Asus U20A Review

Certainly never seen a butterfly with beautiful wings flying to and fro is not it? Well, strength, beauty, and thinness of butterfly wings that’s inspired when designing notebook Asus with these U20A series.

Therefore, despite the wide screen, 12.1 “, Asus U20A designed not as thick and heavy as notebooks in its class. Thinnest part of the notebook is 2.75 cm, while the most 2.9 cm thick. The weight of the following notebook 6-cell battery it was only 1.834 kg. In fact this notebook comes complete with an optical drive, aka DVD-RW drive. Li-Ion battery of its own weight 298 grams.


One cause of light and thin U20A is the use of Intel processors CULV (consumer ultra low voltage), the Intel SU2700 combined with the Intel GS45 chipset, X4500 graphics MHD and a Wi-Fi Link 5100 Wi-Fi. Thin and light notebooks with long-lasting batteries, plus an affordable price is going up the ladder of popularity. More days, more and more notebook of this type available in the market, such as Acer and MSI Slim Timeline X.

But if Asus was able U20A beat his rivals? Let us examine one by one facility of this thin notebook.

Physical
We start from the outside view. Like most notebooks, Asus U20A body made of plastic. All the shiny black body. In the middle of the glossy cover that Asus logo appears.

As usual, the glossy cover was pretty inviting enough fingerprint impressions that we must often wipe. The same thing happened with palmrest panel and LCD frame.

Minimal Screws
Let us turn this notebook for a while. At the bottom we will see the two compartments. Close hinges are smaller, and is a place of memory. DDR memory compartment is only locked by one screw, so easy to open if we want to upgrade memory.

The other compartment is where the hard drive. This compartment is also minimal screws, only guarded by two screws. The lack of screws is easier for us to upgrade their own hard drive.

Screen
When his cover is opened we will see the layer-featured LCD LED-backlit. Size 12.1 “with a resolution of 1280×800 pixels standards. LCD screen is framed by a glossy black panel with cover U20A. There was little effect of reflection from this shiny frame.

Display LED backlit screen was bright, sharp, clear, and precise. At any level of 50 percent, the display is looking very bright. Light level adjustable LCD itself, or from sensors that will adjust the light level in the room where the notebook.

Webcams
In the middle of the LCD panel, as usual, installed a 2-megapixel Webcam. Activate by double-clicking on the menu icon LifeFrame. This camera can set the frequency. When you first activated, you will be presented box contains the location and the recommended frequency of Asus. Webcam quality was good, almost without pause. Images looked bright and clear.

Results recorded images can be saved in BMP, JPG, or GIF. Quite a few options that can be done by recording the picture. Among other images can be added emotion, frames, accessories, date. Resolution images can be selected between 160×120, 176×144, 320×240, 640×480, and 1280×1024.

Sequential shooting (continuous shot) shall be done. The options are 3, 5, 12, or 15 frames per second. If the room where the object is felt less light, do not forget to turn on the flash. Moda bidiknya can choose between Night Scene, Portrait, Slow Shutter and Custom.

Voice recorder is also available in LifeFrame applications. What’s interesting is Game bid. Here, two images can be positioned in a frame, with a choice: vs.., Pair?, And the symmetry face. The effect is very interesting. Symmetry face if elected, it will present a vertical white lines on the screen Webcam. Position your face in the line, and see the effect. If you’re down, on the right side of your face will attend the ‘fat’ and on the left side of the present version of the ‘thin’.

Clean the Rear
The back of the notebook is clean. No nothing there, except slot Li-Ion batteries. So when I first had to charge the rechargeable batteries, we got confused. We did not find a hole to plug, DC plug-in at the back of this. On the other sides we did not find the hole. Inquired had inquired, was the DC-in jack hidden in a rounded right hinge – a clever way to make the notebook is clean of the hole.

Condition of the back of the net from this hole with two opposite sides of a solid port. Look at the right side. Besides DC hole-in at the hinge, each present a single USB port, LAN port, an ExpressCard slot and a DVD-RW drive.

We shifted to the left side. Well, this side really colonized various ports. There are two USB 2.0 ports located by a separate air vent, a VGA port, one HDMI port and SD card slot. Appearing in the front two jacks: microphone and headphones.

Meanwhile at the front, two Altec Lansing speakers ready to let out the sound. Unfortunately in our opinion, the sound quality of big named players is less clear. His bass-less steady.

Keyboard and Touchpad
Keyboard panel is impressive U20A. The buttons have a light sensor and could be burning brightly in the darkness. To turn on the light sensor, press Fn-A. Light level can be controlled by pressing Fn-F3/F4/F5.

These buttons is wide enough to each other so comfortable to wear. No need too loud knock on every button.

Who also seized the attention of the touchpad. Not because of the width and right-left buttons into one button that turns out wide chrome uncomfortable suppressed because it was a little inside. But since this touchpad also be lit with a pattern of dots follow the direction of movement of our fingertips.

As a result, this notebook can actually be used perfectly in total darkness, including in aircraft. For all glowing – keys, display, and touchpad – by itself. Unfortunately U20A touchpad is too sensitive, especially if used for a long time.

Wireless Features
For wireless connections in the U20A, Asus provides Intel’s Wi-Fi 802.11/draft-n, and Bluetooth v2.1. Just do not look for Wi-Fi switch on the body of this notebook.

In this notebook, Asus liked the style shortcut keys to control various things. So to activate or turn off the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, we need to press Fn-F2 key.

Two Power Button
Maybe you will be confused to see there are two power buttons – each on the left and right upper panel of the keyboard. Both activate the computer.

The difference is, the power button on the left is a shortcut button, to turn into notebooks without operating system or access the hard disk. The emphasis will activate special modes Asus Express Gate. Express Gate adaah basically a mini operating system. This mode is very useful for those who are always mobile, and often need to the Internet or view files quickly.

Within eight seconds left after the power button is pressed, the notebook can be used.
We can listen to music or watching movies from the CD / DVD or USB flash disk, call via Skype, and talk (chat) with instant messaging, including playing games online via a wireless connection (Wi-Fi).

We are also free to look at pictures or images on the USB flash disk or digital camera connected to a notebook via a USB port Photo Manager. Read PDF files that fester in the USB flash disk can be by clicking on the file twice.

We just can not keep or take anything to / from disk. System-based Asus Express Gate Splashtop operating system it’s not accessing the notebook hard disk, including operating system activates. That’s why quick access.

To exit the ExpressGate mode, just turn off the computer off via the power button that appears at the bottom right corner of the screen. Or choose to go to the OS, which will enable the notebook as if we press the power button to the right. In normal conditions, we can access anything on the hard drive. It took 1 minute 32 seconds before the bersistem notebook Windows Vista Ultimate can be used.

Bundle Software
Asus software membundelkan enough in his U20A. For software, is paired Adobe Reader 9 and MS Office (trial version), Cyberlink DVD Suite, Lightscribe Direct Disc Labeling, and Picasa 3.

In addition there is Asus Multiframe and LifeFrame to activate the Webcam. Another bonus is the Norton Internet Security antivirus for free for three months.

Included in a SmartLogon Asus Utility Manager, AI Recovery Burner, Splendid Utility, and Asus FancyStart. Splendid Utility controls the screen with six options: Normal, Gamma, Vivid, Theater, Soft, and My Profile. To My Profile, you can set their own color temperature, RGB sync, colorfulness, and save it to a hotkey.

Manager SmartLogon quite interesting, because it allows us to login by using faces. Webcams will be automatically switched on in here and ask us to enter the password and press Capturing photos to create a gallery face. Logon level can be selected from the most stringent (high) to loose (low).

Meanwhile FancyStart used to change the startup screen. Here we can adjust the sound options, background images, frames and modes that will be displayed.

Battery
Our test unit came standard with DDR2 3GB RAM, hard disk 2.5 “320GB and battery 4400mAh Li-Ion 10.8 V Batteries weighing 298 grams was able to support notebook – in our experiments – a maximum of 4 hours 12 minutes. This is when we activate this feature Power4Gear Entertainment batteries.

In other settings, namely Battery Saving, notebooks can be used for 3 hours 24 minutes. While the High Performance setting, time-life to 3 hours 49 minutes.

Power4Gear battery usage settings (High Performance, Entertainment, Quiet Office, Battery Saving) is diaturkan Asus, but we can also change or add it yourself. Entertainment Power4Gear example, will turn off the display within 5 minutes if the notebook uses power from the batteries, or 15 minutes when using the power from the grid. Computers also will be included in the sleep mode after 15 minutes. While in High Performance, nothing is off when the notebook using the power from batteries or from the grid.

Mouse Free
In packaging, in addition to batteries and charger, Asus includes a mini optical mouse. This optical mouse connected via USB cable to be parsed from around the mouse body. But in our opinion, the mouse is less comfortable to wear due to lack of precision.

One thing about the adapter. Our test unit equipped with a charger Asus with two flat feet. As a result when power will recharge the batteries, we have to use the converter – a little inconvenient.
***

U20A Asus is compelling because it can be used even in total darkness. Unfortunately after about 1 hour use, the bottom of the unit was quite hot, so recommended to always use a mat or as a portable lap desk.

One note, the unit we tested was quite different from the units on the market. For example, the processor and RAM on our test unit is a 1.3 MHz Intel SU2700 and 3GB RAM DDR2, while on the market higher, the Intel Core 2 Solo ULV 1.4 GHz Su3500 with 4GB of RAM DDR2. Also our test unit mengemaskan and 320GB hard drive 2MP Webcam, while circulating in the market and 500GB hard drive provides 1.3 MP Webcam with 6-cell battery is claimed to stand working 8 hours, and additional bonus in the form of bags. But both are sold without operating systems.

PLUS: The light sensor on the keyboard, screen and touchpad; rich software bundle; international warranty; bright screen; Express Gate; RAM and hard drive upgrades easy.

MINUS: A bit of heat; feet flat adapter

source :laptopny