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ASUS N81Vp-C1 14.1-Inch Laptop Review from Jarod Kuri. Great Laptop, I recieved my Asus N81 about 2 weeks ago and am loving it.

Hardware:

Asus seems to have put the best parts they could get ahold of in this.

The 2.66Ghz Core2 in the 280dollar price range is not expected to upgrade until October 09, in which case itll be a 2.8 but the same.

ATI 4650 performs great, and while I’ve usually liked Nvidia in the past (for driver reasons) I have no complaints, and it’s overall an amazing card. Upgrade not expected till June I believe, either way it will be minimal.

4gb of RAM is great for vista and most other needs, hd is 7200 which is good since most try and slip a slower 5400 in thier laptops.

The screen is clear and bright, chassis seems well built and keys seem good so far.

Resolution is great for the size.

Software:

Haven’t had any problem with the drivers yet (I downloaded the 64bit vista ones off the Asus website with ease), theres also good software included and for download, my favorite being the SmartLogin, which allows you to take photos of yourself with the webcam, and use your face to log in right at the Windows Login screen. If you get this, just know you need about 150 pictures of yourself in it (it takes several at a time) in different leaning and light positions for it to work every time.

Theres also preloaded software for quick load functionality to Media Center items, like video players, skype and such.

The battery life, could be better. Given its a 6 cell and has a good video card, its reasonable… but I’m more for 9-cells personally. Its enough time to go wireless and watch a movie, so I’ll leave it at that.

Comes with a case and mouse, neither are bad but makes me think I some how paid for them… :p

The bad things I’ve noticed:

Left and Right touchpad mouse buttons are hard to click compared to most laptops.

The Function key is the furthest bottom-left key, even outside of the Ctrl key. Me being a devoted right hander and overall good typist, am still working out this learning curve for my copy and pasting. :p

I’m -very- picky about what I load on my laptop, down to knowing every service running. I hate when companies load Norton on thier pre-install. Can they just put AVG Free on like the rest of the world? None at all would also be acceptable given how much of a pain it is to uninstall anti -virus software. This is a common issue though, for every laptop maker.

Also, when are these guys going to start pre-loading 64bit Vista? 32bit might not be completely demanded yet, but thanks to backwards compatibility theres no reason all pc manufacturers can’t make the switch.

I’m also stuck in my ways for who I buy from and trust, Amazon and Newegg being the two big ones. I bought from Amazon due to being a Prime member (you can sign up for a free month and cancel if you dont order that much) but I was upset when I decided to give my review and noticed that Amazon upped the price $9 from 2 weeks ago! It was 1290, 9 dollars cheaper then Newegg and the rest of the world, but alas its back to suggested price… this shouldn’t stop you but I’m not quite sure why they needed to close that gap. :p

Summary:

Minus the fact I saved the bad things for last, this is a great laptop. The best 14″ out there right now, Asus might have initially gotten popular for thier awesome motherboards but thier Laptops are clearly keeping that going, and still priced under the competition without using cheap components where they can. If you’re not sure on a 14.1″, I love it. 13.3″ is a close second, but its big enough to have full functionality of a laptop and small enough to be comfortable in your lap and traveling..

Its a good blend for me without having to sacrifice too much like I would with a netbook.

To check price or purchase ASUS N81Vp-C1 14.1-Inch Laptop.

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