Zenbook U500 Announced: 15.6" HD IPS, GT650M, Quad-Core i7...

also strange that they make you "upgrade" to an Intel 6235 WiFi card. I thought that came stock.

 

I think, as another person also stated, that the options on Xotic PC are copy paste from another model. Or maybe they just like charging extra for what you should get in the first place.

Edit: I have never heard of a model like this one being sold with that many customization options. That is usually reserved for brands like Sager and Clevo. Unless it is sold by the manufacturer itself.

 

..still doesn't make much sense when just adding numbers together, though.

It's not a secret that Apple has huge margins on the hardware they're selling now. The only difference is that they have top of the line models that have .. even higher margins.

Like I said -- mathematically, it makes no sense to suggest that Apple can provide higher quality hardware since they have higher profit margins. It's just utterly counter-intutive, while shooting itself in the foot, while it's up your own bum.

But of course - if you don't know maths, and your customers clearly don't either. Then why not, right?

 

see the problem with your argument is that you diminish the consumer. Mine diminishes the strategy used to hit the consumer.

They used a stupid strategy that would lead them to razor thin margins. Apple didnt. They are not growing as they can, apple is growing. By that simplistic approach its easy to say who was the smart guy.

And you know what? The OEMs agree with me, otherwise the xps line up wouldnt come back (albeit with a series of problems, not that grey inspiron they launched in 2010 and stayed) to what it was, or the envy line up wouldnt be the hit that it is, the razer blade wouldnt be launched, the m14x? another hit!

While we are facing the loss of the pc as an investment tool, to a more a consumable good approach, the price is inverting in the high end spectrum, and sincerely I hope it stays like that.

The higher price doesnt equals to higher quality, but it leads the consumer expectations to that. Since you can use better materials, more custom designs and so forth (yes there is a basic standard for notebook mobos as well, and several other parts are just ''plug and play''), you expect a higher quality. Its like hey I paid one buck for this mcdonalds burguer, but hey I paid 20 bucks for this kobe burger, you expect that the latter would be more satisfying than the former, while both are indeed very similar.

So in the end its not counter intuitive at all, while the mcdonalds will have a penny measured profit margin, the kobe burguer will have a dollar measured profit margin. While still retaining good market position and better materials.

you still pay a high price for enterprise class hardware, what they did was dilute that with several lesser offerings like the vostro, thinkpad edge, probook lines.

Have I mentioned that dilution and pollution of the brand was/is a terrible thing to do? Do you know how many sales hp lost due to the overheating pavillion? or that dell lost due to the inspirons falling apart? The OEMs offer too many products, waste a ton on R&D, have razor thin margins on 98% of their products (98% is an approximation using HP consumer portfolio) and are still hoping to make some bucks?

You see, you blame an entity that is the fuel of inovation, the consumption, your main target. While I blame the ones that cant seen to know basic economics, that put themselves in traps that could be clearly seem.

 

Karamazovmm - I agree wholeheartedly. That PC sales have gone down while Apple is doing well is an indicator of it.

I don't know how many of you follow HP's new fall line up, but they're headed towards some major brand dilution with using the ENVY name more liberally, where if it said ENVY, you know it was intended to be a more premium product. Actually, the June 2012 Envy 15 (paid $1200) that I am returning tomorrow did have excellent build quality and next to my Y470 (paid $900) and you could really see it. I didn't feel this way about the Pavillions.

It is disappointing to see that most shoppers have no idea about a 1080p screen or SSDs. That's why catchy names like "retina" exist, and they put them out there in the numerous Apple stores for people to see. I was really blown away when I got to use a MBPr in store. But when I went to J and R and got to try out various high end PCs like the Vaio S and UX32VD, the screens were also impressive.

In any case, I'm glad Asus is stepping up the game with the UX51, even if it costs a pretty penny. I made the decision late last night to return my Envy 15 and get one. The hardest part about it was that the 2012 Envy 15 really is a good laptop. But software and support are also as valuable as the hardware, and it's unfortunate that HP and AMD as troubled companies means that software updates for the hardware's shortcomings will suffer. The last thing I need to worry about is if my hardware is obsolete because the companies that created them didn't have the resources to keep them relevant.

 

..I'm just pointing out that you, and a remarkable amount of people, think the hardware in a Mac is worth paying a premium for. And you justify it by basically saying: It must be better because it costs more money.

So no, I'm not diminishing anyone. I'm just saying that the idea that a cheaper PC will have lower profit margins is - if you know maths - a completely counter-intuitive proposal.

And you think that Macs don't overheat? Do you know how many Macs I've "rescued" thanks to batteries that stop working, for example, or contact points that physically break off? It's a product that looks beautiful. And it will last for a long while if you treat it nicely, sure. But it's no different from many other quality products.

The difference is that consumers "instinctively know" that they're not going to be disappointed when they buy a Mac. Even if they have nothing else to compare with, and have no idea what sort of problems should be considered acceptable.

Of course! If you just spend more money on a product that used to cost less - that fuels innovation! It's genius!

Also, "It prints money!".

Seriously.. consumers who know **** is a necessary part of how "buying ****" should fuel anything at all. Without informed customers, there's no reason to compete on features or on quality. You could just put out a marketing line and carry everything on that.

 

I think you are way of the mark. And you were diminishing and still are diminishing the consumers.

While I do own my first mac, and probably will own another one in the future, I owned more thinkpads than anything.

Im an enterprise class consumer at heart.

What you didnt notice was what I pointed out, they have some things custom, better choice of materials...., no, I didnt say that they are better in every way or that they dont have any problems. Im always talking about strategies of approach, consumer expectations and what companies are doing to fulfill those with their products and their profit margins.

I hope you dont make any economic insertion plans, because the attribute ''instinctively know'' doesnt make any sense at all. Consumer expectations are different for everyone, but they move towards some points.

I dont know, but you must be one of those guys that dislike 1366*768 screens, that also dislike cheap cases, terrible mushy keyboards (if you are this one kind of person I dont know why you bought the N series), but those were the inovations that brought down the price of the notebooks.

Good inovation was the 2nd envy 15, without ODD, heat problems gone, average battery life (better than the competition at the time, still better than what you have with your n56 and its a 2 year old machine), gorgeous screen, expensive? yes, better than what was offered at the time by all OEMs in the 15'' market (discounting enterprise class)? yes! Thats HP! overheating piece of *** HP! It had 2 major flaws, the keyboard while good enough for me, it had a terrible layout and the trackpad was awful.

You know there is a reason that sony made the Z line and the S line, high end products were they test things and try to trickle down their more mainstream lines, or the xps m1310, the envy 15 (1st and 2nd gen), thinkpad x301 and several other models and lines. You dont put money on R&D when you dont profit from it.

 

:/

Look. I sat in a room once with a guy from Apple. I had the same statistics as he did. I said - well, from what I see here, handsets in general wear out too quickly, which means people are less likely to spend money over a certain pain-threshold on expensive handsets.

The Apple guy said: from what I can see, our handsets sell amazingly well, and the (tiny undocumented) upper segment of the consumer demographic is willing to spend money for a premium product!

Now here's the thing. We were only looking at Apple handset statistics. It didn't even faze the guy when I said that. It didn't matter to him.

But here's how Apple has maintained their image as a premium product:
1. Their customers love their products.
2. Their customers don't play games. They don't overclock, they don't push their systems.
3. Their customers are happy to never do a single upgrade. They love the idea of a computer that is as functional now as it will be in ten years, etc.
4. Their customers have extremely narrow and specific demands, if they have any at all.

Not saying that's a problem. The software on a Mac tends to be good - and you can buy really good software for it (though it's not quite as awesome now that there's no 64-bit PPC land any longer). But if you look at the statistics for returns and failures, returns, etc. from a retailer - then Macs should be lower on the list, considering the way they're used. And you wonder about that - until you own one yourself. It take a while - and then you understand what happens.

But of course - that doesn't matter. Because "customers know best". Specially in focus group testing with leading questions and ten-minute questionnaires.

In the same way - if someone said that "cheaper" laptops fail more often -- because they're used differently. Because they're being run at full burn while playing games, or running simulations, etc. And that overall the quality tends to be just too low on all these laptops, period. Well, then we're suddenly getting to the real problem, you see: that the "solution" to this problem is simply to compete for the specific type of customer who has no requirements, has no demands, and who will use the hardware with ceremonious gentleness.

That's what Asus is doing. That's what HP has been doing for a long while. Lenovo's "enterprise" line is specifically targeted here as well. To customers who don't care if their hardware is throttled because of overheating three seconds after they start a program, etc. Because these customers will be easy to cater to. And these people will have less complaints.

It's the same as with car-insurance, right? Everyone wants the 55-year old widow as a customer.

 

Hey, now ASUS themselves are calling it an Ultrabook: ASUS and You. Incredible Together.

 

Odd. Can't Intel sue them for that? Maybe Asus have made a special agreement with Intel, or maybe they just figure Intel wouldn't sue a manufacturer as important to Ultrabooks as Asus.

Also, can you stop being cagey about the specs now please Asus? Makes me nervous how this page conspicuously doesn't say "IPS" for the UX51's display as it does for the UX31's. Although a good-quality TN panel might be better than an IPS panel with an orange/red issue like the Sony S15.

I'd love to see a trustworthy spec sheet from Asus for the different models of UX51. The specs must be finalized by now.

 

It's now also on GenTech PC--

GenTech PC - Customize System

Interesting here that you can have a 3610QM instead of the 3612QM at no additional charge. Also interesting is the 650M is specified as DDR3 here as well.

 

This one at least specifies the 128GB SSDs as SATA III by default, unlike XoticPC. But really these specifications posted by retailers seem all over the place. I'd like to see what Asus say about the specs.

 

1) You didnt make squat sense
2) you just took that perceptions of apple consumers out of nothing. All of that applies to the other OEMs as well.
3) Its not ''customers knows best'', thats just childish administration bs. envy 15 1st and 2nd gen? Failure in terms of sale and reception. x301? Who is alive today? MBA or x301 derivatives, the x1c is the first since that ''competition'' started. Vaio Z is currently discontinued.

You confused what i said of treating the customers with respect and know the limitations of what each demographics ask, all those that I stated cater to a high demanding public, which you ignore by saying that they dont know better. You enlist that there is a benefit of R&D on low end machines, those that dont bring any kind of profit at all.

Brand pollution is a extremely prejudicial thing, one that HP is fighting and will have to continue to fight, if they stay true to that envy = pavilion refresh. One that dell continues to fight with their insipron line, one that lenovo fights with their ideapad line, one that acer fights, one that toshiba fights. I dont see sony fighting that kind of battle nor apple, nor lenovo in their thinkpad line, nor hp in their elitebook line (well somewhat in this one) or dell in the latitude and precision.

@CCz_Cataphract @zooot ultrabooks are not limited anymore to CULV or ULV cpus, you can put anything in that is from the icore line from ivy, or ulv cpu from SB

 

Asus has been vague/sketchy with the specs. I would only buy this from a retailer who stands behind their product like Best Buy so i don't have to go through them.

It appears to be DDR3 650M, isn't that about the same as 640M DDR5?

 

They keep listing only dual SSD configurations...so frustrating, wasting money for SSD many people don't need...

 

MikeTLB did a preview of this notebook. This screenshot shows DDR5:



Who do we believe: MikeTLB who actually had his hands on the notebook and gave us evidence of some of the internal specs or third-party stores that can't even get information straight or consistent with other retails?

I'll go with my boy, MikeTLB.

 

It really depends which situation you're in. Bandwith versus clock speed here.

The good news is that there are only two model numbers we've primarily seen in the US anyway, DH71 an XH71, and they are shown at Newegg and J and R having DDR5. The inconsistencies are showing up only at the botique online retailers.

 

Unfortunately still no mention of touch screen Zenbooks. Even the Taichi range shows only the 11'' version.
Hope the site gets updated soon.

 

Yeah it would be nice with some finalized tech specs. I think these PCs must have shipped from Asus by now. I really hope it is an IPS screen, will be interesting to see if we get any further information in the coming week. The supposed release date is getting closer and closer. The place I have preordered says they will start shipping at 25th, although it is not confirmed.

 

I don't understand, how can these retailers change the CPU and screen? I doubt that they would copy and paste data from a different laptop, but only correct half the specs. Also, apparently Asus are doing an event on the 23rd?

 

The official specs have not been released by ASUS so most retail sites are just guessing for certain details (DDR3 VS DDR5, SATA II vs SATA III). Take them with a grain of salt.

 

That was still a preview model, maybe if there were too many throttling problems they went with a weaker GPU...

 

If someone is really keen to grab one of these and try it out (and report back ) you should look around and may find a legit retailer that is shipping it early (ie. before the 25th). I have my new Win8 N56VZ now but looking around at various retailers they have it down as a pre-order only until the 26th so I think a mistake was made in letting my order go through now before the launch - and it *might* happen with this model too. Some places probably have it already sitting in their warehouses, just waiting for the goahead.

Peter

RE:

Maybe but the GDDR5 model would take less power but not that much less - though on a 90W PSU with a 35W CPU and 45W GPU - that's not a heck of a lot of power left for the panel and everything else. Same with the HDD, it takes a fair bit more power than a SSD (ref: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sol...sh-storage/645232-ssd-vs-hdd-power-usage.html)

 

With GDDR5, I would have thought there would be less heat.

 

Just spoke to someone at XoticPC. He said that any specs on the site are simply what is provided to them from Asus and not necessarily what will be on the computer when it is released. So I would dismiss the DDR3 GPU and the Sata II for the time being.

 

The specs are finalized, just that the sites arent. Simple as that. Lets hope for the best, and wait for the worst

 

ASUS UX51VZ-CM042P is the top spec for Europe with price of £1800 in the UK.

 

Hmm, Europe gets the i7 3632QM while the USA gets the 3612QM. Not fair!

Still no sign of Canada getting any UX51s at all... sigh. They're probably still working on a special crappy version for us.

 

xoticpc ships to Canada.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

Also paying 1800£ what you pay 1800$ is not "fair"... But it's real

Sent from HTC HD2 with Tapatalk

 

Sounds good, let's see what ASUS says in their event. We can hear it straight from the horse's mouth.

 

It's the other way around. Takes a bit more power, runs at higher internal memory speeds.

 

Sure. If you don't know math. And don't know anything about how computers are built.

That's because all of them were expensive laptops that offer the same or even less as the cheaper variants. Can't work in the end. Only Apple managed to make that work for them - to openly offer a product that is extremely much more expensive than the rest, while using components that are identical to, and of course cost the same, as everything else.

 

I actually know how computers are built, worked in IBM before they sold to lenovo. I also have a BA in economics, International Relations and will soon have a Comp Sci degree. Really, you dont know much about economics, for starters you dont know basic things like trickling down the R&D for the products that are worth the expense to more consumer models, its really not the other way around, or the thing that we call margins, which you completely miss, not to mention the basic concepts of marketing and product placement, along with pricefication and stratification of products along the consumer desire curves. And another thing, If I didnt know math I would be broke right now, since I work at the stock market currently, and Im fairly good at it.

And thats enough.

Actually no. Specs alone arent what makes or breaks things. For example, you have a throttling machine, yet, you could buy a dv6t that doesnt have any of this problems, and costs less, so by what you say, you are ...?

And yes actually the envy 14 and the new envy 15 are great sellers (the 2nd gen envy 15 was a good enough seller), the vaio z2 is another great seller, the vaio SA and s13 are also great sellers, the xps line up is still a great seller, despite the many flaws of the new design and the studio xps design, the m14x is an underpowered piece of lead that still sells extremely well, much like the m11x, but more, I can continue with this list, its quite long. There are several thinkpads, sonys that I didnt even mention.

 

lol Well, bravo.

 

This may be of interest to some people here - a rumour that Apple may announce a 13" Retina MacBook Pro this week:

13" Retina MacBook Pro could be coming at Apple event - Notebookcheck.net News

The 23rd could be quite interesting if Asus and Apple both reveal new lightweight laptops on the same day.

Edit: Apparently the 13" Retina MBP is confirmed:

http://9to5mac.com/2012/10/14/13-inch-macbook-pro-with-retina-display-confirmed-for-apple-event/

Edit: Apparently "confirmed" just means that their usually reliable source said so. We'll see. I'd be interested in this machine but I think a 15" screen is more practical for serious work.

 

New Photos of 13-Inch Retina MacBook Pro Show Battery Layout, Ports, and More - Mac Rumors

here are some pics of it

think of it as a vaio z without the pmd

 

The direction that Windows 8 is heading makes it much better for PC makers to differentiate themselves actually. Mac does not offer touch, and besides that, the MBPr-13 has been rumored to not offer a dGPU. So if anything, it will not compete with the UX51.

 

from the pics of the mobo and the dual fan cooling system, no it wont have a dgpu. The UX51 competitor is the rmbp 15

 

We have to pay import taxes if we buy from the US though, and it could make getting service under warranty more difficult.

 

I think Memory Express or NCIX would be the best bet for Canada then. We should keep an eye out

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

 

Found some benchmark info for i7-3612QM and i7-3632QM.

CLBenchmark - OpenCL Device Comparison

As I can gather this seems more in line with the difference 100 MHz should give, than what passmark showed. Not sure how many tests were done with each processor.

Although looking at Passmark now it seems like we have another sample for i7-3632QM:
PassMark - Intel Core i7-3632QM @ 2.20GHz - Price performance comparison

Where it scored 6978 which is very close to the 6860 average for i7-3612QM.
PassMark - Intel Core i7-3612QM @ 2.10GHz - Price performance comparison

 

Agree to this and agree to nipsen's earlier statement that Apple's success is largely built on customers that " have no requirements, has no demands, and who will use the hardware with ceremonious gentleness" an so have "less complaints".

Every other notebook manufacturer that would present an expensive laptop with a CPU reaching 105°C during a stress test, from 5° to 10° higher than the cheaper competitors and dangerously near to CPU auto-shutdown, would be overwhelmed by criticisms by reviewers and even more by customers.

Apple seems to be immune from this.
Its success is due to a smart choice of the target market, a "sociological" reason much more than good R&D and technical choices.

 

Really want to find out which retailers will stock the UX51 in the UK... Asus UX51VZ-CN035H: Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories seems to come up but is not publicly listed.

 

Is that a conversion or listed price, and if its the latter then where from?

Ditto.

 

Thanks for that information. Where have you got that from?

 

Nope, you do realize its childish to put the responsibility of your failure to others instead of what you could do not happen that again.

And again, all the asus N series suffers from throttling, the studio xps, the current xps 15 suffers from throttling, the m14x r1 suffers from throttling, shall we continue?

horses mouth, straight from intel

 

I hope not to burst your ego, but it's quite clear to me that your unjustified self-esteem constantly leads you to wrong and negligent conclusions.

By the way, I've seen NO other report of Asus N Series throttling apart stress test in Notebookcheck's review of N56VZ (and not at all in N56VM review by the same site!).
Not a single N56 owner has ever reported of thermal throttling even when gaming at high details (throttling on battery is a completely different issue). In fact, N56VZ has a very good reputation even for gaming.
So, you can't mix N series with true fiascos like Dell XPS 15.

Yes, sure ...
A reliable source indication would be really appreciated here.

 

actually, no I didnt even read the review from notebookcheck, its you making assumptions again. Anything else? When it throttles on gaming there is clear problem, when you stress the cpu 100% and the gpu 100% is a different story, and on that it fails, and yes its from an owner of the n56 that I know that. It was quite clear in the end that it would be like that, its the same thing as last year n56, that did throttle, and its something that happened in the entire N line since it was created.

Aside calling me a liar, and didnt even reading up the article about ultrabooks here in nbr, do you have anything that is even solid to add here?

 

So you consider the same thing to show throttling in just ONE stress test (and in NO OTHER real-world case ever reported) and to show throttling (or even auto-switching off!) even in medium details games like XPS 15 do?
Quite interesting (about your reasoning at least!).

Which article?
The one that says "Here are Intel's requirements for the current generation (Chief River) of Ultrabooks: ... Processor: Ivy Bridge microarchitecture Intel Core Models CULV"?
What is an Ultrabook?

Why do you force me to emphasize that you wrote in such a flat way "ultrabooks are not limited anymore to CULV or ULV cpus, you can put anything in that is from the icore line from ivy, or ulv cpu from SB"? :thumbsup:
Next year, with low-TDP Haswells, I wouldn't be surprised to see that but at present I've never seen such a statement by Intel or anywhere on the net.
But If you have good sources you could show them, of course, otherwise ...

BTW, I didn't call you a liar no more than I call a liar your "Intel source".
But in a chat there are many ways in which each other statements could be misunderstood (timing, for example).