Your Portable Leather Fantasy - Asus U2E

As we can see in electronic stores, notebook computers has recently seen a sharp decline in prices in the recent years, with many priced in the sub-USD$ 600 region. The market for small and elegant portables however, are still in demand by the sophisicated executives, especially our female counterparts.

When you pick up an expensive notebook that's something more than USD$ 1500 from the stores, it's usually a portable gaming monster, equipped with a 15" or bigger LCD with fantastic mobile graphics, or an ultra portable machine with a minute form factor and a >5 hour battery life. Asus' latest ultra portable baby, the U2E just arrived in our labs a couple of days ago. Equipped with an ULV U7500 Chip based on the Santa Rosa platform. Oh, did I forget to mention that the U2E displays at a WXGA resolution of 1366 x 768 pixel, which means that the 11 incher display on this tiny laptop runs at an aspect ratio of 16:9?

With a TDP of 10 watts, the U7500 Merom-2M ULV is arguably the most efficient energy-saving CPU available in the market today. The unit we received came equipped with 1GB of RAM, 120GB hard drive and Vista Ultimate. Battery Life is fantastic with a 4800mAh extended battery at a tad more than 5 hours, all thanks to the LED-based  display panel.

Before we continue with the pictures and some basic benchmarks, here are some specifications.

Processor & Cache Memory	Intel® Core™ Duo Processor U7500 : 1.06 GHz FSB: 533MHz, 2MB L2 Cache;
Operating System	Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate, Genuine Windows Vista® Business, Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium, Genuine Windows Vista® Home Basic,
Chipset	Mobile Intel® GM965 Express Chipset + ICH8M
Main Memory	DDR2 667 MHz SDRAM, 2 x SODIMM socket for expansion up to 4GB SDRAM *Up to 1GB may not be available with 32-bit operation systems depending on system configuration.
Display	11.1" WXGA LED backlight ColorShine,Color-Shine (Glare-type),Asus Splendid Video Intelligent Technology
Video Graphics & Memory	Embedded Intel® GMA X3100
Hard Drive	1.8" 9.5mm SATA 80GB,4800rpm 100GB,4800rpm 120GB,4800rpm 32GB SSD
Optical Drive	5.25" , 9.5 mm Combo: DVD Super Multi Double Layer:
Card Reader	8 in 1 card reader: SD,MMC,MS,MS-Pro,mini SD w/ adapter,MS-Duo,MS-Pro Duo via adapter
Video Camera	0.3 Mega Pixel web camera (Optional)
Fax/Modem/LAN/WLAN	Integrated Intel® High Definition Audio chip ( Azalia) compliant MDC fax/modem and 10/100/1000 Base T Built-in Bluetooth™ V2.0+EDR(optional feature) Intel® Wireless WiFi Link 4965AGN or Intel® PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection(optional)
LED Status Indicator	Power-on/Suspend Battery Charging/full/low Storage device access Capital / Scroll / Number Lock Wireless/Bluetooth on status indicator (optional) Bluetooth on status (optional feature)
Interface	1 x Microphone-in jack 1 x Headphone-out jack (S/PDIF) 1 x VGA port/Mini D-sub 15-pin for external monitor 3 x USB 2.0 ports 1 x RJ11 Modem jack for phone line 1 x RJ45 LAN Jack for LAN insert 1 x micro-DVI port
Hot Keys	Instant launch Keys,2 buttons: Wireless/Bluetooth Switch, Power4Gear eXtreme Function Keys: Fn+F1 Suspend switch Fn+F2 WLAN/Bluetooth switch Fn+F3 Access to the E-mail Fn+F4 Access to the Internet Fn+F5 Brightness down Fn+F6 Brightness up Fn+F7 LCD on/off Fn+F8 LCD/CRT switch display Fn+F9 TouchPad Lock Fn+F10 Volume on/mute Fn+F11 Volume down Fn+F12 Volume up Fn+Ins Numeric Key Pad on/off Fn+Del Scroll Lock on/off Fn+Space Power 4Gear eXtreme Fn+C Splendid Fn+T Power4Phone Fn+V Camera capture Fn+↑: Stop Fn+↓: Play/Pause Fn+ ←FSkip to Previous Track Fn+ →FSkip to Next Track
Audio	Built-in Azalia compliant audio chip, with 3D effect & full duplex Built-in speaker and microphone
Keyboard	17.5mm full size 83 Key with MS Windows function keys
Battery Pack & Life	3/6/9 cells: 2400/4800/7800 mAh, 26.6/53/80 Whrs
AC Adapter	Output: 19 V DC, 3.42 A, 65W Input: 100 - 240 V AC, 50/60 Hz universal
Dimension & Weight	27.7 x 19.4 x 2.49 ~ 2.9 cm (W x D x H) 1.25 kg, with 3 cell battery, SSD
Security	BIOS Booting / HDD User Password Protection and security lock Kensington lock hole TPM(Trusted Platform Module) V1.2 Fingerprint
Supplied Accessories	Bluetooth Mouse Protection bag
Multimedia Software	ASUSDVD V7.0 ( *For Basic & Business only) Power Director V5.0 (*For Basic & Business only) Medi@Show V3.0 (*For Basic & Business only) * Premium & Ultimate are with MCE support from Windows Vista
Virus & Tool Software	Norton™ Internet Security 2007 Adobe Acrobat Reader 8.0 NERO 7 Essentials
ASUS Utility	Asus Win flash for BIOS and Driver live Update Asus Power4Gear eXtreme Asus Life Frame II Asus Live Update Asus Multi-Frame Asus NB Probe + ASUS Wireless Console ASUS Security Protect Manager(ASPM) Virtual Camera
Warranty & e-support	2-year limited global hardware warranty 1-year battery pack warranty On-line problem resolution through web interface (BIOS, Driver update) OS (Microsoft Windows Vista) install/uninstall consultation Bundled software install/uninstall consultation ASUS software supporting

Fetish for Leather

The U2E comes with a pretty chic sleeve, but I'm sure that the laptop will go well with an LV/Gucci Messenger Bag

The leather facade... stunning.

Front View

3/4 View

The touch pad and keyboard. The strip between the two buttons on top is where the speaker is located, and as usual they produce nothing more than just whines.

LEDs for power, hdd activity, battery status, wireless and Num Lock.

Exploring Further

The Biometric sensor

Keyboard sparkling...

The flip side

VGA, Wireless Switch, Exhaust, 2 USB port, HDMI and Audio in and out jacks.

Surprise surprise! The U2E comes equipped with an optical drive! Something that most laptop these size doesn't come with. Other connectivity includes USB Port, LAN port and Modem

The high-performance button, aka the turbo button...

Disassembly

The notebook comes with 2 batteries, a 2400mAh standard battery and a 4800mAh extended battery, which last 3 and 5 hours respectively at full charge. if needed, Asus has a 7200mAh cap battery for this laptop too, which should last at least a good 8 hours.

RAM upgrade is pretty easy. After removing the battery, there are 3 catches that keep the keyboard in place. With just 3 simple flicks, the keyboard can be removed and you'll see what you see above. It's also noteworthy that a laptop this size isn't using the rare micro-DIMM, which most ultraportables this size come equipped with.

Two simple screws hold the optical drive, full replaceable should it fail.

Basic Benchmarks and afterthoughts

PC Mark 05 scores, not fantastic but decent.

PC Mark Vantage failed to complete because of the GPU's inability to handle VC-1 playback.

The 1.8" hard drive is spinning at 4800rpm. Results are impressive for its size, but not quite fast enough compared to most storage mediums available today.

The overview of devices.

78 processes upon bootup, taking up 70% of the physical memory. A tad much isn't it.

Final Thoughts

 We've seen many small laptops out in the market and the U2E is truly a gem with all its built in connectivity options, the optical drive and HDMI output. The speakers didn't fare too well although that's expected of speakers this built and size. The elegant built of the U2E will definitely appeal to the executive crowd, particularly the ladies who do not mind spending more on an ultra portable just to compliment her LV/Gucci messenger bag.  Thumbs up to Asus for this compact technology gem.

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