ASUS N43SL Jay Chou Edition review: Not perfect, but almost "Incredible"

[siopao1984]

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ASUS N43SL Jay Chou Edition review: Not perfect, but almost "Incredible" by VR-Zone.com

In late June, ASUS and Taiwanese celebrity Jay Chou announced the new N-series laptop, N43SL, which claims to incorporate the latest second generation Intel processor as well as SonicMaster audio technology to offer superb multimedia performance for the users. VR-Zone managed to get our hands on the special edition notebook PC and see how "incredible" it is.



Celebrity-endorsed products aren't new; like the Monster Heartbeats by Lady Gaga headphones, Korean girl group SSND (also known as Girls' Generation) for Intel processor, and Ken Watanabe for Canon cameras etc. And it isn't surprising when ASUS and popular Taiwanese celebrity, Jay Chou, jointly launched the ASUS N43SL Jay Chou special edition laptop in late June this year. Well, the interesting thing about the collaboration is that it is unlike other celebrity-endorsed products whereby (we assumed) you just need to have the celebrity put his or her name on the product and pose with it in the advertisements. In fact, Chou was actually "employed" as a chief designer since beginning this year and was involved in the design of the laptop with the ASUS design team. So one cannot say that this ASUS N43SL is just like any other celebrity-endorsed product.

So how good is the ASUS N43SL Jay Chou Special Edition laptop? Before we proceed, let's take a look at its hardware specifications:-





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[siopao1984]

Closer Look





Like what we have seen at ASUS HQ in Taipei, Taiwan, in June, our review unit came in the standard retail box with a picture of the celebrity and the words "Incredible J" which denotes the special edition of the laptop. The bundled accessories include four Jay Chou postcards, cable tie, power adapter, USB optical mouse, quick installation guide, user manual and an update information slip.





The N43SL is fairly heavy at 2.4kg and comes with a 14-inch 16:9 wide high definition (1366x768 pixel resolution) display with LED backlight. Below the display, you can see a strip of maroon mesh which houses the laptop's internal speakers. Below the screen are the full-size keyboard and touchpad with buttons. We noticed that the ASUS has a unique Baroque “J” key which is unlike other laptop keyboards on the market. At the lower right of the palm rest, you can also see the signature imprint of the Taiwanese celebrity, as though he has put his autograph on the product.





Two USB, a HDMI output, LAN and audio (microphone and headphone) connectors can be found on the left of the laptop, which are also next to the air vent. You may want to be more cautious of the warm air coming out, especially after long hours of usage. On the opposite side, we can see a DVD multi-drive, two USB port (one is a USB3.0) and a wireless connectivity switch.





Moving to the rear, we see the words "Incredible J" and the circular artwork at the back of the screen which comprised of music notes, piano keys, nunchakus, poker cards and their suits (club, heart, spade and diamond), as well as a VGA output and power in connectors. Removing the base covers to check out the hardware, we uncovered a 640GB Western Digital Scorpio Blue SATA hard disk, 4GB Samsung DDR3 memory and +10.8V 5200mAh 56Wh Lithium-ion battery.

[eXpLoDe]

nice. i think gi kuha nila ang features sa toshiba nga pwede duha ka hdd ang ibutang.

[siopao1984]

Features and Performance



The unique exterior design makes the product stand out from the offerings on the market, but we do not expect to see less of the Taiwanese celebrity when we go into the working mode of the review unit. After all, bear in mind that this is a Jay Chou special edition laptop. When we powered up the N43SL, we were greeted with a short music chime which consists of seven piano notes that were said to be originally composed by the celebrity himself. After you get to the Windows desktop, it shows a special wallpaper of Chou, while navigating to the music folder, we found four of Jay Chou's music albums which totalled to more than 50 songs for one's enjoyment. Yes, they are all available free and in MP3 format with no digital rights management (DRM).



Even though this is a Jay Chou special edition laptop, it is still ultimately an ASUS product powered by the company's proprietary technologies and preloaded with the software. ASUS has included AI Recovery to let users "burn" their recovery disc with their DVD writer; FancyStart which allows users to change the boot logo at computer startup; SmartLogon, a security feature whereby users can log on to their computers through facial recognition; as well as SonicMaster for optimizing notebook accoustic performance and reproduce sound and music with wider range and better accuracy. The ASUS SonicMaster technology is developed by ASUS in collaboration with Bang & Olufsen ICEPower and the software allows users to adjust vocal clarity, surround, bass and adaptive volume. For the keen ears audiophiles, the SonicMaster software would prove to let them enjoy the songs better, though we recommend using the headphones rather than the above average built-in speakers.

Performance





To test on the performance of the ASUS N43SL Jay Chou special edition laptop, we ran the standard suite of FutureMark benchmark applications - PCMark 7 Professional to measure overall system performance; and 3DMark11 Professional and 3DMark Vantage to measure the PC graphics performance. As the laptop incorporates Nvidia Optimus technology, it is able to automatically switch between the more powerful Nvidia GeForce GT 540M when running graphics intensive applications, and Intel HD graphics for preserving the battery life.

On PCMark 7 Professional, the ASUS scored 1941 points when we set it to use Nvidia GeForce GT540, and 2095 points when Intel HD graphics is selected, which are quite close to one another. We also observed the similarities when we used 3DMark 11 Professional. However, 3DMark Vantage showed a huge difference - P4331 points on Nvidia graphics and P1704 points on Intel HD graphics.We also used some 3D games such as Capcom StreetFighter 4 and with display setting at 1366x768 pixel resolution, the ASUS managed to achieve a very high frames rate of 105.04 frames per second.

The results reflected that the N43SL is powerful enough to run your daily tasks, be they office applications, web surfing, multimedia playback etc, and also most 3D games. You can run the latest games on the ASUS machine, but for a better gaming experience, you may want to lower the resolution and details settings.

In the battery life department, the ASUS managed to last 1hr 38min on our full-drain BatteryEater Pro v2.70 benchmark test. For normal usage with power saving options turned on, it should have no problem lasting over two to three hours.

[siopao1984]

Conclusion



The ASUS N43SL Jay Chou edition is a decent notebook PC packed with all the features the mainstream consumer will need. However, its unique exterior artistic design is either a "love it or hate it" affair, since not everybody enjoy the ruby red theme. Thankfully, there is also the gold flavor if your favorite color isn't red. The ASUS offers good system performance to run most of your applications without a hiccup and the laptop's battery can last you over two hours if you incidentally forgot to bring the power adapter. One complaint we have is its weight. For fans of the Taiwanese celebrities, which we assumed comprised more of females than males, 2.4kg isn't exactly light to lug around, unless you want to build a muscle or two.

In any case, one would expect a celebrity-endorsed (and designed) laptop like this one to come with a premium price tag. At least three thousand dollars you think? Well, you thought wrong. Surprisingly, for the ASUS N43SL Jay Chou edition, it is priced at an affordable S$1,298 (PHP 45,430) with two-year International warranty. Even if you are not really a hardcore fan of the Taiwanese celebrity, you could still purchase it for what a good portable laptop is worth. You can enjoy additional goodies like a customized startup tone, the exterior design and free MP3 albums and wallpapers too. The N43SL is a near perfect laptop with some flaws, but its "incredible" offerings is sure to sway you over, especially with its attractive price.

[siopao1984]

nice. i think gi kuha nila ang features sa toshiba nga pwede duha ka hdd ang ibutang.

actually even before i was with dell naa sila daghang system way back 2009 na dual hard drives and portables like inspiron 1710