V6va's w/ 128mb ATI x700 / 1024mb RAM / 100gb HDD Now available!

PRO, do you find that the 4200 HD is slowing down the system in any noticable way? And just out of curiosity, how much would one of those 7200 replacement drives cost?

This is ALMOST the perfect laptop!

 

I haven't used a 4200rpm drive in 5 years....... it's going to slow down read and write speeds, which aren't really going to affect the type of people who are buying this for office work....... which surprising enough, there are a lot of them even though this is a powerhouse of a system.

We'd sell an 80gb/7200rpm at about $260 and a 100gb for about $100 more.

 

Some more of these came in today... we've got under a dozen left towards the end of the day today... more will be in Tuesday I believe.

 

*UPDATE*

The new V6va does indeed have a 2 year warranty....... I noticed that my unit showed a "24 month global warranty" on the palmrest and I spoke to Asus about it. They said they ordered it with a 1 year, but it came with a two... so market it with a 2 year. So that should be good news to most people.

 

someone please buy my 2 month old w3 dammit

thought this was expected till after jan which is why i didnt wait
oh well

 

This was *always* aimed at Q4 and for the last two months or more I've been saying Thanksgiving time..... so, it was a week early!

 

Did you just say ASUS and early in the same sentence?! *faints*

 

LOL!

So true djembe, so true

 

*NEW UPDATE*

I found out why I like the V6va's screen so much... it's the same screen that's in one of my older L5's........ It's what used to the called the ACEview........ but is now called the "colorshine w/ IPS". This is a screen that is only regular ratio, but bar none, the BEST lcd panel I've ever used. Asus said this is a limited quantity type thing and may not overlap to next year because the cost and availability just don't make it practical. Not to diminish the great screens on the W2/W3/W5.... but this is BETTER!

 

Just for those not in the know.... IPS is "in-plane switching" and what makes it nice is it lines up the liquid crystals perpendicular to the screen.... what this does is drastically improve vertical viewing angles so that they're close to what the horizontal angles are......

 

Saw this thread, because of that called proportable and asked a few questions the other day. I would have ordered one of these immediately, but he guy on the phone made me feel like I was inconvenienceing him by asking a few simple questions. Will find one elsewhere now...

 

... I'm sorry you feel that way, but none of our people would make anyone feel like that and if were they must have been misunderstood. If you call between 1-2pm EST, and asked if an order placed at that time could get out that day, then the reaction could have seemed that way. Orders must be in by noon to get out to FedEx by 2pm and that's on our site. Every single day everyone seems to call around that time and expects their order to ship that same day.... it gets taxing on all of us because everyone is doing their part to get orders out for the day and it seems that people ordering late in the day can't wait for the next day either.

So, one of those people happened to be you, I apoligize on behalf anyone you would have spoken to, but I listen to most of what goes on all day and "inconvenienced" is the last thing anyone should seem to be. I'm sure eventually you can find this somewhere else, but you're not going to get a member discount from anyone but us. Let me know if I can help you.

 

Wow, sorry to hear that, I had the exact opposite exeperience. I must have emailed Justin a half-dozen times with a bunch of questions, and I usually got a response within a few hours, or at most one day turn around. Called sales to ask a question on Saturday, and spent the next half-hour chatting with Sean about the V6Va versus a Z70va, and he helped me finally decide on the V6Va. When I emailed them about wanting to upgrade to 2day shipping (I had been thinking I was still ordering the z70va, which wouldn't have made it before thanksgiving no matter what shipping option due to build time), they not only did so, but they did it for free since Sean remembered me saying exactly that.

Unit arrived today, slight wear and tear on outer box (thanks Fedex ), but the inner box was fine. SEXY laptop, very happy with it so far. It's reinstalling xp pro as we speak (I'm a control freak ).

So, point is, ProPortable is a fantastic place to buy an Asus lappy from

 

Thanks Bullhead.... You've always got to take a little care when it comes to shipping...... With the way they handle packages there's a reason it's package as it is, suspended like that in the middle of the box. The outside box could get trashed and dropped and the laptop will still be ok....... although I'd rather here "slight wear and tear" then: "It looked like Ace Ventura delivered it".

Enjoy....... that's my new favorite system!

 

Congrats Bullhead!
That IS a darn sexy lappy you got there...
*V6Va envy*

 

Bullhead, PICS AND REVIEW! POST-HASTE! :asus:

Congrats

 

I dunno what all the hype about the V6va is all about. I thought this would be the Turion incarnation of the z70va, but it turns out it's only an ensemble unit...

Why all the love? Sure it looks great but so does my z70va

*pats z70va, there there, you're still beautiful*

 

Steve - when you said you thought it would be an "turion incarnation.... but then it's only an ensemble" ... That doesn't really make any sense. But as a "refresh", it technically makes the unit better than your Z70va with an IPS screen...... IPS technology basically makes the glaretype screen which was developed to have great brightness and color reproduction like a CRT monitor...... basically have all the viewing angles of a CRT as well...... It's a wicked screen and it just makes the V6 series that much better. It almost seems wrong to have this much power and technology in this thin of a laptop.

 

ohh ok, a great screen, that definitely would be an upgrade, and i guess it's thinner (haven't checked). makes more sense now.

Oh, and when I meant a "turion incarnation". I thought it would have an AMD CPU rather than intel...lol, i thought that's what the v vs z meant for some reason...but with everything else the same as the z70va, really wanted an AMD, but darn intel cornered the laptop market.

Lol, oh sorry, i forgot to mention...I didn't realize there was a v6v out there before, and this was a refresh version...i thought it was a play on letters from z70va -> v6va... dunno what i was thinking...

 

Well the only few things that could make the Z70va "better" .... widescreen, portbar option, modular bay........ but basically what I always loved about the V6 series is that it was all of what I loved about the old M6n/ne models... but thinner... and yeah... it's a lot thinner if you actually could see them next to each other.

Well Asus could make a turion based ensemble... the models would end is "z" or "k" most likely...... I don't see this being a turion any time soon though.

 

Yeah! Here in Norway it seems I have to wait a few weeks for the V6Va, so someone have to tell me if its worth hanging on...
Interesting details would be:
* Are the fans, especially the GPU fan, as noisy as the Z70Va?
* Does the fans shut up the same way as the Z70Va if undervolting and configuring speedfan correctly?
* What temperatures do you get from playing BF2 for a few hours?
* What do you get on 3DMark05?

EDIT: and it really doesn't have DVI nor SVHS?

 

LOL. I'll see what I can do, this weekend is crazy and I need it for doing some work with.

Briefly:

Laptop mid-upper right side does get hot at max performance, definately not pleasant on the lap. Lower right gets warm during heavy HD usage, but nothing uncomfortable. DVD-drive is fairly quiet during normal operation. Keyboard is good, no complaints about it. Touchpad operation is nice, although the scroll feature isn't always the easiest to get to work. Only complaint here would be the keys themselves, as I find myself having trouble getting clicks to always work if I try to use my thumb (b/c the key has very little movement near the top, most of the click movement is nearer the bottom). Gonna go pickup a wireless/bluetooth mouse in the near future.

The screen is incredible. I can see the screen pretty **** clearly at any vertical angle, haven't played around too much at horizontal angles. Picture is gorgeous, default res is 1400x1050 (iirc, on desktop atm). Sadly, there is one tiny bad pixel in the middle, but I had to go looking for it to find it (it's ONLY visible on a pure black background, and even then it's hard to see). I'll send it off for replacement in another week or two when I can, so we'll see how well Asus handles their ZBD warranty.

Opening and closing of the lid is fairly effortless, and no latching involved. The top of the battery looks like a part of the case, you woudln't even know that's the batty you're looking at.

Weight is nice, Light enough to easily carry around, but not so light I'm afraid my clumsy *** will break it .

Laptop comes with Nero 6, AsusDVD, PowerDirector Pro, Medi@Show, and Norton Internet Security 2005 (A/V, firewall, and spam blocker). Also includes a winxp pro (sp2) restore cd, which does not require the restore partition to still exist. Oddly enough, they install xp pro on a fat32 partition (which is dumb). I nuked it and did a clean install of xp pro sp2 myself, not that the pre-installed one was bloated (nothing extra besides what I listed above), I'm just a control freak .

Anyway, that's about it for now, I'll try to get some pics when I'm back home, and maybe some updated impressions later.

 

Not loud at all, from what I've noticed. I'm waiting to see how audible it is in a quiet classroom (I'll find out Monday on that). First laptop I've ever owned, so I can't compare it to much.

Haven't played with any of this yet, still getting used to it

Don't own BF2 But did play Civ4 for awhile last night, and it didn't seem abnormally hot (forgot to check temps, I'll try to remember next time).

If I have it at home I'll check. Not a real big fan of 3DMark, as it has little to no basis in real gaming.

VGA only (firewire too if you want).

 

How about heat dissipation through the wrists? I just saw some infrared photos of the V6Va that seemed to indicate that the area around the right wrist got pretty hot. Do you notice anything, for instance when running CPU/GPU on max for some time?

Is the glossy screen just good for video, or is it OK also for regular work? I will be putting in long hours of programming on the laptop, so eye-strain is definitely not acceptable.


Basically:...should I get this over the Z70va/M6Va?

 

i dont see any reason to pick the v6va over the z70va unless weight and size is an issue.

 

Area to the right of the touchpad gets rather hot during heavy use (So far I've been pretty much on A/C power at max performance). Wouldn't want to leave my hand on it for too long. During gaming (Civ 4), this is not a laptop you would actually want on your lap, it's **** hot on the bottom right (upper). However, I still have yet to hear the fan at all, so I guess that's the tradeoff.

Seems to idle in windows at aroun 58-60c, and after 2hrs civ4 it was around 75c. Fan at 60c is usally 2400rpm, and at 75c it was 3400 rpm (all reported thru ASUS probe).

Screen's great, except for outside in heavy sun (very reflective).

 

Does that mean that the wrist receives a lot of heat? I have been working on a Dell D600 the last year, which heats up the left wrist a lot. REALLY don't want to have another laptop with that problem..:-/

 

If my V6 gets hot I bet the V6a must be even hotter because of the more powerful graphics card (even thought it has new heat pipe). It’s so much power under such a small hood , so I guess it’s expected. I really dig the new screen though. I wish Asus refreshed V6V as is, but with the new screen…

 

... the graphics can really be controlled..... and the "heat" is going to come from the hard drive........ almost impossible to eliminate all warmth with what is about 1/32" thick space between your hand and the hard drive and a sheet of aluminum between them.