Asus UL30JT

I agree, the HD5650 will kick some serious butt in the Acer and should satisfy 99% of people looking at ultraportables. I'm not sure what more anyone could ask for. People have to keep in mind that the Acer is an ultraportable that is <1" thick and under 4lbs. There are a lot of challenges in putting a gaming videocard inside a very small frame. If it used a stronger videocard the cooling system may not be able to handle it.

 

I find it odd that several are saying these notebooks with the 210/310M GPU's won't run modern games. At Expert Laptop Review looking at the UL80Vt with the 210M:
http://www.expertlaptopreview.com/?p=96

He says, "In the Crysis gaming test, the Asus UL80VT-A1 managed an average of 32 FPS at native resolution with everything on low. The game still looked great and was enjoyable to play despite it being on low settings."

"In Counter-Strike: Source, the computer put out 150 FPS average in the stress stress at native resolution. I then tested it with 4x AA on, and it resulted in 99 FPS. In game FPS on de_dust2 varied. It averaged about 60-70 FPS with no AA with occasional dips down to 40 FPS. The game was certainly playable on high and native resolution."

"Left4Dead 2 ran very well (40-60 FPS) at native resolution with textures on high and shaders on medium and no AA. . If you bumped up the shaders and effects to very high and high and turned on 2x AA, the game played at about 26-35 FPS."

"I loaded up Batman: Arkham Asylum with the default settings, which were set on Very High at native 1366×768 resolution. Game play was fairly playable, but it was also noticably choppy at times (26 FPS average in the video stress test). I dropped the settings down to medium. This time it got 40 FPS average in the video stress test and game play was perfectly playable and smooth."

"I then downloaded Team Fortress 2. It has been known to give ultraportable gaming machines a tough time due to its high shader requirements. When playing, I averaged about 50-60 FPS at native resolution with everything on High with no AA"

"Protoype played very smoothly at the default 1280×720 (which was the max res for some reason) and on the default medium settings. Frame rates were in the 30-40 range."

"Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 achieved 30-60 FPS at native resolution 1366×768 with texture settings on “High.”"

In a U30Jc review, they said:
"In Left 4 Dead 2, playing through one level with the resolution set to 1366 x 768 with high-detail settings... " their avg FPS was 32 with a high of 62.

Another review said of the U30Jc:
"In World of Warcraft, we upped the effects to ultra and the resolution to native, and still were able to play at a comfortable 34 frames per second."

"In Far Cry 2, the game proceeded at a nice 44 fps clip at 1024 x 768"

"In Star Trek Online, we destroyed Borg probes at 95 fps with the resolution at 1024 x 768, and 46 fps at the max 1366 x 768. Gameplay was smooth and graphics were richly detailed. "

CNET reported on the U30Jc with the 310M, playing Unreal Tournament III in 1280x800, no AA+no AF on high settings, they avg'd 81 FPS. In 1440x900, 4X AA, 8X AF on high, they avg'd 73 FPS.

They ran Just Cause 2 on medium settings and native res and the game ran utterly smoothly.

HOT Hardware reported getting 52 FPS on Half-Life 2 Episode 2 at native res, High Quality & no AA.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars scored 46 FPS at native res, High Quality & no AA.

PCMag ran Crysis on the U30Jc at medium quality and 1024x768 on the U30Jc and had 21 FPS. This game is the exception. It still needs to be run on low settings for smooth gameplay.

In the same test, the Macbook Pro only averaged 13 FPS.

No, the UL30Vt, Jt or U30Jc are not an M11x, but just saying, it seems these notebooks WILL play modern games though not all on high settings.

... and looking up the HD5650 3DMark06 scores, yea, you're right. It is a much better (like not even remotely in the same league) GPU!

 

The only thing that may repel me from the Acer aside from pricing is the thickness. The graphics power will be a nice touch...and a convenient excuse for SC2 when I should be studying....

 

Hi Quatro,

Thanks for you input.....,

However you showed me a comparison between Su7300 vs. i3-320M.

I'm looking to Compare Su7300 vs. Core i5 520UM.....

1. Performance % Increase or Decrease

2. Battery Life % Increase or Decrease

Thanks

 

The problem there is the i5-520um for the most part is vaporware. Unless someone gets a hold of one of the machines that were at CES and even then these most likely were ES and not production chips...........

 

at low settings... why would i play any game with settings set to anything but max if thats how i can play a game on my home pc with a core i7 and gtx260?
what i would like is a laptop that can do both, be ultra portable on the go and enable a beefy vga once im home so i have one platform to do it all...

oh no, dont get me wrong... i have a lot of respect for acer and asus for getting those chips in these thin and light ultra portables!
but one thing is whats physically possible or feasible, and another thing is what features a product could have that made it even more attractive and interesting...

yes, thats what id like to see as well...
if you use turbo mode and the asus 33% overclock, the i5 520UM should end up at roughly the same speed as a core i3 320M... i think thats why he used those performance numbers... there arent any reliable numbers from an i5 520UM so far...
so the performance will be 77% faster than an SU7300 at stock and maybe around half of that if you compare an SU7300 oced to 1.7ghz vs the i5 520UM overclocked...
so on average id say the i5 520UM oced will be 33% faster than the su7300 oced.. in some applications it should be much faster though, anything that uses more than 2 threads should be 50% faster or even more... its just that so far there arent many apps that use more than 2 threads... there are few that use 2 to begin with ^^

now how much itll hurt battery life... we can only guess...
my guess is that it reduces battery life by at least 15% and possibly up to 33% as it seems to consume a lot more in idle. so instead of around 10 hours of the UL30VT, the UL30JT probably only gets around 6-7 hours...

thats what the asus guys at the electronics show told me today...
this plus the fact that they didnt actually have any UL30JT in stock and didnt even know when it would be available made me chose the UL30VT.
i just arrived home... havent even unboxed it yet

i ended up paying 30$ more for an extra 2gb of memory...
overall i paid around 800$/600E... is that a good price?
was the best deal i could find here in taiwan...

yes... i have a feeling that the UL30JT was supposed to be launched already, why else would the advertise it on a sales events flyers? they must have anticipated that it would be available once this event happens, but its nowhere to be found and nobody knows when itll come out...
since there are no other i5 520UM chips around my guess is that

1. intel cant make enough chips with this low power consumption
2. apple bought up all the low power i5 chips for their upcoming laptops
3. asus and others realized that the power consumption is notably worse for those chips and they are delaying the launch until intel can come up with propper low power core i7/i5/i3 chips...

maybe all 3 are true to some extent...
either way, even if the UL30JT would have been available, i wouldnt recommend anybody to get it unless they really need 4 threads for whatever they are doing and dont mind the 5-7 hour battery life

 

how ?

not far from Intel Core i7 720QM

 

Oh. Oops, sorry.

I indeed have the i3-350M.

What notebooks are presently out & on sale in the US using the i5-520UM? The UL30Jt & UL80Jt will, but they're not out yet.

 

yeah but vantage isnt exactly representative of real world performance... its more of a best case scenario...

the 520UM, especially when oced by 33% with asus turbo33 is definately very fast... i dont think anybody doubts the performance... the thing most people seem to be concerned about is battery life...

btw, this notebookjournal.de site is a bit weird...
http://www.notebookjournal.de/tests/notebook-review-asus-ul80vt-wx028v-nkmo-1054/3
http://www.notebookjournal.de/tests/test-review-asus-ul30a-qx050c-nkrt-1014/6

check the battery life tests...
both the UL80 and UL30 were equipped with the 84Whr battery, 8cell 5600mah... but for some reason the UL80, with a bigger screen, reaches over an hour longer battery life than the UL30?
but the power consumption in office mode, ie with browser and word open is notably LOWER on the UL30... which makes sense...

at the same time they said the UL30 reached 1004 minutes batery life or 17 hours (!!!!) in idle mode...

very confusing... testing battery life is definately one of the least reliable indications in reviews these days... performance varies from review to review but is always within a 5% range or so... but battery life... there are sometimes worlds of differences in the reporter battery life if you compare some reviews... too bad there is no better standard for meassuring battery life...

for digital cameras for example theres a really good standard, shooting a picture every X seconds with the display showing the last picture for Y seconds, then the next picture is taken... too bad there is nothing like this for laptops, there are too many battery benchmarks and every review uses them in a different way it seems :/

btw, im too tired, ill unbox my UL30VT tomorrow and post some pics

 

What? No i3's in this list? I'm crushed.

What happened to equal opportunity?

 

Unfortunately that's not going to happen anytime soon. I have the same system as you (i7 and GTX260) for my desktop.. but I'm wanting to be able to do my work without being constrained to the same spot. As much as I would love to be able to take my games anywhere, I've decided I have a desktop designed for gaming.. a laptop that can play a few games that I care about, even if it is on low settings, I can deal with. I just need performance, portability and good battery life outside of gaming.

 

For a start, I said Crysis on medium settings, not low. Crysis is also perhaps the most demanding game out there right now, which means the Mobility HD 5650 will play a lot of other games on max settings. I agree that at home I'd rather play games on a desktop, but you're not going to carry your desktop with you every day to play games away from home, are you?

 

If i'm away from home I'll most likely be doing other things.
You just can't game hardcore on a laptop. You'd have to bring an external mouse with you everywhere. Even then it's a 13" screen. Kind of ridiculous

 

That's down to personal preference. I, for one, would like the ability to game away from home without taking my desktop with me - it makes LANs with friends much easier, and I can play games at university. It might not be worth it to some people, but some level of gaming capability on a laptop makes sense.
My current situation is that I'm overseas and will be going back to Australia in July, and I would like to play some games in the next couple of months. I wouldn't mind a new desktop, but getting it back to Australia would be too much effort, and there would be lots of trouble with warranties. Granted, I'll probably be buying a more powerful gaming laptop like the MSI GX640, which actually does make it into desktop territory, and I'll be sacrificing some portability (it's 6lbs) and battery life (only ~3 hrs), but it should do the job for me.

 

Meh. This laptop is most definitely not for heavy gamers. You get the most out of your gaming experience when you play games at highest settings. A good part of the experience is being able to really enjoy all the eye-candy that much of the game's development costs went into. All your heavy duty games these days recommend a quad-core processor and extremely powerful graphics cards to enjoy a lag-less gaming experience. If I were a regular LAN party frequenter, I'd rather just sacrifice portability and buy a heavy desktop replacement. Of course if you also have to do school stuff and work tasks on it, then you'd have to either put up with the extra weight or buy an affordable lightweight like this one for those needs.

For me, this laptop will be great for playing flash games (post Flash 10.1 release) on my break time and it'll nicely accommodate my multitasking needs. I'll definitely be taking whatever laptop I choose back and forth from home and school daily so portability is an absolute must.

 

Just wondering, how 'future proof' is this laptop? I'm between this, the vt, and the new acer timelines. I want something to last me through college (YAY) and be able to play new games on low-medium throughout the 4 years. The heating on the Acer series seems like it'd be a large issue, and I'm not sure I need THAT much power, and the VT seems to just cut it for current games. Is the JT worth it or should I look elsewhere?

 

The 310M is definitely not a gaming card, and as such it's not an option for me, but I think a lot of people would be happy with the HD 5650 in the Acer. Sure, it's a compromise, but if you want portability, ~8 hours of battery life, and decent gaming capability, the Acer looks to be the best option on the market - much better than the Alienware m11x. If the 3820 with HD 5650 was already available for purchase, I'd have a serious decision to make with that vs the MSI GX640.

Perhaps the combination of portability, battery life, and gaming capability doesn't interest you personally, but that doesn't mean it's of no value to others. To me, it looks like the Acer 3820 with HD 5650 sacrifices little in terms of battery life and portability compared to the UL30JT, while offering big gains in performance, especially for games. Unless the UL30JT is a lot cheaper, or you need the ASUS warranty, I don't see why you'd buy the UL30JT.

 

My friend, no machine is future-proof. Technological advancements pop up at an exponential rate.

For current games and games that come up 3-4 years down the road, yes you will most definitely need more power than what this laptop's graphics card can offer. I can't stress enough how much this laptop isn't really meant for heavy gamers. Games these days are becoming more and more demanding and two main bottlenecks are how much your graphics card can handle and increasingly how many calculations your CPU can handle. ULV CPUs in this case won't suit your gaming needs very well.

I apologize if I'm coming off blunt and direct. But seriously you're best off getting a MUCH more powerful desktop replacement.

 

Seriously, what is it with people and their unrealistic expectations? If you're going to spend good, hard-earned money on a car for your racing needs, you don't buy a Prius or a Corolla just for the fuel efficiency. You'll wound up not only racking up super low MPG from accelerating constantly but also killing your engines especially since they weren't build for so much stress.

Same with this laptop. It's a mainstream ultraportable. I give kudos to Nvidia for packing more graphics processing power than usual into such a thin machine. But we're still not at the point where we'll see GPUs that can play Dragon Age and newer games at max settings in most ultraportables. Additionally, judging from the way games are demanding more oomph today and later down the road, this laptop will become quickly more than just a little obsolete. It'll chug and cry when you try to play a new 3D game 3 years down the road.

Seriously, stick with the 5650 and make sure to use a cooling pad with it.

 

To some people, carrying a 15-17" desktop replacement with them on a daily basis is out of the question. As I said before, I'm probably going with the MSI GX640, which for a gaming laptop is quite light at 6 lbs, but for some people that weight and/or the battery life of ~3 hours wouldn't be acceptable.

Your metaphor is quite poor, because people looking for a "car" here aren't looking for one just for racing. They're looking for one that they can use on a daily basis, but still have some fun with at the track.

Also, your focus on the ULV CPU of the UL30JT rather than the 310M as a bottleneck is just plain silly. The so-called "need" for quad-cores in games is also wrong. If there truly was such a "need", no laptop would be suitable for gaming, considering the laptop quad-cores are far, far slower than their desktop bretheren. In general, the dual-core i7-620M will be better for gaming than the quad-core i7-720QM, but either way laptop graphics cards are much more of a bottleneck than laptop CPUs.

 

That, I understand, which is why I earlier suggested getting a low-cost ultraportable solution for everything else non-gaming related. It really doesn't hurt to read back a few posts--or just read carefully.

I would say my analogy was nicely constructed, wouldn't you? The point I was making on comparative terms is it's not always the best idea to buy a product and use it to fulfill a purpose for which it wasn't really designed or in this case can't perform that great in.

No, I mentioned both the CPU and the GPU and I didn't focus solely on the CPU. I never said there's a "need" for quad-cores. If you read the past posts carefully, you'll notice my post stated in opinionated terms that a quad-core is one aspect of an optimal gaming experience especially for calculation-intensive games. The GPU I will agree is the more dominant factor in graphics processing power. But once again, while no one actually needs a quad-core, it's nice to have and highly recommended these days. Also don't forget that gaming companies are increasingly catching on to the potential in the newest hardware out. For now, most of the games released do better on higher clocked dual-cores but there are games out there that love cores.

 

Also try to latch onto my main point stated more than once.

The average gamer doesn't have money trees blooming his backyard. Therefore, he will take into consideration a few factors that include but aren't necessarily limited to 1) How well his laptop can play current games 2) Budget. How much bang per buck he can get at a price range 3) Whether he'll be carrying it around once a week or daily and 4) My point. How well this machine will fare 2-3 years down the road. It's admittedly some would argue it's actually a sub-point of the first criteria. To expound upon this, it's a question of how reliable is the machine's cooling system. If the fans are doing a -poor job of keeping temperatures from blowing past 120 degrees C from day one, then it's best to think again. If the machine can't play L4D2 at medium or high settings without showing noticeable skipping, then it won't fare any better against newer games that are so much more demanding.

Example: My G50VT-X5

It plays Guild Wars fine. With my cooler running, I get temperatures that range between 60C-80C depending on how much activity is taking place. If I'm handling horde of Elementals, it'll hit the high. But when I'm just walking, it sits at 60C.

Fast-forward a couple of years, you have BF: BC2. I'll tell you right now that my laptop can barely handle it. It runs hot and at high settings, it sometimes lags. If it's anymore assurance, Supreme Commander despite being an old game is unbearably laggy. Same with World in Conflict despite having far fewer unit calculations to handle. I can almost swear that my room gets hot when my laptop roars while playing WiC.

But I'm not complaining. Why? This laptop served me well in the past 2 years and continues to serve me well. It plays SC no problemo and I still get the occasional giggles from L4D2 though the temperatures DO hit the 80s. Plus let's not forget I got it at a sweetass firesale price on CL from a dude who was trying to pay off bills.

EDIT:

Thus it would seem to me the 9800M GS was a reliable workhorse that strangely enough didn't go obsolete as fast as I'd imagined. But it can't be forgotten that if I'd chosen to buy a lighter machine with a not-so-great card, I wouldn't have been able to play L4D1 or 2 when they were released. I would've had to play both at low settings and pitiably low FPS.

 

That just serves to increase the cost. For most people, the best thing to do is to skip the gaming laptop altogether and get a desktop + a low-cost ultraportable, but there are people who want to have the option of playing games wherever they are without carrying a heavy desktop replacement with them.

Why would the Acer have an HD 5650, or any kind of discrete card, if not for gaming? Intel's GMA HD is powerful enough for Full HD video.

Incidentally, from what I've seen, the Mobility HD 5650 is capable of playing Dragon Age: Origins on high settings.

As for the cooling issue, from what I've seen the cooling on the Acer 3820TG is quite good.

 

I think you're starting to confuse yourself and go on tangents. We're not on the Acer forums and the person I was responding to was asking about the UL30JT's gaming capabilities. Though I DID probably come off a bit blunt, I said in only so many words that the 5650 will most definitely do the job and in my belief, won't go obsolete so quickly. In other words, I recommended the Acer Timeline over the UL30JT.

EDIT: I didn't completely rule out ultraportables for gaming. My point was a little bit narrower. I was ruling out the UL30JT as a primary gamer's rig which I will state again it doesn't seem to be well suited to be.

Now the Nvidia 310m? I wouldn't place any horseracing bets on it. It's definitely not cut out to play future games 2 years down the road recession or not.

 

One of my older posts for clarification.

 

Well, I was going by this:

That comment ignored the legitimate reasons why people would want gaming capability on an ultraportable. I'd definitely say it was you who was doing the confusing here, not "me confusing myself".

As for the 310M, I have agreed all along that it isn't a good idea if you want to play games.

 

OK we get it. Please stop posting about how great the Acers are. You've stated numerous times you want a gaming laptop and how the UL30JT won't be good enough for you. There's no need to keep pimping Acer in this thread. You've said it many times the UL30JT is not good enough for you, so just let it go.

 

Except that there's a number of people in this thread who are interested in gaming on their ultraportable, so I think it's reasonable to steer them away from the UL30JT when there's much better options. This, it seems, is exactly what zeth006 was doing as well.

 

There's always bound to be some level of bias in any opinion. My opinions are shaped by my experiences trying to play older games on budget machines that clearly weren't designed with the gamer in mind. As much as Blizzard shaped Diablo 2 to be able to run on mainstream integrated graphics, I found a lot of relief in paying an arm and a leg to upgrade to 128mb of RAM in the early days.

Today, a typical RAM upgrade after discounts/rebates isn't nearly as pricey as it was many years ago. But popping more gigs of RAM won't create the same gaming performance miracles they once did. Games like Diablo 3 will require more than just a few gigs of DDR, which is why as I would have back then and now stress engineering miracles aside going for a notebook that's geared more to the gamer.

A few weeks back, I discouraged someone from trying to buy the Sony Vaio Y for playing games like Crysis. The SU7300 is no lightweight but the integrated graphics leave much in wanting.

 

Ahhh, but that's where I distinguished between what I personally felt would be best and what was in the poster's interests.


And once again as I stated in that post, if my tone came off a bit strong, that is why I apologized ahead of time. I didn't wish to sound like I was talking down to him and telling him what's best for his gaming needs.


But to outline my original posts all into one, let's put it this way: In my mind, there's a broad spectrum that stretches between between bare ultraportability, low power, low TDP at one end and gaming performance but with heavier weight at the end. I immediately cast aside 310M as a clear contender for gaming machine. My personal preference is for a desktop replacement with one of the best graphics cards out there and a light, budget notebook/netbook to act as an ultraportable for on the go. Once again, that's just my preference. An assessment, or a point to support my main point if you will. If you took it as my main point, well, that's where the other posts came in.

However, if ultraportability and gaming as two-in-one is a clear necessity, then he would probably fare best in his situation with a more balanced offering by Acer. Yes, it does strike a balance for someone who doesn't want two machines. If that's the case, all power to him!

I don't think anyone else misconstrued my main point by any stretch of imagination. But if my posts illustrate anything, it's that the notebook market allows for such a diversity of options. I argued in favor of having 2 to fulfill all purposes nicely. But if that didn't work out, there was always the Acer to fulfill both. Each to his own.

 

For many people, I think having both a gaming laptop and an ultraportable is out of the question, mostly because of the cost involved; they might as well save some cash and stick with a desktop for gaming.

If it reaches 2.133GHz on two cores, the UL30JT will be quite a solid performer for CPU-intensive tasks. Considering how good the ASUS UL30Vt is, the UL30JT will almost certainly be one of the best ultraportables on the market for those not interested in gaming.
However, unless the cheapest HD 5650 TimelineX config is a big step up in price, the Acer 3820 looks like a better machine. You get a more powerful CPU and video card without sacrificing much battery life or portability. In fact, with the 9 cell, the Acer will probably have the advantage in battery life, though this would add to the weight. To some, the sacrifice might still not be worth it, and if the difference in price is big then that's definitely going to matter, but I've made every effort to be objective in comparing the two laptops.

 

I'm not a politician. I'd appreciate it if neither my statements nor a few sentences within my comments were cherry-picked and taken out of context. Doing so leaves a bad taste and only invites internet flame wars for which I don't have the stomach (or the time) right now.

We can save the fun like that for election time. By fall of 2010, I'll have plenty of ammunition to lay on anyone against whom I have the typical "I disagree with what you just said and the way you said it" mindset against on matters ranging from healthcare reform and foreign policy conduct to whether I believe conspiracy theories hold any water.

That aside, I have a job to go to. Cya laters.

 

Sorry to cause this argument. I know the 310M isn't a very powerful graphics card, certainly not for an avid gamer, but no one has commented on its ability to play upcoming games on low-medium settings. I'm currently writing this on an old HP Dv6119us (1.6 ghz dual core + 1 gig of ram). So, I'm pretty much happy if a game can run smoothly, albeit on very low graphic settings. So, is there any speculation on laptop's ability to play games that might be coming out 2011-2012? Just the stuff from 2006 til now should last me quite a while...
Also, just a little personal preference, I like the idea that the JT will probably run very cool with minimal fan noise. While I'll probably just have to wait for the laptops to be released and benchmarked, I was hoping for some predictions.

 

On low settings and native res, most current games should run smoothly. The UL80Vt (overall, the UL30JT should be close) runs Crysis on low at 32 FPS average at native res, which might be good enough for you - an average of 32 FPS means there would likely have been times when the framerate dropped a lot lower, though, and hence probably not smooth the whole time (minimum framerate is important). However, it's games like Crysis that make it difficult to predict how games will be in the future. After all, Crysis is from 2008, and yet even now in 2010 it's still one of the most demanding games there is.

I'd expect that within the next two years you'd still be able to run many newer games quite well on low settings, but definitely not all games. There would probably be a number of games that would be out-and-out unplayable (Shattered Horizon is an example of a current game that would already be unplayable), and many more that wouldn't be smooth in open / crowded areas. You probably would've wanted to play some of those games, but if that's okay I think it might do the job for you.

 

I guess you're accusing me of this, but you should know that if I didn't interpret your points the way you wanted them to be interpreted, it wasn't intentional.

 

Thanks for all the discussion above about the merits of the acer versus asus. I was thinking of getting the ul30jt because I like the warranty and weight and battery ( and so following this thread thru it's countless pages each day) but the more I think about it, I think I'll get the acer timeline instead now. Although the only game I will play on it is Dungeons and dragons online, I know from past games that it seems like lag gets worse with each new patch until I buy a new machine. So I'm going to assume that as time passes the requirements to play keep going up even within the same online game. I can't afford to buy a new machine that often so I'd rather pay $100 more now to get an extra year out of my new laptop.

 

ill get which ever comes out first

 

yeah, but we can dream right?
would be awesome to have an ultra portable that transforms into a kick4ss gaming machine once the power cord is plugged in and an external display is hooked up...

med? not bad...
and no, unfortunately not, but how cool would it be if we could eh?

i always have a very light logitech optical mouse with me... i hate touch and trackpads

wouldnt recommend that msi laptop... i saw it at the show and its built quality didnt impress me... looks and feels cheap, and they put the mic next to the keyboard and touchpad, so your video chat or skype friends will constantly hear lots of keyboard noise... really a terrible idea lol hahah... price perf didnt sound too good either... i think a timeline with 5650 is "about" as fast and costs and weighs less...

there are barely any games that use more than 2 cores... they might use a third and fourth core to 10% or 20%... but if your only on 2 cores youll get 95% the performance... and most games really only use one core fully and then offload some stuff to a second core and load that by 50% max... thats my experience at least... i was really mad at intel for having no 2core 4 thread cpus for 1366 at the same clocks as a 920, cause my 920 has 4 cores and 8 threads out of which most are constantly idle, even when playing games...

phew... even 5650 graphics might not be up to the task...
the vt is really not for gaming... if you care about gaming, i wouldnt get a laptop with G210 or G310 graphics... its more like a cool add-on feature, that you CAN also play games...

the UL series is all about battery life and size and weight...

id rather say it the other way around
geez whats up with the hardware not delivering what so many of us wish for? hehehe
that doesnt mean the current hw is bad, but theres definately room for improvement

9cell eh? mhhhh any idea how many watt hours?
and what weight? im impressed about how low weight this 8cell on my asus ul30vt is... its lighter than my vaio sr15t battery, which lasts only 2-3 hours LOL

yes, like i said before, the ul30jt really sounds very powerful... and very flexible as you can adjust the cpu to run at different max speeds and adjust perf vs battery life neatly... but yeah, its graphics are not good enough for gaming, id rather pay 200$ more and have 100gr more weight for a bigger heatsink and get 5650 style graphics on it... they will be disabled on the go anyways so it wouldnt hurt battery life...

but like i said, what held me back from buying a core i5 laptop or waiting for one yesterday was:
1. not available, theres not even a launch date
2. higher price for higher perf and hyper threading that i just dont need...
3. lots of hints about 15-33% worse battery life

i think the ul30vt is perfect for me... 1.3ghz with incredible battery life and 1.7ghz with very good battery life and low weight...
the only thing i dont like is the super reflective display and the super relfective black paintjob on the chassis which makes every finger print visible... i read that the silver version of the ul30vt doesnt have this problem but its not available anywhere here in taiwan :/
the ul30jt has the shiny paintjob thing fixed... but ill just have to get over it i guess and if it gets too annoying ill just sandpaper the top layer of the pain off hahahaah

 

I'm at this point too now...UL30JT or Acer 3820T.

 

Is there any chance either of them will be out in time for me to purchase prior to heading to Japan May 15? If not I will decide between UL30Vt-A1 and U30JC.

I don't really game whatsoever, I just want a laptop with dedicated graphics so I can do HD video readily and flash as it evolves. I.E. I mainly just want the dedicated graphics to keep the door open. I do a little bit of image editing for my work but for the most part I am looking for long battery life and enough oomph to not hinder me throughout the day.

That being said, I have had my eye on the UL30VT-a1 for a long time, but I am always reluctant to not buy the latest and greatest. I would love to get the PL30JT, the 3820 Timeline or the UL30Jt before May 15, but is it possible?

Is there anything that people have tried to do with SU7300 CULV's and just found them to be too slow other than gaming and video editing?

$770 is starting to look really good for the Vt-a1, but I lust for the JT.

 

I've heard it has a little keyboard flex, but that's not enough to worry me; people on the forums who have it seem quite happy with it. The mic doesn't seem like an issue either since I'd get a separate one anyway. However, I seriously doubt that the 5650 is anywhere near as fast as the Mobility HD 5850, and the GX640 is very competitively priced at ~$1100.

 

WOAH that late you reckon?
I asked a store here and they gave me end of this week and early next week for PL30JT to be in stock. Could very well be full of CRAP but there are few stores here in australia that have listed them for pre order.
I certainly hope it arrives before end of April.. I will be screwed if not..

 

Don't know about Australia, but I figured if they were going to be available soon I would be able to find some sort of substantial release date.... and everyone keeps saying that Intel is pushing to release the i5 variation in them in Q3 I thought.

 

You are screwed...

Seriously though, I would hate to NEED any Asus model to be out before a certain time. After the last 4 months I think it is safe to say that there is no way of knowing when these things will drop. If there is a store near you that expects 'em soon, great. We have been hearing similar things with some models in the US but these statements are only worth so much without confirmation from Asus. WE SHOULD BE GETTING CLOSE THOUGH!!! Right? Right?

Did yous down under receive the UL30VT around the same time the US did? Beginning of Jan?

 

only 1100... thats not bad at all...
yeah the 5850 will be beefier, but itll have to deliver more pixels as well since it has a larger screen
i guess the gx640 is a good compromise between price perf and battery life... but for me its too much of "not this and not that either"
ive never been a guy for compromises haha...
i just bought an ul30vt... i figure out one thing i want and then want the best, and its battery life and weight for me in a 13" form factor and asus has the best and its surprisingly one of the cheapest if not the cheapest option too!

i dont remember but theres an a1 and an x1 right?
in the us one is always grey/alu silver and has the bigger battery and 2 year warranty and the other one is black and only has 1 year and a smaller battery... i read that somewhere i think in the customer reviews of buy.com

anyhow, i bought the ul30vt just now, the black one, and id recommend you the silver one... im not sure since i havent seen the silver one, but the reflections and finger prints should be much less visible on a grey model... thats what several people said as well. and definately look for the 84whr battery model, 5600mah iirc...

btw, its odd, i got the black model, and it says 2gb but they upgraded it to 4gb for me... and they also upgraded the battery to the 5600mah model and also gave me a 2 year worldwide warranty card... so i basically got the same features as the grey us model but mine is black, hah

not that i know of... at least not in the asus when its oced to 1.7ghz...

yeah i was the same... but i couldnt wait anymore, i wanted a new laptop NOW and not MAYBE next month, MAYBE in 3 months...
plus all the rumors of worse battery life really scared me off... i5 will have a lot more perf than the ul30vt, 500mhz higher clocks and support for HT will definately be useful if you need that kind of cpu power... well i dont... after thinking about it i would probably disable the asus turbo33 on the ul30jt to have longer battery life... and even then it would probably be worse than the ul30vt...

so in the end id sacrifice battery life for more performance i dont need... and id actually pay more for that... so for me, the ul30vt is definately the better option...

this is very helpfull to figure out what laptop you should get:
pick any laptop you like and then tell somebody else why you like it
or tell yourself, but its easier with another person sometimes...
youll figure out what the main points are that you like...
dont be shy! if you like it cause it looks good or is brand XYZ.. then say so... its after all what makes you like the laptop, just write everything down that comes to your mind, in no orderly fashion... just random...

now that you know what your looking for, prioritize everything... take time to make sure you got it all prioritized properly... all the things you said you like about this particular laptop... list it according to importance... if you had to remove something or change the spec of this laptop you like, which would you get rid off more likely than the others? which feature is the most important one?

if your not sure, dont worry, it doesnt matter if you can decide which is no3 and which is no2 etc... if your still clueless, pick another laptop you like and do the same thing, make a second list... dont look at the first one or think about it! if you want make a third and fourth list for even more laptops you like...

then look at the top 1-3 points of your list(s) and compare the models that fit your wishes and youll probably end up with only 2 or 3 models... weigh in the pros and cons of each, imagine yourself carrying each of them, working on them... imagine the same 1 year in the future... and after a day or two youll have a good idea what to get usually...

i always recommend having a real look at a laptop before buying it!
look at what your getting, touch it, lift it up, move it around, use it... play a video on it, surf on it, play a game for 10mins on it...

my list:
1.) size, (13")
2.) battery life (8hours+)
3.) weight (less than 2000gr)
4.) design (thin, stylish, classy)
5.) cpu performance (c2d ~2ghz)
6.) display quality
7.) ssd/hdd performance and size
8.) heat/noise
9.) built in 3g modem
10.) price (less than 1200 us$)
11.) 3d performance

HINT! it helps to pick a form factor first... look at different laptops and try to narrow down the size of a display you can still accept and the size and correlated weight of a laptop body you can still carry around comfortably, and a large enough factor so your not bothered by the keyboard being too small etc...

 

You got a great deal. The vt-x1 has better wireless card ( intel instead of the crappy atheros). While the a1 has better warranty and battery.
You just got the best of both worlds =)

I'm waiting for the jt as well, will have to make a choice by the end of this month, if it's not release I'll get a vt-a1 and intel's x25-m 80gbs ssd =D

 

XS-saaya

where did you buy your x1? Also, why did you get the black one? I like the all-black look and I would prefer the better wireless card. Heh, but I want the better battery and warranty

 

With the new Macbook Pro updates, anyone thinking of comparing the 13" with the UL30JT? Afterall, Apple claims a 10 hour battery life which seems to be more than what the review sites are reporting for the UL30JT. The 13" models still use Core 2 Duo's though, but they are more powerful than the SU7300. With a better graphics card and optical drive for a little more weight and a little premium, they seem pretty good to me. Also less hard drive space but..

13" MacBook Pro
- $1199: 2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo, NVIDIA GeForce 320M, 4 GB RAM, 250 GB hard drive
- $1499: 2.66 GHz Core 2 Duo, NVIDIA GeForce 320M, 4 GB RAM, 320 GB hard drive

UL30JT (According to ASUS site)
32.2 x 23.2 x 1.48~2.46 cm (W x D x H)
1.70 kg (with 8 cell battery)

MacBook 13" (According to Apple site)
Height:
2.41 cm (0.95 inch)
Width:
32.5 cm (12.78 inches)
Depth:
22.7 cm (8.94 inches)
Weight:
2.04 kg (4.5 pounds)

 

I can order this Acer now in Sweden.
How does it stand up to the UL30jt do you think?
Acer 3820tg
13,3-inch 16:9 LED
Intel Core i5 430M
4 GB RAM / 640 GB harddrive
ATI HD5470 1GB DDR3
12 hours battery (you wish ;-)
1.3 MP HD-webcam

I really want to buy an Asus UL30jt. (I gave my child an UL30vt when she got 14 years last week and I love it).

 

how much, compared in USDs