Asus S46cm - Anybody have some words to drop on it?

This elusive notebook seems to only be available in Eastern Europe/Canada/Asian locations... however, spec-wise, the laptop is a perfect match for me. I love the Asus brand and it looks like a quality computer, unlike the closest thing (The Acer Timeline M5 which looks like pure cheap plastic).

Naturally, I can't find ANY reviews on the notebook. I searched far and wide, and not even the stores selling it had any reviewers. So if anybody has it just give me your general thoughts about the computer? (Build quality, look and feel, performance)

Also, if you know where to buy one in the United States, that would be a great tip too. I probably have to buy off eBay or from a Canadian store, which I'd like to avoid.

 

Often times, you can find the Americas version of the same unit; it's just rebadged. I'm not sure which model this is identical to off hand, but you can try contacting Asus to see if they have an identical model for the states.

 

Hi All,

I have the S46CM-DH51 sitting right here in front of me - was $754 CAD.

At the moment I am trying - unsuccessfully - to get a proper OS installed onto the onboard SanDisk SSD i100...I am failing at that since getting the BIOS to recognize it leads me into a blackhole of information.

Anyone have any pointers on how to configure BIOS to boot from the onboard SSD?

TIA

 

thethirdnut - you should make your own thread regarding this. A moderator may see your post as hijacking and thus, remove it.

What do you mean by black hole of information? Does the iSSD show up in BIOS?

 

@ProStar - I now have Ubuntu installed on the SSD - no issue there.

As for own thread...the OP asked for any word on this particular model. I am the FIRST person to respond to the thread that actually has the unit...

I'm quite happy with the build quality, etc of the unit thus far if that is what an impartial review qualifies as. It does indeed seem to have a niche role since not too many other units have the SSD + 1TB HDD, nvidia GPU, etc around the same pricepoint. That is why I purchased it.

If there was some other info OP requires pls let me know.

 

You're right. Sorry, I'm functioning (if you can call it such) on 3 hours of sleep. I must have misread.

Did you manage to purchase in the states? I think OP is looking for a North American retailer/etailer.

 

NP. I bought it here north of the 49 @ Futureshop.ca who incidentally was bought by Bestbuy a couple years ago.

 

Hey dude, could you let me know if..

1. The relatively slow processor sometimes feels like a bottleneck when gaming or multitasking
2. If the temperatures are really, really high when the computer is going through intense use(such as, gaming or multitasking)

 

@Bob Marley.

Windows 8 did not feel extra snappy, but that's the first time I've seen that OS. I purged it and am now running Xubuntu 12.04 off of the SSD - using the 1TB HDD for storage only. Windows has been completely exercised from the system - recovery partitions as well.

Linux runs very well and definitely feels 'snappy'. It boots in approx 15 secs from BIOS screen using the 24 GB SSD.

I therefore, obviously haven't done any gaming on it, but I have tried out XBMC on it and 1080p bluray rips run flawlessly off the HDMI port using VAAPI - the Intel GPU video hardware decoding.

This is an apples-oranges review for you likely, but my $0.02 nonetheless.

 

I too seem to have a hard time finding reviews on the s46cm due to it's isolation of sales. However I just purchased it from futureshop in canada for $686, with free shipping. I was also trying to decide between the Acer M5 but I settled on this due to the build quality of aluminum as opposed to plastic.

Since there is a lack of of reviews on the s46cm-dh51, i actually read the review on the s56cm-dh51 which is just the 15.6" model compared to the 14.1" model. Everything seems pretty solid, and the only major problems that was really mentioned was screen viewing angles, battery life (but they mentioned it may be a faulty battery on their model because it only racked 3.5hrs from idle) and minor scratching on the optical drive due to the tight build.

One of the features which i'm not too fond about is the gap between the body and the screen. I think it's because of the removable battery, but still, i'd prefer a built in battery just to avoid having that gap there.