The Asus Zenbook UX31 came within a week after the Aspire S3. Back then, it was available in two sizes: the 11.6-inch called Asus Zenbook UX21 and the Asus Zenbook UX31 with 13.3.
This test is using the UX31-DH52, which costs about $1099. Another model, the UX31-DH53, provides double SSD capacity and costs about $300 more. Otherwise the two models are essentially the same.
The Asus Zenbook UX31’s Housing
As the UX21, Asus Zenbook UX31 also looks promising at first impression: Enchant presentation and gloss of the case of a block of aluminum. Fingerprints are barely visible except for the screen.The display cover is specifically due to the reflections of the metal surface, which shows a design with concentric circles, eye-catching. At the leading edge of the housing is only 0.8 inches thick at the trailing edge of only 8.9 inches, and thus even a little slimmer than the competitors, like the Acer Aspire S3.
The base unit of Asus Zenbook UX31 is pretty solid although the housing is not made of aluminum entirely. The screen frame is clearly made of plastic. However, this does not diminish the solid workmanship of the unit.
After we were allowed to play with the Acer Aspire and the weak hinges, the Asus Zenbook UX31 brings a definite improvement. The central hinge bar on which the screen unit is connected to the base, can prevent the transmission of vibrations from the tap or when used on the thighs well. The hinge is also home to the speaker system.
Overall, the housing of the UX31 is clearly exemplary. Asus has managed to transfer the outstanding workmanship and style of the smaller UX21 without significant losses on the 13.3-inch UX31. It looks a bit angular than the similarly sized MacBook Air and even the Aspire S3, but this is ultimately just a matter of taste.
Equipment of Asus Zenbook UX31
The interfaces of the test model include all of the UX21, but they were arranged somewhat differently. For example, the mini-VGA port is now on the right side next to the micro-HDMI port. If you want to connect an external monitor via HDMI, you must buy a HDMI adapter. The audio jack is also only for headphones or external speakers. A separate input for a microphone is not available.The extra space on the Asus UX31 allowed installing a 2-in-1 card reader on the left side. Such lack the UX21. The front and rear offer no interfaces. Similarly, there is no Kensington security slot.
Keyboard and Touchpad
The keys have a hard texture and are very close haptics the remaining housing. The total size of 28.25 cm x 10.75 cm is quite spacious and the large distances between keys, the keys and never forced to close. Even the arrow keys, which are often used in notebooks of this size and squeezed to very small, are sufficiently large and have plenty of space. Unfortunately, unlike the Aspire S3 there is not stand-alone "Page Up" - and "page down" keys.As for the tactile feedback the soft keys provide a firm pressure point and are not spongy. However, they are a bit flat, but it's easy to get used to the keyboard within a few minutes.
The only major gripe with the keyboard is that it offers no backlight. That would have been the icing on the cake. Just three buttons, namely Power, F2, and Caps Lock, are tiny status lights.
The touch pad is 10.5 cm x 7 cm tall and has pretty much similar to the rest of the housing has a smooth texture. The available mouse controls for the work area is unfortunately smaller than it looks.
Left-and right-clicks are executed by pressing the corresponding sides of the touchpad. The problem is that left-and right-clicks in practice were often interchanged with each other than we wanted. Sometimes clicks do not even have been detected. The pointer moves unexpectedly and sometimes for no reason at one edge of the screen. Fortunately, the latest Asus driver fixes many of these problems, and the touchpad is so much more responsive with less unintended reactions.
Display Screen
The Asus Zenbook UX31 uses a 13.3-inch display with a high native resolution of 1600 x 900 pixels. This resolution is higher than most other similarly sized notebooks which usually have the smaller 1366 x 768 pixel resolution. These include the Acer Aspire series, the Samsung Series 3 and the first generations of Samsung Series 9.The viewing angle stability is typical TN-screen; the colors are highly dependent on the position of the user. This is especially true for the view from below.
Of course this will not be a problem as long as the primary user has a perfect, vertical view of the screen. The horizontal viewing angles are good, but already at 15 degrees vertical deviation of the colors starts to invert.
Asus Zenbook UX31’s Performance
In the heart of the Asus UX31 operates a 1.7-RSL8 GHz Core i5-2557M processor, which can be clocked at high turbo boost up to 2.4 GHz for both cores. As ULV processor the power (TDP) at 17 watts, almost half under Sandy Bridge CPUs at full voltage. The stroke rate was reduced in favor of battery life and lower heat. It is a usual strategy of the ultra-slim class. Popular competitors like the Samsung Series 9 and the Aspire S3 also use a ULV Sandy Bridge processor. In particular, the 13.3-inch MacBook Air uses the same CPU as Asus.Like all Intel’s second generation CPU, the Asus UX31 comes with an integrated Intel Graphics HD 3000 graphics. Although this supports Turbo Boost up to 1.2 GHz in the test model, it is still just a starter solution. Modern PC games can not be played back with high or medium settings without having to convert them into a slideshow.
As usual nowadays, the main memory is 4 GB of DDR3. The modules are soldered directly on the main board to reduce size and weight.
The DPC Latency Checker could even be detected with active WiFi modules, no recurring high latencies.
In the CPU-based benchmarks, the UX31's performance proves relative to competitors. The Cinebench R10 64-bit single-core and multi-core scores totaled for example, 4204 and 8349 points. Acer's ultrabook with his 1.6 GHz Core i5-2467M, however only reach 3523 and 7121 points in these benchmarks. The 1.4 GHz Core i5-2537M in the Samsung Series 9 exceeds the UX31 in this regard with ease. The similarly equipped 13.3-inch MacBook Air arrived with 4201 and 8266 will be essentially the same score as the Asus.
The special Corsair XM11 SSD helps this particular Asus model to better performance. This SATA-III drive is controlled by a SandForce SF-2281 controller. The same controller is used in many SATA III SSD of the accessory trade, such as the Patriot Pyro, OCZ Vertex 3 and the Kingston HyperX product line.
In the GPU-based benchmarks, the results in much the same with other laptops with Intel integrated HD 3000 GPU. A 3DMark score of 3497 points total 06 is slightly lower than the UX21 and the MacBook Air, but higher than that of the Samsung Series 9 and Aspire S3.
In the stress test the GPU clock speed commutes between 450 MHz to 500 MHz one, since the GPU turbo-boost the resources of the two-core CPU has to share.
Noise and Temperature
The fan noise at word processing and light web surfing is barely audible. A little louder, but not annoying hum is heard during high-definition video playback.Even under maximum stress, the fan noise is still very well tolerated. Better ventilation in larger housing here may have helped to reduce the overall noise.
Even at low load, the Asus laptop shows a noticeable warm. Under load, the temperature rises a bit. Especially the rear areas of the laptop (both from each other as well as keyboard side) can be significantly warmer than the other parts. The average temperature of the laptop was in idle mode while both the under and on top of about 26 degrees Celsius. The ambient temperature was the time of testing cool 18 degrees Celsius.
Under maximum load, the temperature climbed on the bottom and the top of an average of 6 degrees. The steepest increase in the upper central region and right above the F8 key. There, we observed an increase in temperature of 12 degrees Celsius. The front of the ultrabook remained still relatively cool, especially on the left side. The base was never uncomfortably hot here.
After a two-hour stress test with Prime95 and FurMark no throttling of the CPU was observed. HWiNFO with the behavior of the turbo-boost was observed of the CPU cores whose pulse rate never fell below 1.7 GHz. On the contrary, they worked throughout the tests continue to range between 1.7 GHz and 1.9 GHz. The maximum turbo boost of 2.7 GHz could be observed only in the first minutes of stress testing. Similarly, leveled off, the clock speed of the GPU more or less at 450 MHz and 1.2 GHz reached only the beginning. The 3DMark 06 CPU value immediately after the stress test was just the initial result of 2758 points.
Speaker
The sound system from Bang & Olufsen ICEpower speakers located in the long hinge-bar, which connects with a laptop screen. Thus, the two angled speakers focus sound directly to their users.The sound system of the Asus laptop, especially given the form factor, is very good. Nevertheless, the slim design prevents stronger bass or softer sounds in the music playback. Unfortunately, the output quality decreases when the volume reaches the top third. The use of external devices to the audio jack is for longer music or video sessions, of course, ideal.
Battery Life
In Asus Zenbook UX31 a 6840 mAh, 50 Wh lithium-polymer battery is installed. Asus promises up to 7 hours of battery life when fully charged. Using the Battery Eater Reader's test we were able to confirm this. This ended with a shutdown after 450 minutes. It was the Windows energy saving profile and selected to minimize the brightness. The laptop could not even go into standby or hibernation.The Battery Eater Classic test was used to determine the minimum battery life. The notebook turned out here with maximum brightness and maximum output profile after 125 minutes.
A more practical test was carried out with the profile "Balanced" and at 60% screen brightness. With permanent internet browsing with flash and occasional Hulu video, it took 314 minutes, until the 5% - was displayed battery warning. From 0 to 100% the Asus laptop charges about 2.5 hours.
Overall, the battery life is good, but the 13.3-inch MacBook Air with the same CPU keeps longer than a couple of hours. Also, the Samsung Series 9 outperforms the Asus, but uses the slower clocked 2537M i5 CPU. In comparison with the smaller UX21, which is equipped with Core i7-2677m, the UX31 wins due to its larger capacity battery (50 Wh vs. 35 Wh at UX21) and slower Core i5.
Conclusion on Asus Zenbook UX31 Review
After the somewhat disappointing Acer S3 we initially looked a little worried on the UX31. Fortunately, the Asus 13.3-inch is way much better ultrabook.First, consider the high quality of the aluminum unibody construction and a comfortable keyboard, potential competitors or roughly on par with Apple's MacBook Air also make it here, the high brightness and native resolution of the screen, to be mentioned favorably.
Second, the Asus Zenbook shines with its SATA III SSD performance.
Some minor weaknesses, however, should be considered. It would be ideal, especially for frequent outdoor use an optional matte screen. The battery life is better than the Aspire S3, but slightly worse than the 13.3-inch MacBook Air with a keyboard backlight could be a real added value could, however, may shorten battery life.
In addition, users should not forget the touchpad driver update to improve accuracy and usability. Finally, nothing is more annoying than a brand new laptop, which is devalued by an unreliable touchpad. Thankfully, via the 'Download' tab on Asus' official website latest drivers can be downloaded.
Asus' first step on the ultrabook market leaving an excellent impression due to its great quality, bright screen and the sovereign power.
Title Post: Asus Zenbook UX31 Ultrabook Reviewed
Rating: 100% based on 3109 ratings. 5 user reviews.
Author: onSquid
Thank You for Visiting Asus Zenbook Fans
Rating: 100% based on 3109 ratings. 5 user reviews.
Author: onSquid
Thank You for Visiting Asus Zenbook Fans
