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

Fair enough DvP/Mac, I still expect australian pricing to be high because retailers/firms here are notorious for charging whatever they like because they can get away with it

Haha, if only.... quantum based storage/computing.... drooooool.

 

I LOL'd hard

 

First amazon shop in Germany lists the 500GB version of the notebook "on stock". Of course they raised the price to €2.124,20 but the "normal" amazon price is still on 1999€. Date was removed and set to "available soon". At least it looks like a real launch

Edit:
3 other shops change the information to "on stock" now
One is stupidly expensive and the 2 others show 1999€ for the 500GB option (no touch of course:
http://www.notebook.de/index.php?section=shop&group=1743&productid=51086
http://www.notebooksbilliger.de/asu...fcampaign_id=45c48cce2e2d7fbdea1afc51c7c6ad26

Edit2:
One shop dropped the price already to 1.930,00 EUR but "not yet available".

 

TigerDirect will be in-stock the second full week of November (i.e. maybe around the 14th)

 

By the way, the site pointed out by DvP has the specs in great detail, and since the mark the item as 'In stock' one could rely on them. Just browser to the end of the webpage.
UX51vz specs

Interesting thing is, they still mention 8 cell battery with 90W.

 

They also mention:

Main memory
Size 8 GB
Technology DDR3 SDRAM
Clocking PC3 12800 (1600 MHz)
max. Expansion to no extension possible
Installed 2 of 2 modules

I hope that just means you can't expand the memory without removing one of the modules and replacing it with a larger one, but that's a couple of places now that have listed the maximum memory as 8GB.

 

on the same site

Abmessungen 380 x 254 x 6-20 mm (mm)
Akkuleistung 4750 mAh
Gewicht 2.2 kg
Hinweis 8 Zellen Akku, 90 Watt

4750 * 14.8 = 70300 mW

 

W(att) is no mesurement unit for battery capacity anyway. Therefore I expect that they are referring to the power supply.

I did no find the UX51VZ now in the German Asus download database but sadly nothing that contains specs. Only the confirmation that it is a VGA port (what was sure already). Sadly they have something like a unified manual for multiple notebooks as it looks.

Addtitionally the UX52 and UX51VZA is also listed in the download database but there are no files so far.

 

I was hoping that they missed the 'hr' in 90W. But upon checking other sites, it's true what DvP says. It is really the specification of the AC adapter.

Compared to the MBP retina's amperage of 8460 mAh, 4750 mAh sounds paltry. Unless ASUS has built the laptop really really efficient than normal (impossible).

 

Cyberport.de says 1679 € 512 GB and 1427 € the one with 256 GB °_°

 

Check again, it's the same 1999 and 1699.

 

For me are still 1679 € and 1427 € °_°

 

I'm enough sure that these prices are without VAT.

Inviato dal mio GT-I9100 con Tapatalk 2

 

This is what i display on my browser

 

I think "netto" means without tax.

Inviato dal mio GT-I9100 con Tapatalk 2

 

For some reason I still see 1999 and 1699.
In any case 1679 + 0.19*1679 = 1999. Same is true for the other 1427 + 0.19*1427 = 1699.

It's the 19% VAT.

 

..does it come with a suite and an escort for an evening, or something like that?

 

Look on the right-hand side picture on the total sum. It is excluding VAT.

 

Damn you, let me dream a little more

 

Meanwhile Intel has updated its drivers for HD3000 and HD4000, allowing for an HDMI 1.4 port to support upto 4K (4096x2048) display!
New Intel HD3000 and HD4000 drivers

And UX51 has an HDMI 1.4 port.

 

My goodness, it's the future! And Anandtech and Engadget will declare that Intel invented 4k resolution tomorrow on the frontpage.

 

1234567890

 

Even with that, if the GT650M is powering the HDMI port, does Intel supporting that through it's card help in this case?

Peter

 

If the HDMI port is directly powered by the GT650, then it anyway would support upto 3840x2160 resolution.
Nvidia GeoForce GT650

 

Doesn't really matter either way now peoples can just be happy.

^^Too much Halloween candy

 

All specs we know about:

CN021H - 3612, 500GB - CN
CN025H - 3612, 2x128 - PL
CN032H - 3612, 2x128 - UK
CN035H - 3612, 2x256 - DE
CN036H - 3612, 2x128 - DE
CN038H - 3612, 500GB + 128GB - UA
CN046H - 3612, 2x128 - North Europe

CM039P - 3632, 2x128 - ZA
CM042P - 3632, 2x256 - CZ
CM054H - 3632, 2x128 - CN

DH71 - 3612, 2x128 - US
XH71 - 3612, 2x256 - US

 

I'm interested at CM039P - 3632, 2x128, but if you search it on Google, you find only Sud African sites and in the specs RAM is DDR3 1333MHz

Price is 1833€ included VAT at 14%

 

So if you take all of these, and you add the two US models (DH71 and XH71), and then you add the touch versions that we still know nothing about, you get possibly 14 versions of the same laptop (which goes under two names, U500VZ and UX51VZ), none of which are the SSD+HDD version that most people want to buy, all of which are painfully expensive, and none of which are actually available for delivery yet. In Canada we have zero models so far, and no idea what we'll get or at what price. What is the point? Why do Asus feel the need to confuse all their potential customers?

 

Whatever happened to the 128Gb SSD + 500GB HDD combination? Wasn't that originally announced as the base model for the ux51?

 

i hate how all damn companies have to have fatal flaws. hp had quality inspection flaws for the envy, sony with build quality, apple with price and not interchangable parts. same thing happens with the cellphone industry. if only there was a perfect company. that would be the most successful

 

guess thats life with how companys operate now. assembly lines are terribly hard to control, so its understandable to have a percentage of computers with flaws. but like with dell and their XPS15 debacle, that was clearly dell management pushing out a product before full testing had been completed. that computer had a lot of potential in the premium arena of PC notebooks, but failed miserably.

asus is pretty good overall, but they really need to get their act together on this ux51vz launch, or they're gonna have people moving onto different manufacturers.

 

^

Tech industry moving so quickly these days, and the fact that a lot of design is about compromise. Sad state of things yea, but just something we have to live with.

I've pretty much written off the U500vz. It looks like Asus Australian haven't picked it up for sale Q4 2012 (calls to Sales today said they have gotten their Q4 sales packs and the U500VZ isn't listed - was told to call back in 1-3 weeks and see if it's changed).

Plus with the preorder/sales prices, it's going to be expensive. MacBook Pro expensive.

Now to try and find a suitable alternative. If the XPS15 wasn't so broken i'd probably jump on that, but who knows, they might fix the wifi issues :\

So far my options are (Given requirements, slim/light/well build, 15.6" 1080P IPS panel, i7, SSD/ability to put SSD, Dedicated GPU):

Deal with thickness/weight/TN panel: Asus N56
Deal with thickness/weight: Clevo P150EM/Other clevos (since can spec IPS panel)
Deal with 640M LE: Sony S Series 15 + install own SSD
Wait for wifi issues to be fixed and deal with TN panel: Dell XPS15
Deal with price: MBPR

Not sure what other options there are?

Get a smaller screen: Asus 13" Zenbooks/Lenovo X1C/HP Spectre/other ultrabooks

Or, slam an SSD into my current notebook (Dell Studio 1555), and just deal with the ty build quality, horrible trackpad, weight/dimensions, useless battery life and fairly inaccurate screen :\ :S

 

That seems to be about it. I'm considering sticking with my old machines until the next MacBook release and/or Haswell, but that requires patience, which I'm not very good at.

 

Same position as you are in and my top contenders for 15/17


RMBP 15" 4.4lbs
expensive, 650+ ddr5, probably best build and warranty, generally no user upgrades

Asus UX51 15" 4lbs
650 ddr3, expensive

MSI GE60 (15" 5.28lb)
660m. quality?, repair?, not shipping yet from xoticpc?

FORCE QAL51-HD (15" - 5.51 lbs)
nvidia 650 ddr3, quality?, repair?

Gigabyte P2542G (15" 5.73)
nvidia 660, quality, repair?

MSI 16GA 15" 5.85lbs
660m, quality?, repair?

Clevo W350ETQ 15" 5.95lbs
660m, quality?, repair?

====
MSI GE70 17" 5.95
660m quality?, repair?

Samsung Series 7 (17" 6.3lbs)
nvidia 650 ddr3, repair?

Razer Blade (17" 6.6lb)
expensive, 660m, quality?, repair?, generally no user upgrades

 

Yea, I want a laptop for when I travel over the summer (leaving early december, tho I could probably leave it until later and pick it up when I go home for Christmas).... doesn't make things easy :\

Cheapest solution is probably just throw an SSD in my current laptop, but i'm at the point where I just want to throw it out the window, useless piece of junk.

Yea, I'm dubious about the majority of those listed because they're 'gaming' machines, that are just ugly, and for whatever reason the manufs think that 'thin and light' means 3kg+ and 40mm+ :S Plus dubious about the build quality too (especially the MSI/Gigabyte/Clevo's - tho i've heard the Clevo's are supposed to be fairly decent).

:\

 

Its not MacBook Pro expensive. The cheapest 15 inch MBP is €1949 this only has has 512mb GPU, no SSD, 4GB RAM. For UX51VZ you can get SSD, 2GB GPU and 4GB RAM for €1699, that's €250 cheaper for a better laptop, just looking at specs and it also built for windows.

 

did you guys see this?

ASUS UX51VZ-XH71 - XOTIC PC - 15,6" ASUS Zenbook Prime

if you click customize you wil see very detailed specs also you will learn that you can buy this laptop for 6k+ dolars if you go with full specs .

 

I wouldn't expect you to read all 1300+ entries here but I think it has been discussed before that XOTIC allows people to customize everything and then when they have the product, they start limiting what you can customize. Someone pointed out that you can't customize anything on the UX31 or UX21, can't remember which. So you won't be able to customize everything and I don't think you will get it for 6k+ dollars.

We are all still waiting on some confirmation on detailed release specs (touch or no touch screen???), release date and reviews.

My patience is running out though ...

 

At least you had the patience to reply to the chap and help him out. Good going man .:thumbsup:

The goal is near.

 

Completely agree. It is absolutely amazing, how Apple have been able to create such high quality laptops - while the rest is just sub par. Linus torvalds just commented recently about laptop resolution and how Tablets and phones are improving much faster than laptops. Essentially, we've had the same resolution in laptops for 5 years+ ?

Is it too much to ask for a high quality laptop that can game - yet be thin and light as well as well designed and beautiful ?

 

Yea it pretty much is. Let's compare US (preliminary) prices for simplicity sake.

MacBook Pro 15" Retina: $2199/$1999 EDU (i7-3610QM, 8GB 1600Mhz, 256GB SSD, GT650M w/ 1GB GDDR5)
U500VZ-DH71: ~$1900 (i7-3612QM, 8GB 1600Mhz, 2x128GB SSD in RAID0, GT650m w/ 2GB GDDR5)

So it's *basically*, as near as makes no difference, the same price. Essentially the same CPU, same amount of RAM, technically the SSDs in the U500VZ will be faster since it's in RAID0, but that comes with disadvantages (TRIM is slower, and the risk of failure is higher), same video card with 2gb vs 1gb of VRAM.... however the MBPr has a much higher resolution screen, it goes without saying that it will also be better made, longer battery life and a much better warranty/support network.

So, like I said, the differences are as near as makes no difference.

Sure the MBP is built for OSX, but it's the same hardware, it should run either OS just as well.

Soooo yea, makes it a lot harder to choose between.... but maybe i'm not the target audience, it's the perfect laptop for me (the U500VZ... well, either, actually), just ~$500 too much.

^

XoticPC has been discussed before, and yea, from what I understand it's just prelim specs, I doubt the end product will be that customizable.

 

+1 internet points for wildrabbit.

I know right. That being said the MBPR is not without it's issues, but they're a lot easier to deal with than some of the other companies (like the XPS15 wifi fiasco, and Asus's inability to launch products properly)

 

This is a very important point, which many try to discount. MBP retina is more or less the same hardware. It should be able to run Windows 8 as good (if not better) as the Asus UX51VZA. And let's not get embroiled in the 'no good drivers available' etc. issues.

 

That may be so, but what many seem to be forgetting is that you'll be running windows on too high of a resolution for windows to handle. If you need to set DPI settings to 200 many apps will look weird. I encounter that behaviour when its even set to 150% scaling..

 

Agreed, but most of the 'standard' applications scale quite OK. So this is not a major issue. More or less purely software issue which could be resolved independent of the hardware.

High res apps would soon be the mainstay.

 

Thanks to wildrabbit for the clearance about the exotic.

I don't know this was also discussed but aren't you guys aware of the Image Retention issue with mbpr.
if you are not, you can read the 350+pages of discussion from here:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4034848?start=0&tstart=0

it had 500K+ views before but apple admins resetted the view count so it has only 10K+ now.

 

At least for me, the MBPr screen is still too glossy even though it is definitely reduced from prior versions since it doesn't have the glass over the LCD. I tried it out, wanted to like it so bad, but I just couldn't. For a lot of people, this isn't a determining factor. But some of us need matte.

 

In mbpr, LG displays are the ones that shows image retention. It is told that even though some of the samsung displays are fine some of them have yellow tinting.

If the u500 doesn't come with big problems it will be superior to the rmbp i think.

 

Asus needs to get this product out the door. If the Retina Macbook Pro had come with a 1080p screen I would have gone for one even without Optimus. I've been waiting to buy since the end of August

U500VZA please, now. If I wait much longer I really will be buying a MacBook Pro.

I noticed that someone above mentioned the XPS L521x, but they said they wanted an IPS screen. The XPS has a TN screen, that is of middling quality at best. I also had 2 different units and both had very annoying dead pixels. If you're looking for an excellent screen it's not an option.

 

Windows 8 is better equipped to deal with HighDPI screens (at least in Metro).....

Like I said, I know the MBPR has issues (i've heard throttling and as someone pointed out, ghosting issues) - but their warranty/support service is top notch, they've got Apple stores in pretty much every major city (hell, we've got 2 apple stores and i'm in a capital city in Australia).

The only thing not standard about it is the trackpad (and drivers exist for that), keyboard hardkeys and potentially the battery/profiles/power management... everything else is standard (sure, custom fab, but standard chipsets, standard cpus/gpus/wifi modules, etc etc etc)....

Yea I know it has a TN panel, that (and the current withstanding wifi/throttling issues) is what's holding me back.... otherwise I like it's styling, looks well built etc. Ah wells.

I think the Sony S15 screen is too flimsy for my liking (seen a few youtube videos where there is a severe amount of flex even just opening the screen - not good).... which sucks because I think besides the U500VZ that was my next best alternative.

Really not sure what to do now