark06, the integrated Intel GMA 4500MHD graphics meant the UX30 struggled, scoring 678, making it not suitable for gaming. PCMark05 showed a different story though, scoring 3,551, meaning the UX30 works fine as a productivity machine.

Turning off all power-saving features, setting the screen brightness and volume to maximum and playing back an Xvid file, the UX30 lasted 1 hour 57 minutes and 3 seconds, a little disappointing considering the low power CPU, and that the battery is non-removable. It is a harsh test--but it should still be scoring higher.

Service And Support

Asus offers a two-year limited global warranty with all its notebooks. Should a problem occur with the unit, you can send it to any Asus service center around the world for the first two years and get it repaired using the warranty card. Issues during the third year of coverage can only be resolved in Singapore service centers for units bought in the country. For users who travel overseas often, having a global warranty is important. However, the Asus service overseas centers should be checked for accessibility. Asus Web site provides software support and updates as well as a telephone hotline number.

Tags: Light-emitting Diode, Aluminum Lid, Norton Internet Security 2009 Trial, Asus Web Site, Intel Core 2 Duo

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