Deceptively Thin, Surprisingly Fast
By Harry McCracken | Sunday, December 19, 2010 at 10:34 am
Last Gadget Standing Nominee: Asus U36Jc-A1
Price: $999
The computing world is awash in powerful laptops. There are also more and more thin-and-light notebooks with 13″ screens. But 13″ thin-and-lights that are truly powerful? They’re still a rare breed. That’s what makes the Asus U36Jc-A1 intriguing: It looks like a typical 13-incher that emphasizes portability over potency, but it packs a standard-voltage Intel Core i5 CPU and Nvidia G310M discrete graphics. It also has Nvidia’s Optimus technology, which lets the system switch between the G310M and integrated graphics on the fly for better battery life–Asus says it can run up to nine hours on a charge.
The U36Jc-A1 has an aluminum-magnesium alloy shell, is .76″ thick, and weighs 3.4 pounds. Asus says it’ll go on sale on January 17th.
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December 19th, 2010 at 2:07 pm
It sounds like the perfect thin and light, with one glaring (literally) exception: the shiny screen, which one initial reviewer has called "tragically glossy" — well, that's probably excessive, but I am wondering how a laptop that is specifically intended for traveling to airports, coffeehouses, and other places with bright and changeable lighting will deal with bright conditions. Well, it could always double as a shaving mirror . . .
December 19th, 2010 at 3:09 pm
The cool thing about these small screens is there's a win either way with graphics with these powerful GPUs (game-wise anyway). On one hand you can cram super-small pixels in the smaller space and get amazing picture and use the GPU to its fullest, or you can have bigger pixels but run games more smoothly. I'm surprised these machines have yet to take off.
Looks real good for the price.