Just got my W3J!!!

Many thanks to everyone in the Forum; couldn't have done it without you!

Bought it at Platinum Solutions Ltd, 237 Tottenham Court Rd, London for £1279. The guy there was very nice and I probably would have chopped a bit more of the price (the initial price was £1300) but the guy could see I was so excited lol The W3J is being charged at home as I type, he said I should charge it for six hours at first and try to drain the battery completely before recharging that this would help the battery have a longer life (true or false?)

First impressions:

I'll start with what I don't like:

The resolution: 1280 x 768! ugh! Nasty! The icons on the taskbar on the right look very pixelated and ugly compared to the ones on the W2V (not sure if it has anything to do with the resolution, just guessing) and there wasn't much real estate (IMO, don't stone me) I could console myself with the fact that not many 14" notebooks have higher than WXGA but the res was almost a deal breaker. To people who are buying make sure you have seen what WXGA looks like on a 14" before you order.

The screen: I wasn't impressed. It was at the brightest setting when the guy at the store put it on and it wasn't that bright IMO. I wasn't expecting a VAIO screen but it didn't look too good. The screen has a sweet spot, viewing angles are okay, nothing spectacular. We checked for dead pixels and there were none! *Knocks on wood*

The speakers: Oooh boy! Maybe I was used to the harman/kardon speakers on my old Toshiba Satellite 5200-801 but these speakers are truly nothing to write home about. If these are supposed to be better than speakers in other brands notebooks then I can only imagine how horrible those one are.

BTW how do I increase/decrease the volume? Have to read the manual when I get to the hotel room.

The HDD's rpm: 4200 'nuff said.

The touch pad: Hmmm, maybe I'm not used to this yet but the touch feels somehow, not exactly responsive. The buttons are even worse; you have to press it hard for it to register.

That's it for the cons; I hope I'm not sounding too negative because I really, really like the laptop(maybe I'll love after I've spent time with it lol) but I just have to say things the way I see it.

Now the pros:

Build quality: Love it; love it, love it!!! High quality materials; great fit and finish the screen has a little flex but not much, really love the design, the power button, everything about it. Looks amazing ( but strangely I actually think the A8J looks better) The battery isn't a perfect fit though >..> it kinda wobbles.

Performance: I haven't spent much time with it but I can already tell that it's superfast compared to my Toshiba or my old pentium II desktop lol; everything loads very fast without any slowdown. I haven't played any games on it yet but I just bought half-life 2 so I let you know how it goes.

I will update later on (in about six hours), I will try and play around with it and I can't snap any pictures till I get back to the netherlands(where I live) on Sunday. Feel free to ask any questions.

 

Nice, I got fed up waiting for the Asus W3J and came to my senses and bought an Apple MacBook Pro instead. Also got it cheaper than the W3J to boot.

 

Buying a macbook pro is not coming to your sences. Its a complete different class of PC. doesnt even have a GPU. weighs to much for its size. has no express card slot. the only thing going for it is it has DVI and is well constructed. Its really not even that great of a deal money wise. i mean its ok. XGA looks the same on any notebook so if you dont like it you should really know the difference before you buy. i prefer sxga. Its not far to compare it to the W2v screen either. sometimes ICons look pixelated because they are enlarged bigger than they are supposed to and its not the screen. like enlarge a 320x240 image and it will look pixelated no matter how sharp the screen is. as for the brightness. The w3 series are very bright in fact as bright or brighter than most sonys. And i have put then side by side. and its brighter than a W2V. speakers do suck though.

 

the MBP comes with an X1600 GRFX card.

 

But it's terribly underclocked so this GPU is like integrated sh..t Just kidding.

 

The MBP w/ its dedicated gpu is so seriously gimped, it performs roughly ~400 pts better than an x700 on 3DMark05. You can overclock it w/ ATItools but even so, other x1600s out there are getting ~5000 pts. The x1600 on the MBP can only overclock oh so much. The highest 3DMark05 score I've seen on the MBP is like ~3300 pts. You also have to remember, the 15in MBP has a 4x superdrive vs the w3j's 8x. Sure you can get the 17in MBP (to get the 8x) but that defeats the purpose of having a small and very portable laptop. The MBP does have webcam function, but you can always purchase a $29 logitech webcam for your laptop. The iSight alone costs ~$129 on Apple's site. That's $30 more than the most expensive webcam logitech currently has to offer. And finally, the screen on the w3j should be as bright as Sony's or even brighter. I've always wanted to get the SZ but found that even w/ the premium version, the backlight was still not as bright as I would've wanted. So far, my Dell Inspiron is still brighter than my w2v, still brighter than my gf's 15in MBP, and I expect it to be brighter than the w3j when that arrives from g2p.

 

It is underclocked a ton! I think the stock settings are 350/350mhz for the MBP. Most other laptops like the W3j is 450/450mhz stock. And even that I'm told is slightly underclocked.

 

I see people are a little defensive

Again, congratulations to Kal on his great buy!

Let me elaborate on the MacBook Pro, I am not going to be gaming a great deal so I went with the Mobility X1600 with 128MB dedicated memory. Oh yes, I am aware of the "underclocked" GPU but it is really a non-issue for me. The design, build quality and the glossy WXGA+/WSXGA screen won me over. The screen on it is really great, probably the best non-glossy screen I've seen, so it shall be fun to compare with the glossy one. And again, I got it fairly cheaper than what the Asus W3J would have cost me, as an added bonus.

 

The MBP is a fine notebook and does plenty of things well. It's well-built, has top quality components, and probably performs well. Apple is known for producing great screens, so I'm sure its screen is fine as well.

But of course the W3J is an excellent laptop, too. It's lighter, will have superior performance as already discussed, and is also well-built with top components. Basically, you're getting a good quality lappie either way.

For my money, though, I'm just more comfortable with Windows machines (but have plenty of self-hate for that). That simple. Plus I want to game with this notebook, for which the MBP is just not going to cut it.

 

what I'd like to see are screen comparisons between the W3J and the A8J. Or does such a photo comparison already exist?

 

I missread i thought he said the new macbook. my mistake.

 

"The resolution: 1280 x 768! ugh! Nasty! The icons on the taskbar on the right look very pixelated and ugly compared to the ones on the W2V (not sure if it has anything to do with the resolution, just guessing) and there wasn't much real estate (IMO, don't stone me) I could console myself with the fact that not many 14" notebooks have higher than WXGA but the res was almost a deal breaker. To people who are buying make sure you have seen what WXGA looks like on a 14" before you order.

The screen: I wasn't impressed. It was at the brightest setting when the guy at the store put it on and it wasn't that bright IMO. I wasn't expecting a VAIO screen but it didn't look too good. The screen has a sweet spot, viewing angles are okay, nothing spectacular. We checked for dead pixels and there were none! *Knocks on wood*"

Wow I am glad I decided not to buy one now, The braindead engineering decision to put the vent on the right side of the computer was a huge indication of how poor a design this computer would be.A cheap screen doesn't help much.I think I will go for a dell m1710, abit more expensive but a vastly superior computer.

 

Is 1280x800 on a 15.4" laptop acceptable for the original poster? It would seem that 1280x768 on a 14" would be much less pixelated since it has the same resoultion but on a smaller screen which would seem to make the pixels smaller?

 

Yeah...Dell's are designed well/sarcasm.

Hope you don't get any light leakage out of the vastly superior Dell monitors.

 

My laptop from work is a Dell. Where is the vent? On the right side. And that's not all. There's an intake vent underneath the computer, too, which in my opinion is the most idiotic location.

And speaking of the m1710, when you say "a bit more expensive" were you being sarcastic? It's like a $700 difference! All that for a computer that has more power for gaming, but also weighs in heavier than post-pregnancy Britney Spears.

I'll make you a deal. Give me the money you're going to use on the POS m1710, and I'll build you a custom built mid-tower rig that will wipe the floor with that computer. And I'll pocket the $300 left over.

 

Could you tell me what is wrong with you? How can you compare 14" and 17" laptops?! They are completly diffrent leagues. And the price - 2700!! For Dell?! Come on!!

 

I guess this is the "buy a Dell, and go to hell" syndrome

No pun intended of course, just kidding

 

how do you activate/deactivate the hypermemory for the x1600 on the W3J?

 

You don't.

HyperMemory is supported in the BIOS for the video card and dynamically pulls the 2nd 256MB from System memory when it is needed. You have 256MB dedicated on the card, and it only pulls the HyperMemory as and when needed.

 

Brain dead engineering what are you talking about. I have used every brand notebook known to man. And every screen size. i have owned maybe 10 notebooks in 4 years. The W3j doesnt use a cheap screen every 14.1in widescreen on the market every single one has limited viewing angles. Its a limitation of the manufacuring process. only an IPS screen would be better. the vent on the right has no effect at all. The air is slightly warm and i used the w3v alot before and with a mouse it wasnt even an issue at all. and if you think dell has supieror computers you really dont know much about computers in general. While some dells are good for the money they are not superior. not to mention asus makes some dells. to their specs of course though.

 

Wow, I have to hand it to you, you are a brave boy for posting this….. You sure know how to make yourself popular around a Asus forum…..

 

There was only one thing wrong with this post. He is right The screen is not the best screen on a laptop not by far. But its all relative. There are no better screens on 14.1in notebooks none they are all about equal on viewing angels. I would not use this as a main screen to game on. But the screen is very bright as bright as sony im not sure how he can say its dim. reall the only brighter screens are ones on like Media center laptops that are over 300 nits i could guess the w3j is about 220-250 nits which is very bright for a laptop. to give an idea the w2v is about 200 nits.

 

Ok Kal your 6 hours are up, start using and give us an update. Some of us are still waiting for reviews.
W3J
or
A8JM