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

The author of this video is MikeTLB and he has already posted it here.

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Defiantly set on this as a future upgrade. Giving myself it as a reward once I pass my MCSE and CCNA exams in about 6 months. Probably will be new models out by then, but good to see a high end cpu and graphic cards in these ultrabooks finally.

 

Thank you very much Mike!!!
Youtube: Asus Zenbook U500 gaming performances

...sadly no details about throttling :-/

Testing the audio system on the Asus Zenbook U500 - YouTube
-> Audio quality

 

Thanks for the links and thanks Mike for making the vids .

Question, I definitely need a mic/headphone connected at the same time to the multi port. Does your package include such an adapter in the box?

Thanks,
Peter

P.S. Does the subwoofer sound any different if it is not on top of the actual laptop as in the bid? It would make it very difficult to use in normal use in that position between the user and the KB.

 

Just a curiosity...what is the boot time with windows 8 + SSDs in raid 0?? microsecs??

 

my XPS 15 does 10 seconds so I am VERY curious to see what this does

 

Your xps is with ssd or with msata? If msata, do you use it as cache (IRS) or did you install the whole w8 in it?

 

full size SSD, my XPS came with the Samsung 830


On that note....does anyone know if the Asus uses full size SSD or mSATA?

 

They are full size SSDs

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U500 has two 2.5" bay.

Someone has write in the comments of Mike's unboxing video that:
ASUS' Zenbook U500 will see release in November and has a recommended price of €1599 (£1270).

If it's true then we can hope a lower price than recommended price, usually it happens always that.

Mike can you take a picture (macro) of a screw of the bottom?
If it's possible can you tell to us the model of intel WiFi card or if has U500 bluetooth?

 

The only info about throttling that Mike has said was during playing Crysis 2 and he has said a little throttling is happened.

 

When? I only heard that fps were low and he changed to a lower level of detail

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Asus Zenbook U500 gaming performances - Skyrim, Crysis, Dirt 3 and NFS Unleashed 2 - YouTube

minute 3:50

From YouTube:

 

Just answered on youtube

lol written together

 

So, it looks pretty acceptable from what I see in the video/comments. We'll probably just need a cooling pad or a flat surface -- that's not glass

 

A cooling pad should do wonders with so many vents on bottom and the aluminum base.

 

Are you sure? I've lived under the impressions that it comes with module SSDs, just like the UX31A.

I've tried searching for the SSD based on its Model Code and I couldn't find anything about it.

Anyway, here's my post: Asus Zenbook U500 - an in-depth preview . There's also the video on Youtube, but the details are in the post. Please excuse any typos, it's a bit late here and it's been a long day.

Hopefully I've managed to address all the questions and did not draw any wrong conclusions. If I did, just leave a comment on the site or here, i'll check them tomorrow morning.

As for the throttling.. have a look at the heat and noise section in that review. I also have the logs for crysis but I'm not going to make them public, I promised Asus I'm not going to, before they sent me this early sample. BTW, don't forget this was a sample... that's why I did not draw any final conclusions for my post and that's why I did not call it a review.

 

Hi,

I also thought that it has dual 2,5" bay. This is the text from the press release:

"Flexible storage choices mean the ZENBOOK U500VZ can meet a variety of application needs. Dual SSD drives deliver outstanding performance with up to 512GB capacity, while the combination of a 128GB SSD and 500GB hard drive offer the perfect balance between high-performance and high-capacity storage. "

Could also be 128GB mSata SSD to be honest.

 

Hmmm, true. I got a bit confused by the fact that SIW Pro, a software suggested by someone above, says that the disks are NOT Removable... Cand 2.5" drives be Not removable or is the software wrong (i'm leaning for the latter)

 

Asus launching u500 in Russia at the end of september. Recomended price from 1900€!!! That's insane. You can buy retina macbook for that price. Not sure if i still want t buy it.

 

Can your Asus rep tell you if that's the case?

I want to know if i can use my Samsung 830 SSD on this, that way i can just buy the lower base model and install my own

 

THANKS a lot!

 

I'll ask, but I doubt he'll be able to help without actually removing that back panel.

 

bummer about the over heat and throttling

my last laptop died from over heat so I'm scared of anything that can reach 95C+ during gaming.

 

Where does this news come from??
Anyway, I'm not too worried about throttling:

and the screenshots show cpu and gpu running in turbo boost after 1 hour of Crysis

 

Asus has never been shy with their pricing. The Zenbook Prime costs $1100 for the lowest configuration. The N56VZ has gone around for $1000. The G55 series retails for at least $1200. We should expect a minimum of $1900, perhaps even more.

What an interesting cooling system we have here. I've never had a laptop fan exhaust fumes in front of the display. More often I see ventilation on the sides or rear. Of course I was expecting the laptop to get hot, now the question is how sweaty my palms are going to get during gameplay. Am I going to be able to toast Quiznos sandwiches on the palm rest?

 

im thinking starting price around 1.6k not at 1.9k also, my envy has vents in the back that when the display is open, they are infront of it. i can assure u that it doesnt get hot at all. only section u might consider "hot" is right next to the hinge where the gpu is located but not enough to toast stuff lol . I think the regular mbp also has same fan output

 

definitely not. the palm rest and keyboard only get merely warm. The upper rim, just near the screen's hinge, gets very hot, but you're never going to touch that one, so it's alright

 

People should really stop suggesting high prices and saying what to expect especially when nobody really knows. Just wait a month.

 

Well said!

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First of all, thanks again to MikeTLB for his very good work.

My first thoughts after the preview:

- the true performance boost is given by RAID 0 SSDs configuration (which in addition supports TRIM).
HD Tune results seems to be what you should expect from a well-tuned SSD couple in RAID 0 (about 1000 MB/s in sustained transfer), so I think it's all ok here. Well done, Asus.
I hope (and I think) that RAID 0 SSDs will be more and more common in notebooks (and not just in ultrabooks), even if it means to give up to internal optical drives when needing two disk bays (as usually is in notebook with size smaller than 17").

- battery is rather disappointing for a 74 Wh unit. It seems to be on a par with N56VZ (very similar CPU and GPU), that however uses a 56 Wh battery. I hope it's just a software tuning problem on this pre-production unit.

- temperature is higher than I expected, especially since I've read U500 has two fans and not just one (confirmed?).
95°C CPU temp when gaming (and not in Prime95+Furmark stress test), although in a demanding game such as Crysis 2, seems to me a little bit worrying and, possible throttling apart, I hope it doesn't have bad effects on hardware in long gaming sessions.
Anyhow, this was a "prototype" unit. A further and more complete check (including the now "forbidden" stress test) is needed on production units.

- the included external optical DVD-RW is a boon but I hope that using two USB ports is not always mandatory, since U500 has just three USB ports (shame for a 15.6" model, even for an ultrabook it doesn't seems to me so small to lack room on sides for an additional USB). I have an external Samsung optical drive which has a double USB power cable but usually just one USB connection is enough.

- screen seems quite gorgeous (and without orange- or blue-gate!) but the fact it's not completely matte (i.e. not so-matte as other good panels, even TN ones) reduce its appeal to me.

- glad to read that Wi-Fi is good, since there has been lately some complaints for recent Asus models such as N56VZ with Atheros wireless adapter.


All in all, U500 seems to me a great laptop which likely boosts some future trends (like SSDs as standard equipment or RAID 0 SSDs) but that really would benefit from expected technological advances like lower consumption/heath components (mobile Haswell?), more than other not-so-slim notebooks.
But, of course, a better and more pondered judgement needs more in-depth tests on a production unit.

 

Mike, can you tell us if the bottom screw are Torx type:

Torx - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://www.google.it/search?q=scre...QC9DAtAaPz4C4AQ&ved=0CDIQsAQ&biw=1066&bih=820

 

yep, torx screws

 

You're no fun at all. We do know how much the main competitor, the Retina MacBook Pro, costs. I assume the price will be close to the Retina. Given Asus's previous pricing habits, they are likely to charge a bit of a premium for their higher-end models. The Zenbook Prime was about $100 more expensive than a MacBook Air with similar hardware. So even though we don't "know" the number, we can make an educated guess.

Believe it or not, there are many people out there who have fun by correctly predicting a price. It's interesting to have debates over prices before they are confirmed. This is a speculation thread, and we're speculating what the price will be. I think you just don't want to accept the inevitable, that the Zenbook U500 will be too expensive for anyone to consider over a RMBP.

 

So you're going to make the assumption that the people smart enough to accomplish the beast that is the u500, won't be smart enough to price it competitively?

 

First of all I don't mind if you want to guess what the price will be, but it's one thing to say what you think it might be and another when you tell people what they should expect. As if you knew.

And secondly U500's competitor is not just rMBP. What about Sony Vaio S15? Similar specs, weight and starts at $1250. Unlike Apple who has blind followers willing to pay whatever Apple asks them Asus usually prices their products on what they're actually worth. I get that this is a premium laptop and that it will be more expensive. Personally I have no problem paying more for the specs I'm after. But I'm sure it will all depend on the configuration. You said that Zenbook primes start at $1100. False. You can buy the UX32A for $700. True the specs are low end but that's what Asus does again unlike Apple. They offer several different configurations so that people have a choice and are not forced to buy one single model that the company believes is what everybody will want. And for the $1100 UX31A you're getting a way better FHD IPS panel than what you'd get in Macbook Air so of course they can charge a bit more for that.

 

the sony s15? 640m LE, with DDR3 vram. it really aint a competitor, its like saying that he xps15 is a competitor to the cmbp. Not even close. Its like saying the sony z2 is a competitor to the asus u36, those guys are miles and miles apart from each other

the only competitor to the u500 is the rmbp, and yes I think its going to be around 1800, that is still priced competively.

 

You're more than welcome to think whatever you like. All I was saying is for people to stop saying how much we should expect it to cost because nobody knows. That's it. Unless you have some insider information and if that's the case please enlighten us.

And I also said that the specs are similar not the same. Do you actually think the jump between 640m LE and 650m warrants $600 difference in price tag? By your analogy the U500 and rmbp are miles away too as U500 only has 1920x1080 where as the rmbp has 2880x1800.

Anyway off topic back to the specs.

 

I think comparaison with Vaio SVS 15 is a good comparaison. This is sensibly the same spec ( Screen full Hd, 3612qm, graphic card middle class, light and thin.)

The Asus seems better than the Vaio fot the Screen, a little bit for the graphic card and i think the audio. But it seem heat a lot and the Vaio has a better autonomy (for the moment).

 

The screen of U500 is exactly the same IPS panel produced by LG used in Sony vaio S15.
According to notebookcheck S15 is capables to keep its base clock during stress test so it hasn't throttling problem.
At this moment we don't have any specific info about possible heat problem or throttling in U500.

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Shhhhh, Asus may hear you!

 

Can you give me your source ?

Comparatively to a UX32Vd, the Vaio Z which has yet a very good screen seems setback. And everybody agreed to say the screen of the S series is less than the Z..So i thought locigally the Asus screen stayt better thant the S ( but maybe the screen of the S updated recently ? )

 

The model number of the screen is the same for Asus U500 and Vaio S15 (according to what MikeTLB wrote), even though Asus' one seems to have no color reproduction issues, so there actually may be some minor differences. However, I think that at least brightness, color gamut and contrast are the same for the two screens

 

As you can read in this thread, MikeTLB has U500 prototype unit. He has checked Windows code display and this string is the same of IPS panel of HP ENVY 15 and Sony vaio S15, maybe LG has fixed orangegate and bluegate.

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The model number of the screen was confirmed by mike few pages back. Nothing wrong with this screen provided of course LG has fixed the orange/bluegate issue which seems to be the case. There are barely any other 15 inch IPS panels on the market in any case.

 

It's possible it's a display controller problem and not one with the panel. It could also be a newer revision, both the Envy 15 and Vaio S15 have glossy screens.

 

Wow, imho this machine looks really good from many angles!

For my particular use case, the biggest unknowns are:
- how well will Linux run on it when it's released? Anyone knows how stable this particular Wi-Fi chipset is, and whether the graphic card setup is decently supported? On the Vaio Z for example it works well with Intel, but it's impossible to set the brightness while running with NVIDIA.
- I'd like to put my own drives in both 2.5'' bays. That's pretty much a must. Anyone knows if it'll be possible (and not too hard) ?

 

No the Sony screen is not glossy ;-) It's not matte also but it has some anti-reflective coating which is a pretty nice compromise in my opinion.
Review Sony Vaio SV-S1511X9E/B Notebook - Notebookcheck.net Reviews

 

God damn. I see this AFTER I get a Sony S15.5. WAI YOU DO DIS ASUS?! FFFFFFFFS

Yeah I'm a tad mad as you can see.

But I needed a laptop for school so I couldn't really wait until October. Oh well, guess I'll wait for the 3rd or 4th gen of these .....

But yeah, if everything is good (no orangegate, overheat, backlight bleed, throttling, etc.) then damn, this would've been the perfect machine.

 

yeah i went with the envy 15 waiting for somethign like this. but i absolutely couldnt wait anylonger when college was about to start.