ASUS Zenbook Prime UX31A

The new ASUS Zenbook Prime UX31A might look exactly like the old Zenbook UX31E, but remember it is what is on the inside that really counts! ASUS appears to be all about consistency these days and have kept the sleek aluminum chassis the same on this razor thin Intel Ultrabook .

The weight of this thin Ultrabook also remains the same, at 1.3 kg or about three pounds. It is only when you open the Zenbook Prime UX31A that you'll start to see the improvements over the last model. For example you have an illuminated keyboard with a gorgeous 1080p IPS (in-plane switching) display for you to look at when you use it and on the inside you have a 3rd Generation Intel Core i5 or i7 'Ivy Bridge' processor along with the new Intel HM76 Express chipset.

The new processor is faster and also includes improved graphics thanks to the inclusion Intel HD Graphics 4000 technology. The new Intel HM76 Express Chipset brings native support for a pair of USB 3.0 ports, so both USB ports on the Zenbook Prime are SuperSpeed USB 3.0 enabled. ASUS didn't stop there though and fixed a number of smaller issues that end users griped about on the original Zenbook. For example the power connector easily came out on the Zenbook, so it was changed to a different type that 'clicks' in and stays in place on the Zenbook Prime. Basically, ASUS fixed what needed to be fixed and left what was working alone! This is great news for consumers as you get a refined product that has been tried and tested by millions of people.

Before we dive into the Ultrabook that we will be reviewing we need to cover what an Ultrabook is. For starters, Intel has trademarked the Ultrabook name, so only certain laptops that meet the Ultrabook criteria can be called that. According to Intel, a laptop has to meet or exceed these five characteristics to be an Ultrabook.

• Quick Startup - Going from hibernate to keyboard interaction in 7 seconds or less. Resume from sleep should be even faster than that.
• Long Battery Life - The minimum for a single charge of the battery must be at least 5 hours.
• Thinness - Ultrabooks need to be less than 21mm (0.82-inch) thick.
• Enhanced Security - The laptop firmware must support Intel's Anti-Theft and Identity Protection technology.
• Performance - Must be powered by Intel processors.

Basically, The Intel Ultrabooks are Windows powered alternatives to the hot selling Apple MacBook Air! They are thinner, lighter and often faster than ultraportables that many have used in recent years. The thinner designs on Ultrabooks don't look half bad either thanks to use of lightweight materials like aluminum and magnesium alloy for the housing. Inside you'll find powerful 2nd or 3rd generation Intel Core processors and a solid-state drive to give you a laptop that is snappy and responsive.

The downside of Ultrabooks being so thin is that you have to give up a few features that most don't need in 2012 and beyond. For starters the optical drive has been kicked to the curb, so if you want to run a CD, DVD or Blu-Ray you'll need to invest in an external USB drive. Other features missing from most Ultrabooks are the ethernet port and DVI video outputs due to how large those connectors are and a removable battery. Most people are running just Wi-Fi now days, but we still run across a hotel or two that don't have Wi-Fi and that wouldn't be a good thing with an Ultrabook. You can always get adapter cables, but who wants to carry that around as that defeats the purpose of having something so light and portable.

Now that you have know what an Intel Ultrabook is all about, we can get back to the Ultrabook that we will be reviewing here today.

The ASUS Zenbook Prime is available in two sizes, the ASUS UX21A (11.6" display) and the ASUS UX31A (13.3" display). Both sizes come standard with a 16:9 HD display that runs at a screen resolution of 1600x900. If you are buying an Ultrabook we highly suggest spending a little extra and getting the by IPS FHD 1920x1080 pixel display. The 1080p display also includes an antiglare technology that looks much better than a high-gloss display. Once you figure out what size Zenbook Prime that you want and what display you want, you then get to pick the processor and how much storage capacity you want! You have your choice of 128GB or 256GB of SSD drives and either an Intel Core i5-3317U or Intel Core i7-3517UM processors.

The model that we are going to be reviewing today is the ASUS Zenbook Prime UX31A-DB51. This model is the 13.3-inch model with the 1080p IPS display, 1.7GHz Intel Core i5-3317U processor, 4GB of DDR3 1600 MHz memory (RAM), and a 128GB solid-state drive.

ASUS Zenbook Prime UX31A-DB51 Specifications:

• 1.7GHz Intel Core i5-3317U Dual-Core Ivy Bridge CPU
• 4GB of DDR3 RAM
• 128GB SATA III 6Gbps Solid State Drive
• Integrated Intel HD 4000 Graphics
• 13.3" Widescreen IPS Antiglare Display
• 1920 x 1080 Native Resolution
• 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0
• Bang and Olufsen ICEpower Speakers
• Integrated Webcam and Microphone
• Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)

The ASUS Zenbook Prime UX31A-DB51 runs $1049.95 shipped, which is price competitive with other brands with similar specifications.

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Samsung NP-900X3C Series 9 Snap Review

The Samsung Series 9 is one of the most amazing laptops that we have tested recently. It has everything to be called an ultrabook, yet it has been branded as a notebook by Samsung. Nevertheless, the blazing performance, the ultra slim form factor and the exquisite build quality are truly awesome. It costs a lot of money, but then again, this is the best option for a Windows ultrabook which actually competes with and beats the MacBook Air, overall. Add up your savings, or beg, borrow and steal to get this one!

Very rarely do we get a laptop that is completely unique and leaves us awe-struck. Quite frankly, we cannot remember when it last happened, till we got my hands on the Samsung Series 9 laptop. Samsung insist on calling this a laptop, but this machine surely matches all the criteria you need for an ultrabook. And then some!

Build & Design

Ultrabooks are meant to be slim and sleek, as much as possible, keeping the dimensions in check and the weight down. There are a lot of devices running around that aren’t the slimmest by any means, but do get classified as ultrabooks. The Samsung Series 9 deserves that tag more than anything.

Straight out of its very premium packaging, and you literally have to rub your eyes to be doubly sure of what you are seeing. The Samsung Series 9 is slimmer than even the MacBook Air! The Series 9, at its thickest point is 12.9mm thick, while the MacBook Air tips 17.2mm at its thickest point. That didn’t stop Samsung from fitting in 2 USB ports, mini HDMI out, the 3.5mm jack and a memory card reader. You get adapter options for LAN and VGA out, with the LAN adapter a part of the package. Even the power adapter is a thing of brilliance, with its compact design small enough to fit in the palm of your hand.

The Series 9 has corresponding chunky portions on the sides close to the display hinge side, and that is where the ports are fit in. From there, a flowing design seamlessly slims down the machine without any fuss. The curves carry on where the lid meets the hinge, and is very much appreciated when the Series 9 is placed on a table with the lid closed.

The Samsung Series 9’s 100% aluminum chassis mostly consists of Duralumin. This is used to create what the company calls a “slim and aerodynamic design”, and is usually used in aircrafts. The result is a solidly built laptop that is very light to pick up and move around.

The Series 9’s brilliance doesn’t end there. The mineral ash black colour is rather rare. Materials used are premium, and critically, the display hinge tautness is among the best, if not the very best. The overall design has a dollop of sharpness about it, something that gives the aura that this is an attentive ultrabook. Open it up and you will notice the slim bezel. The keyboard layout has not been compromised in any way, and as if to give out a lesson to other ultrabook manufacturers, Samsung’s keyboard responds with the same brilliance as the one on the MacBook Air. For others who claim that key travel and response is slightly impacted by the slim form factor, this ultrabook rubbishes that theory. It is the best built ultrabook by far, and priced appropriately.

The display hinge is quite strong, and a whiplash doesn't send the lid scurrying all the way back.

Features & Specifications

No shortage of power on the Series 9. This is powered by an Intel Ivy Bridge Core i7-3517U processor and paired with 4GB of RAM. This processor clocks at 1.9GHz and Turbo Boost takes it up to 2.4GHz.

For your data storage, the Series 9 comes with a 256GB SSD. This drive is one of the fastest ones around, something that we will explain in greater detail in the performance section.

The display is not reflective, and that helps the Series 9 score well in the display tests.

The Series 9’s 13.3-inch display has a resolution of 1600 x 900 pixels, which is much higher than the fairly common 1366 x 768 pixels. This difference shows up clearly, with absolutely amazing clarity of text. Readability on this screen is by far the best among all ultrabooks we have tested, helped immensely by the sharpness and the largely non-reflective nature of the display. Black level depth and white saturation levels are slightly on the lower side, but the display does very well in the pixel stability tests.

Excellent keyboard and a generous sized touchpad add a lot of functionality to this brilliant design.

People have often claimed that keyboard usage experience on an ultrabook is more of a compromise since the dimensions dictate that the keyboard not spread out too much and the key travel is not adequate. However, with the Series 9, Samsung would beg to differ. The keyboard on the Series 9 is like a tasty dish served up by a five-star chef! The key layout, despite a smallish real estate, is perfect with good key spacing. And the most critical bit, the key travel, is perfect. There is a distinct feel of precision and sharpness to it, very much like the MacBook Air. Shifting from the Air to the keyboard on the Series 9 was a breeze, and didn’t take much acclimatizing. And that cannot be said for a lot of ultrabooks out there.

Performance

Without a shadow of a doubt, the Series 9 powered by the Core i7 processor is the fastest among all ultrabooks that we tested. The PC Mark Vantage score of 12972 is the only one breaching the 10000 mark, with the second highest being the 9966 scored by the HP Envy 4. The PC Mark 07 score of 4647 is again the highest, with the Fujitsu Lifebook U772 quite some way behind in second place clocking 4221. If you remember reading a bit earlier about the fast SSD on this machine, the drive test score of 41503 is pipped only by the 128GB SSD on the Lifebook U772, with a score of 42453. All other SSDs are considerably slower.

Despite being razor thin, there are still a lot of connectivity options.

All the scores are mentioned here to give you an idea of how good the performance of this machine is. In any usage scenario, the Series 9 will not struggle or get bogged down, no matter what you load it with. The overall snappiness of the system is seriously boosted by the excellent drive performance. We used this machine quite a bit, and this one fit almost all usage scenarios perfectly – home and office work, multimedia viewing and the road warrior.

The battery life offered by the Series 9 is a delight. Quite frankly, we were surprised to see this clock 246 minutes in the stressful battery test. But the surprise element was that this is by far the best battery backup time clocked by any ultrabook, including the less powerful Core i3 and Core i5-bearing machines! In a typical day at work, this should give you around 6.5-7 hours of battery backup.

One of the best built laptops out there.

Graphics capabilities are rather toned down on this package, particularly because the idea was to make this the slimmest ultrabook in the market. The integrated Intel HD 4000 graphics will offer the barebones basic, but then again, no one is buying the Series 9 for gaming surely. Admittedly, there will be some who will argue that for so much, you should be able to get an all-rounder laptop, but that would just be nitpicking!

Ultra thin chassis, thinner than the MacBook Air.

Bottom Line

As we said earlier, not many laptops and ultrabooks make us jump out of our seats. But the Series 9 seems to have done that quite successfully, doing everything right. Right out of the box, the exquisite build quality justifies the money you have just spent. Switch it on and the performance is a delight. Battery life ensures you can almost last one full day of usage at work without reaching for the sleek power adapter. All in all, the Series 9 does it all. You can flaunt your bank account’s strength without compromising on functionality and performance. This is the closest a Windows machine has come to a MacBook Air overall, and that is a compliment in itself. - source

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HCL ME Ultra 3074 Snap Review

HCL surely had the correct idea when it came to ultrabooks. The market is more than ripe for the inexpensive versions as well. However, from what we can see, HCL has gotten the implementation slightly wrong.

Build & Design

On the looks part, the HCL ME Ultra 3074 does look fairly premium and classy. The lid has a light aluminum finish, while the keyboard deck has a slightly darker brushed metal look. The underside is again of a lighter colour, and that spills over on to the right and left sides as well.

Open the lid, and you see a fairly clean keyboard deck. The layout and the size of the keys is fairly similar to the MacBook Pro, at least that’s how it looks on the outset! Touchpad is fairly decent in terms of real estate space, but the Dell Inspiron 14z’s touchpad is slightly bigger and wider. Not that it made any difference with Windows 7, but with Windows 8, the more space you have for the multi-touch gestures, the better. Port placement is shared between the right and the left side ports.

While the looks of the HCL Me Ultra have been well handled by HCL, the build quality and the overall solidity of the package is slightly less than the best. There is a fair amount of flex everywhere on the chassis. The lid isn’t the thickest one out there, and any extra pressure on it will make it dip. What is really worrying is the amount of play the keyboard deck has near the display hinge. Open the display, or change the tilt angle, and you get a fair amount of movement on deck. Clearly, not something that will last very long. Press down hard on the keyboard and there is a pretty profound dip in the middle. This is not to say that the Dell Inspiron 14z is the best ultrabook in the budget segment, but it is much better built than the HCL ME Ultra. Well, good looks will only take you so far. At least that is true for most ultrabooks!

Specifications & Performance

The moment you compare the spec sheets, the difference is fairly evident. The Core i5 in the Inspiron 14z is by far the better performer, expectedly, then the Core i3 on the HCL ME Ultra. The benchmark tests clearly peg the Inspiron 14z ahead. For illustrating this point, we have the Inspiron 14z’s PC Mark Vantage score of 7404 shows the advantage it has over the 5558 for the HCL. Even in real life performance, the Dell ultrabook is fairly quicker than the HCL ME Ultra. Both ultrabooks have the 500GB primary storage drive and a 32GB mSATA.

Again, where the Dell is considerably ahead of the HCL ME Ultra in terms of gaming and graphics capabilities. Another look at the spec sheet clarifies the reason why HCL is lagging behind again. Inspiron 14z comes with an AMD Radeon 7570M (1GB) chip, while the HCL ME just makes do with the Intel HD 4000 integrated graphics. We don’t even need to compare the benchmark test scores to illustrate that the Dell Inspiron 14z is the better deal.

However, there is no running away from the fact that the ME ultrabook offers some excellent battery backup. The battery lasted 207 minutes from full charge to complete discharge in our stressful battery test. This is among the better scores among all ultrabooks, and this should last around 5 hours in a typical office usage scenario. For that reason, and that reason alone, we are even bothering with this ultrabook.

The 14-inch display of the HCL ME Ultra has the fairly commonplace resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels, but we like the overall package of the display. It is not reflective for starters, and with matte displays rather rare, this is a huge surprise. Colour reproduction is not very vivid, but the text is handled very well, making text readability easier. It does lose out quite a bit in terms of black levels, but more than makes up for it in the overall scheme of things.

The HCL ME Ultra came preloaded with Windows 7 Basic, and the website still suggests that a Windows 8 update has not been done for this ultrabook. Dell, on its part, has upgraded the Inspiron 14z to Windows 8.

Bottom Line

The HCL ME Ultrabook is directly competing with the Dell Inspiron 14z in terms of the price. Between the two, the Dell has a better build quality, better specifications, and inevitably better system performance, apart from a a dedicated graphics chip for a bit of gaming. The HCL ME on its part offers very good battery life. But that surely cannot be only reason to buy an ultrabook. It is a disappointing effort from HCL, primarily because of the poor build quality.

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Acer Aspire S5 world’s thinnest Ultrabook

The Acer Aspire S5 “world’s thinnest” Ultrabook measures just 15mm in depth at its thickest point. That’s 0.59 inches in old money. In comparison the MacBook Air is 0.68 inches and the Samsung Series 9 2nd Generation Ultrabook is 0.58 inches thick. Well, it seems like there’s more than one “world’s thinnest” Ultrabook around…

Acer managed to keep the thickness of the laptop down partly due to how the ports on the S5 are accessed. On the bottom of the laptop a panel hinges down to form a wedge(when a button is pressed), at the thickest point, towards the screen hinge, the ports are revealed and are accessible. Acer call this “MagicFlip I/O”. The action of this hinge will also tilt the keyboard of the laptop on your desk for a better typing angle, so it has a secondary ergonomic function.

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LaVie World’s Lightest Ultrabook

How light would you like your Ultrabook? If even 3 pounds seems to heavy to you, try packing the 13.3-inch NEC LaVie Z, which weighs a paper-light 1.9 pounds. We had a chance to go hands-on with the svelte system here at Intel’s Developer Forum and we just couldn’t believe how light it felt in our hands.

At just .59-inches thick, the LaVie Z is also one of the thinnest notebooks on the market. Despite the thinness, we were pleased to see that the Ultrabook, which is made from a lightweight lithium-magnesium alloy, has room for several ports including an SD card reader, two USB ports (one of which is USB 3.0) and a full-size HDMI port. We wish there was an Ethernet port, but you can’t have everything on a system this light.

The 13.3-inch screen touts a respectable resolution of 1600 x 900 which, in our brief hands-on, made images fairly sharp, but colors were not particularly vibrant and the viewing angles on this glossy screen seemed poor as a lot of light reflect off its surface. Even at maximum brightness, the display did not seem particularly bright to us, but to be fair, the notebook was on display in an area of the convention center with a lot of sunlight coming in and hitting its surface.

The LaVie Z’s keyboard has some awkward key sizes and placements, with a tiny undersized right Shift key that sits to the right of the up arrow key, a giant rectangular Enter key that looks like it belongs on an old-school typewriter and a tiny square backspace key. When we pressed the keys they seemed a bit shallow but not overly stiff or mushy. The small, matte touch pad appeared reasonably accurate in our use.

However, the most impressive feature of the NEC LaVie Z is clearly its lightweight chassis. While we normally have difficulty holding a notebook by its deck with just one hand, we were able to hold up the LaVie Z with our left, non-dominant hand while filming with our right. Better still, the Ultrabook did not feel creaky or loosely constructed even when we held it this way.

Though it is made for the Japanese market where it was released in August, Dynamism is now selling the LaVie Z to U.S. consumers for $1,799 with a 1.9-GHz Intel 3rd Generation Core i7 CPU, 4GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. - source

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Lenovo ThinkPad X230

Design

Measuring 1.05 by 12.01 by 8.13 inches (HWD) and weighing only 3.39 pounds, the X230 is light enough to tuck under your arm or into a laptop bag, whether for a quick meeting out of the office or a convention requiring a cross-country flight. The rigid magnesium-alloy chassis is covered with soft-touch rubberized paint, giving the ultraportable the black, boxy look you expect of a Lenovo business system while keeping things lightweight and easy to grip. Despite having portability to spare, it still feels a little clunky when compared to a 13-inch ultrabook like the HP Folio 13-1020us .

Features

On either side of the laptop, you'll find a full complement of business-ready features, like two USB 3.0 ports, an always-on USB 2.0 port (for powering peripherals or charging gadget batteries), a card reader (SD/SDHC/SDXC/MMC), Gigabit Ethernet port, both VGA and Mini DisplayPort outputs (the later with audio), and an ExpressCard slot. Internally, the X230 is equipped with Bluetooth 4.0 and Intel's Wireless Display technology (WiDi 2.0), which lets you stream HD video through an adapter, like the Netgear Push2TV ($99 list). Security is also taken into consideration, with an integrated fingerprint reader on the palm rest, Trusted Platform Module (TPM), and an optional SmartCard reader on the front of the laptop.

Our ThinkPad X230 review unit offered 320GB of storage space, but can be alternately configured with either a 500GB hard drive or 256GB solid-state drive (SSD). Lenovo doesn't clutter the desktop with a lot of special deals and links to websites, but you will find that the hard drive has a few programs preinstalled on it. In addition to Lenovo's ThinkVantage suite of apps and utilities, you'll find generally useful programs and services, like Google Chrome, Evernote, Skype, Microsoft Office 2010 Starter, and a 30-day trial of Norton Internet Security. SugarSync provides the foundation for Lenovo's branded cloud storage solution. Lenovo's warranty is for one year, with extended warranties (two to five years) available for purchase.

Performance

Lenovo outfitted the ThinkPad X230 with Intel's third-generation Core i5-3320M processor, a 2.6GHz dual-core CPU paired with 4GB of RAM—although, like the hard drive, this varies by configuration. Intel's new processor line boasts better performance and power efficiency, so it wasn't a huge surprise to see the ThinkPad X230 top other ultraportables in processor-intensive tasks. It scored 3.09 in CineBench R11.5, and took 1 minute 35 seconds to convert a video in Handbrake and 3:37 to apply 12 filters in Adobe Photoshop CS5. This beats out the competing HP ProBook 6360b (CineBench 2.85, Handbrake 1:45, Photoshop 3:48) and the consumer-focused Editors' Choice Toshiba Portege R835-P88 (CineBench 2.75, Handbrake 1:46, Photoshop 3:55). Because it uses a low-voltage CPU instead of a full-fledged laptop processor, the Folio 13-1020us took 5:24 to finish our Photoshop test.

The ThinkPad X230 also promises improved graphics capabilities over the X220, thanks to Intel's HD Graphics 4000, the integrated graphics solution included with the new processor platform. In 3DMark 06, the X230 scored 5,118 at 1,024 by 768 (with no anti-aliasing) and 2,791 at its native resolution of 1,366 by 768 (with 4x anti-aliasing enabled). The performance was ahead of that of most competitors, but the Lenovo actually fell ever so slightly behind the Toshiba Portege R835-P88, which scored 5,142 and 2,827, respectively.

With a 63Wh battery, the ThinkPad X230 lasted 7 hours 45 minutes in MobileMark at 50 percent screen brightness, making this the one test where the X230 didn't meet expectations. It fell nearly an hour short of the times of ultraportable and ultrabook competitors like the Portege R835-P88 (8:40), the Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (8:40) and the HP Folio 13-1020us (8:47).

As a laptop for on-the-go productivity, the Lenovo ThinkPad X230 is an excellent performer, with the best productive capability we've seen in a business ultraportable. If your use scenarios don't demand high performance, you might benefit more from a business ultrabook like the HP Folio 13-1020us. But because of its processing power and its fine collection of features, the new Lenovo ThinkPad X230 replaces the X220 as our Editors' Choice for business ultraportables. - source

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Samsung Series 5 Ultrabook

Samsung is taking the wraps off its 13-inch Series 5 Ultra Touch Windows 8 ultrabook today, and at a starting price of $809.99 for the Core i3 version, it’s one of the more reasonably-priced machines we’ve seen so far. An extra $50 will buy you a Core i5 processor upgrade, but otherwise, both models will have the same 1366x768 10-point touch display, 4GB of RAM, and 500GB hard drive with 24GB of ExpressCache — Samsung’s term for high-speed solid state storage directly on the logic board. The Series 5 Ultra Touch isn’t breaking any records with its 3.83-pound weight, but it’s not bad for a machine with a spinning hard drive.

The company also took a minute to touch on its renamed Ativ Smart PC 500T and 700T Windows 8 tablets, which will be selling for $749.99 and $1,199.99, respectively. While both will be running Windows 8 and not the more limited Windows RT, that extra $450 will buy you an Intel Core i5 processor (the 500T comes with an Atom Z2760), a bump from 2GB to 4GB of RAM, and a doubling of storage, from 64GB to 128GB.

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Asus Acer Netbooks End Life

The last two major netbook manufacturers, Acer and Asus, are closing the doors on these mini-laptops. According to Digitimes' Monica Chen and Joseph Tsai, Acer "has no plans to release more netbook products" such as its Aspire One, while Asus has already ended its Eee PC line.

Other netbook manufacturers, such as Samsung, have long since abandoned the market.

Why netbooks failed to catch on

Netbooks were "still enjoying strong sales" as late as 2010, according to an optimistic report by ABI Research. But the growth trend which it predicted flattened out and declined, thanks to four factors pointed out by the Guardian's Charles Arthur.

Not worth it for many, compared to notebooks

One is that the original, Linux-based netbooks failed to catch on, as they had trouble running Windows PC software. But Microsoft charged between $30 and $50 for each netbook's Windows license, and insisted that the new crop of Windows netbooks be larger and more expensive than the original Linux-based models. This placed them in close competition with low-end laptops, the prices of which were going down instead of up.

The rise of the iPad

The other biggest factor is that the iPad and Android tablets took the place of netbooks for many buyers. While Apple's iPad was the price of a full-sized laptop, the company soon introduced discounted or refurbished versions ... as well as the smaller, $329 iPad Mini, which doesn't cost much more than most netbooks. Besides that, the whole iPad line was even lighter than netbooks and had longer battery life, besides being more responsive and having more popular apps.

Meanwhile, companies like Amazon and Barnes and Noble made $199 Kindle and Nook tablets, which beat out even the original $249 Linux-based Asus Eee's price tag.

A little bit bigger, a lot better

During the netbook's heyday, many called for Apple to make one of its own. As Apple tech expert John Gruber pointed out, however, netbooks were "cheaper, not better," which contradicted Apple's business model of selling high-margin, premium products.

When Apple did release a small laptop computer, it was the $999 11-inch MacBook Air, which went on to be a best-seller. Other PC manufacturers tried to follow in Apple's footsteps with Intel's "Ultrabook" specification, which is basically a recipe for MacBook Air clones that run Windows, but so far have failed to make a dent in the market.

Taking the place of netbooks

Besides Ultrabooks, the other notable netbook-like computers on the market right now are Chromebooks, ultralight laptops which start at $199 and run a slimmed-down OS based on Google's Chrome web browser. Former netbook manufacturers Samsung and Acer are both making Chromebooks, while Asus manufactured Google's popular Nexus 7 tablet.

Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008. - source

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Asus Chromebox Review

ASUS’ first desktop Chrome OS device is simply called the Chromebox. From a distance it looks like a somewhat larger Intel NUC. The low profile, square form factor has become the shape of choice for bringing Ultrabook CPUs to desktops. ASUS’ take on the design is matte plastic on all faces, with a glossy plastic trim around the top. There’s a single white LED above the power button on the unit. Google’s Chrome logo and brand integrate nicely on the top of the box. Google appears to be learning from the mistakes of its predecessors - logos are ok, as long as they don’t clutter up the design.

More expensive materials would be nice but for $179, I’m not complaining. In a world where small dimensions usually come at a premium, ASUS and Google continue the Chrome OS trend of delivering a better than expected experience at a given price point.

ASUS Chromebox Comparison ASUS Chromebox vs. Intel Haswell NUC

ASUS Chromebox
	ASUS Chromebox	Intel Haswell NUC
OS Preloaded	Google Chrome OS	None
CPU	Intel Celeron 2955U (2C/2T 1.4GHz 2MB L3) Intel Core i3-4010U (2C/4T 1.7GHz 3MB L3) Intel Core i7-4600U (2C/4T 2.1/3.3GHz 4MB L3)	Intel Core i3-4010U (2C/4T 1.7GHz 3MB L3) Intel Core i5-4250U (2C/4T 1.3/2.6GHz 3MB L3)
GPU	Celeron: Intel HD (200/1000MHz) Core i3: Intel HD 4400 (200/1000MHz) Core i7: Intel HD 4400 (200/1100MHz)	Core i3: Intel HD 4400 (200/1000MHz) Core i5: Intel HD 5000 (200/1000MHz)
Memory	2GB/4GB configs, 2 x DDR3 SO-DIMM Slots	2 x DDR3 SO-DIMM Slots
Storage	16GB M.2 SSD + 100GB Google Drive for 2 years	1 x mini PCIe (full length)
LAN	10/100/1000 Ethernet	10/100/1000 Ethernet
Wireless	dual-band 802.11 a/b/g/n, BT 4.0	1 x mini PCIe (half length)
External I/O	SD card reader 4 x USB 3.0 1 x HDMI 1 x DisplayPort 1 x Audio Jack (mic-in/speaker out)	4 x USB 3.0 1 x mini HDMI 1 x mini DisplayPort 1 x Audio Jack (mic-in/speaker out)
Power Supply	65W	65W
Dimensions	4.88" x 4.88" x 1.65"	4.59" x 4.41" x 1.36"
Starting Price	$179	$285

The Chromebox has four USB 3.0 ports. Two are located on the front, and two more around back. On the back side there’s also a Gigabit Ethernet port, DisplayPort and HDMI outputs as well as a 1/8" audio out.

There’s an SD card reader on the left side of the unit, along with a Kensington security slot. The recovery switch is just above the security slot. To enter recovery mode use a pin or paperclip to keep the switch pressed down while powering up the unit. Hit CTRL+D to boot into dev mode once at the recovery screen.

Despite ASUS’ initial claims that its Chromebox would be fanless, there is a single fan inside the machine. Air is brought in through the bottom and vented through the back of the chassis. Fan noise is minimal, and it is entirely possible to run the machine without the fan spinning up but open up enough tabs and you’ll find the fan humming away all the time. My review unit was a development unit, which ASUS claims was a bit louder than final retail units will be. Given the low performance requirements of Chrome OS and the low thermal footprint of the Haswell based Celeron inside, noise isn’t an issue with the ASUS Chromebox.

As with anything this size, the power supply is external. In this case ASUS uses an AC adapter that looks a lot like what you get with one of its Ultrabooks. The external power supply can deliver up to 65W, although I never saw power consumption above 15W.
Hardware & Configurations

The Chromebox will be available in three different configurations. Each configuration is a fully functional PC with DRAM, storage and WiFi already configured. Chrome OS comes preloaded on all systems.

In the US you’ll only find the Celeron 2955U and Core i3 models. ASUS sampled me the $179 Celeron 2955U but upgraded to 4GB of RAM instead of the default 2GB.

ASUS Chromebox Configurations
	Chromebox-M004U	Chromebox-M025U	Chromebox-M020U
OS Preloaded	Google Chrome OS	Google Chrome OS	Google Chrome OS
CPU	Intel Celeron 2955U (2C/2T 1.4GHz 2MB L3)	Intel Core i3-4010U (2C/4T 1.7GHz 3MB L3)	Intel Core i7-4600U (2C/4T 2.1/3.3GHz 4MB L3)
GPU	Intel HD (200/1000MHz)	Intel HD 4400 (200/1000MHz) 4K Video Support	Intel HD 4400 (200/1000MHz) 4K Video Support
Memory	1 x 2GB DDR3-1600	1 x 4GB DDR3-1600	2 x 2GB DDR3-1600
Storage	16GB M.2 SSD + 100GB Google Drive for 2 years	16GB M.2 SSD + 100GB Google Drive for 2 years	16GB M.2 SSD + 100GB Google Drive for 2 years
LAN	10/100/1000 Ethernet	10/100/1000 Ethernet	10/100/1000 Ethernet
Wireless	dual-band 802.11 a/b/g/n, BT 4.0	dual-band 802.11 a/b/g/n, BT 4.0	dual-band 802.11 a/b/g/n, BT 4.0
External I/O	SD card reader 4 x USB 3.0 1 x HDMI 1 x DisplayPort 1 x Audio Jack (mic-in/speaker out)	SD card reader 4 x USB 3.0 1 x HDMI 1 x DisplayPort 1 x Audio Jack (mic-in/speaker out)	SD card reader 4 x USB 3.0 1 x HDMI 1 x DisplayPort 1 x Audio Jack (mic-in/speaker out)
Power Supply	65W	65W	65W
Dimensions	4.88" x 4.88" x 1.65"	4.88" x 4.88" x 1.65"	4.88" x 4.88" x 1.65"
MSRP	$179	$369	?

The Core i3 model ships with an ASUS Chromebox wireless keyboard and mouse (available for $50 separately). The Core i7 model, which isn't available in the US, features a remote control with QWERTY keyboard, external speaker and 1080p webcam.

The $179 configuration is clearly the sweet spot for ASUS’ Chromebox. While the Core i3 model does increase memory capacity and improves performance, unless you have a real need for 4K video out the savings offered by the entry level Celeron model are hard to beat.

Storage

One of the biggest problems with entry level PCs is they ship with a mechanical hard drive rather than solid state storage. The result is very high latency IO and a user experience that can be substantially worse than using a smartphone or tablet when it comes to launching apps. Many Chrome OS devices instead opt for shipping higher performance eMMC solutions or low end SSDs; ASUS’ Chromebox is no exception. All ASUS Chromebox models ship with a 16GB SanDisk U110 M.2 (SATA) SSD. ASUS isn’t multi-sourcing the drives, this should be the only thing you find if you crack open one of the boxes.

The Chromebox ships with an SD card reader and four USB 3.0 ports so you can obviously get media onto the device, there’s just not much space to store it. Also keep in mind that as with (almost) all SSDs you’ll want to keep a substantial amount of free space on the drive to avoid ruining the user experience. In the case of the U110 you have around 12GB free by default, and I wouldn’t drop below 3GB - 4GB free on the drive.

Given the small size of the internal SSD, I don’t expect we’ll see a lot of users pulling large files off of the drive. As there’s no support for network share access under Chrome OS, if you want to play an offline video you’ll have to either stream it off an attached USB/SD card or copy it locally from external storage. Although the Chromebox features four USB 3.0 ports, I measured max sequential write speed at around 42MB/s (copying from a USB 3.0 Patriot Supersonic Magnum SSD). I suspect we’re limited by the write speed to the single NAND device (likely two NAND die) on the U110.

All Chromebox owners receive 100GB of free Google Drive space for 2 years - an attempt to offset the limited local storage.

Memory

ASUS offers three different configurations of the Chromebox. The entry level $179 configuration ships with a single 2GB DDR3-1600 SO-DIMM. Even the upgraded Core i3 model ($369) only ships with a single 4GB DDR3-1600 SO-DIMM. It’s only the fully upgraded Chromebox M020U (Chrome for Meetings) that ships with two SO-DIMMs (2 x 2GB).

ASUS shipped me the $179 system upgraded with two 2GB DDR3-1600 SO-DIMMs (4GB total up from the 2GB base). For light usage I didn’t see DRAM usage exceed 2GB, however when I really started heavy multitasking with the machine I can see 2GB being a bit of a limit. I’m pretty confident that the $179 configuration will make for a good system as is, however it likely wouldn’t hurt to buy another 2GB SO-DIMM ($20 - $25).

Inside the ASUS Chromebox

Like the NUC, it's pretty easy to get inside the Chromebox. Peel off the four rubber feet underneath the box to reveal the four Phillips head screws. Remove the screws and use one of the screw holes to provide leverage to pop the bottom off and you're in.

ASUS' motherboard is slightly rectangular (11.25cm x 10cm) compared to the more square Intel NUC form factor (10cm x 10cm).

There are no real surprises on the inside. The Chromebox features two DDR3 SO-DIMM slots, an M.2 SATA port and a mini-PCIe both of which come populated from the factory.

via AnandTech

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