ASUS is one of my favourite brands when it’s about computer peripherals.
During the IFA in Berlin, ASUS took opportunity to present (amongst
other nice goodies) their newest creation of Ultrabooks. Okay, Ultrabooks
aren’t something spectacular today because almost every brand has one.

So what’s so specual about this one then?

Let’s say, that ASUS took it’s already-successful ZENbook series, gave it a small remake and (yes, you see right!) give it a 15 inch chassis.

The result: A portable solution, big enough to impress with a fine-resoluting FullHD-display being supported by a NVidia 650M graphics card.

Sounds like other 15-inch-classic notebooks, yes but being as flat as an Ultrabook and having a long stamina (a criterium often failed by classic notebooks!) yet offering tremendous i7 ivy bridge power and being ready to play also some modern games with moderate settings will make it a wanna-have-goodie (even for me!)

So why no MacBook Pro 15 Retina then?

First: it’s still very expensive with up to 2800 EUR with my desired config.
Second: It’s not as gaming-friendly due to a weaker GPU
Third: Why would I need a 2880×1600 display if the GPU is hardly capable of bringing content fluid to the screen?

The MacBook Pro 15 Retina is great, no doubt but the contrary is that Apple locks up it’s device extremely leaving you no choice to replace hardware if it breaks or faster one comes up.

The Asus Ultrabook has a userfriendly Maintenance bay that allows access to all essential components and also allows easy cleaning of the fans (which could be essential when we talk about the enormous CPU and GPU power it offers!). Thus the body holds 2 2.5-inch drives which allows performant configurations or a performant system drive paired with a data storage drive. The choice is yours. 4GB of pre-soldered RAM and an additional SODIMM bay allows up to 12GB RAM (when you fork in an 8GB module. The MacBook Pro 15 Retina, by the way, has no SODIMM slot. So you have to configure it to your needs at the Apple online store. And Apple still takes lots of money for a RAM upgrade! Since the Pentalobe screws disallow any user-maintenance from factory, you’re also enforced to preconfigure your HDD config. Once chosen and sealed, you’re about to go with what you have. No later decisions!

The Aluminum unibody seems as eloquent as of the MacBook so no flaws there. The sound isn’t as good but hey, that’s due to it’s small size. You can’t have a flat notebook and the sound of a stereo. That simply doesn’t work. The antiglare display akes it predsined for outside work. And using a backlit keyboard WITH a separate number-section makes it a notebook you’d like to work with for hours.

Speaking of battery times. According to ASUS, the Ultrabook is about to entertain you up to 8 hours using Eco mode and when using with Web and DVD for example, you may still face 5 hours battery life.

Heavily stressed, the battery may be down in 2 hours but hey, powerful components need juice… lots of it!

Connectionlike you will find (most important) USB3.0 and other up-to-date connectors.

Pricelike the U500VZ is about to settle between 1300 and 1800 USD depending on what you configure. But yet it seems a sexy price compared to the competitors (like Samsung or Apple)