Review ASUS N75SF Notebook
At this year's international exhibition Computex, the renowned ASUS company demonstrated three new models of multimedia notebooks N75SF, N55SF and N45S. An older model with the maximum configuration got into our test laboratory. The functional diversity of the ASUS N75SF laptop is complemented by a high-quality speaker system from Bang & Olufsen, with which ASUS works closely. Among other things, the device has a lot of other advantages, and the very first thing you notice is the stylish design. Let's see what other pleasant surprises this model can please?
Contents of delivery
We received an engineering sample for testing ASUS N75SF laptop... It is packed in a large cardboard box. Inside, in a plastic "tray", we found the laptop itself. The whole box is divided into several compartments. In addition to the laptop compartment, there is space for the battery and power supply. There was a compartment under the laptop, apparently for documentation. But since we have an engineering sample, it was not here. But what really pleased me was the presence of a small SonicMaster subwoofer. It has a cylindrical shape, and its dimensions can be called quite compact.
Design
From the very first minutes the multimedia ASUS N75SF managed to surprise everyone. The laptop case looks monolithic, somewhat cumbersome, there are no sharp edges. Its glossy surface will look gorgeous wherever you look from any vantage point. Even the soiled and reflective surface did not leave an unpleasant impression. We would like to point out that the lacquered lid is elegantly highlighted with chrome trim around the edges. The frame, however, like everything else, is made of plastic. The edging along the entire plane is slightly deepened. By the way, it is not the only chrome element in the design. The lid of the laptop is adorned with the corporate logo of the ASUS company.
Now let's take a look at the inside of the laptop. Everything here is divided into two main color zones, which are painted in black and silver. It should be noted right away that the panel of the line of LED indicators, the area of the keyboard block with the grill above it, as well as the metal panel under the screen are painted in steel color. All other parts of the interior are dark. These are, first of all, the display frame, the palm rest and the hinges that connect the base to the screen.
We would like to note that in addition to the play of dark and light colors that refresh the interior of the laptop, the designers decided to experiment a little with the glossy and matte finish of the case. In particular, the inner surfaces, apart from the display frame, are almost completely matte. Fingerprints will not be very visible here. The surface itself is smooth, smooth and therefore pleasant to the touch. Interestingly, the oversized grille above the keyboard hides two hinges, which are not too large anyway. However, despite their small size, the hinges do an excellent job and securely hold the display in position. By the way, thanks to these hinges, the laptop screen can be opened up to 140 degrees, which is quite enough for comfortable work. At the moment of closing the laptop lid, when about 12 degrees remains, the auto-finishing is triggered. In order to prevent touching the display with the working area, there are special rubber feet on the display frame. There are very few of them - two on the sides and two at the top, but they are all quite long.
The surface of the bottom panel of the ASUS N75SF laptop, in contrast to the work surface and the lid, is made rough. It is also made of plastic that is quite tough and resistant to deformation. There are large rubber feet along the entire perimeter of the bottom in each of the four corners.They are high and raise the laptop well above the table surface, which in turn contributes to free air circulation.
The bottom panel of the laptop has one compartment providing access to internal components and several ventilation grilles to remove heated air.
In general, although this design cannot be called classic, it is still quite unusual. The build quality is good, the details do not play, and there are practically no flexes.
Display and sound
ASUS N75SF laptop is equipped with a widescreen 17.3-inch screen with a resolution of 1920 × 1080 pixels. This Full HD display has an excellent brightness level (approximately 300-nits) and produces gorgeous, fairly colorful colors. On such a display, watching movies will deliver extremely positive emotions, since the image quality is no worse than on a Full HD TV screen. With a 16: 9 theatrical aspect ratio, video viewing will be more comfortable because there are no black bars at the top and bottom of the screen, and its large area provides an optimal working environment, since it will be more comfortable to work with two open application windows at the same time.
By the way, the display has a glossy finish. But the high image quality contributes to the fact that the reflections are somehow not particularly noticeable, although they, of course, are present, and cannot be avoided. True, a high level of brightness will allow you to work with a laptop outdoors, even in sunny weather.
Viewing angles ASUS N75SF laptop can be described as good enough. The horizontal visibility is especially pleasing. Accordingly, you can watch films with a company of several people. Moreover, even if you look at the display almost from the very end, the colors will not be distorted. But with vertical viewing angles, things are a little different. Even with a slight tilt of the display "away from you", the image began to distort and turn into negative, and when tilted forward, it did not undergo significant inversion.
As we said earlier, there is a wide perforated grill above the keyboard block area. There are two stereo speakers underneath. Based on the size of the lattice, it seemed to us that they are also quite large, but in fact this turned out to be not the case. Standard columns are installed inside, and this width can be considered, most likely, as a tribute to the design.
The laptop is equipped with a sound system from the famous Danish company Bang & Olufsen. The products of this company belong to the premium class and it is difficult to confuse it with any other. We were able to make sure of this as soon as we turned on the speaker system for listening. From the speakers came a realistic and moderately loud sound of a wide range, in which both high and low frequencies were sufficient.
By the way, it's not for nothing that the laptop comes with a subwoofer. With it, you can truly understand what a spacious, powerful and incredibly deep sound is. Regardless of the genre of the track being played, you will enjoy high-quality sound in which low frequencies are clearly audible. Now, the need to connect external speakers will be irrelevant. Even the most fastidious music lover will appreciate the excellent balance of sound without distortion. Note that connecting a subwoofer is quite simple, because this does not require any additional programs.
At the top of the display bezel you can see a built-in 1.3 megapixel webcam. It allows you to take high-quality photographs with a resolution of 1280x720 pixels. In addition, with its help, you can shoot movies with a clear, rich image and a resolution of 640x480 pixels. Well, it's not worth talking about the opportunity to communicate with friends on Skype or organize a video conference. She will cope with all this without problems.
Keyboard and touchpad
ASUS N75SF laptop is equipped with a full-size keyboard with a separate numeric pad - numpad. So, the keyboard unit consists of rather large keys with a standard Latin layout.There are no Russian symbols here due to the fact that we have an engineering sample for testing. For production models, Cyrillic characters will be highlighted in light green.
Now let's look at the keys themselves. They have a flat surface that slopes slightly downward. Square and 20mm buttons are clearly labeled, which, when combined with a gray surface, will help you distinguish between characters and facilitate typing. I was glad that the buttons of the numpad and arrow block were practically not reduced in size. All keys of the main and auxiliary units have an average travel, and during actuation you can feel a clear recoil. By the way, due to the fact that the keyboard is not an island type and is not equipped with a backlight, it does not become less ergonomic.
On a large work site, it was possible to accommodate literally everything that is necessary for a full-fledged work. In addition to the numpad located on the right side of the main unit, on the left you can see two vertical rows of keys. One of them consists of a group of multimedia buttons that serve for comfortable control of audio tracks. The keys from this row, unlike others, are pressed more tightly. This is very convenient, because during printing, accidental clicks cannot be avoided, and these buttons are not so often in demand. The topmost button launches ASUS Music Now. Now you can listen to music without even loading the operating system.
The second row consists of a line of LED indicators. Indicators for wireless network and hard drive status are located here. There are also LEDs indicating muted sound and activated Caps Lock function.
We would like to draw your attention to the fact that the laptop power button was placed not as usual above the keyboard, but near the buttons of the digital block. This solution can be called somewhat inconvenient. However, you can get used to this over time.
The touchpad sits exactly in the center of the wrist rest. Its design cannot be called traditional. So, for example, it does not have an upper border, and all other edges are highlighted quite clearly. By the way, the pad of the touchpad is not deepened, but together with the under-palm surface is on the same level. In general, it is convenient to work with the touchpad, because it has a large area for positioning, and its surface is matte, so the fingers will slide easily and without delay. In addition, the touch manipulator supports multi-touch gesture functions, so you can rotate images, zoom, and scroll through pages. By the way, there is no special marking indicating the zone of vertical and horizontal scrolling on the touchpad.
There are not two, but one solid key under the touch field. It is better to press it around the edges, as it works better this way. We would like to note that the lower part of the "rocker" key drops slightly to the front edge, but this does not affect the usability in any way. The key is pressed effortlessly and without loud clinking.
Processor and performance
ASUS N75SF laptop comes pre-installed with Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit operating system. It has a simple interface and is able to provide the user with wide functionality and stable operation.
The laptop can be equipped with a dual-core second generation Core i5 or Core i3 processors, as well as more powerful ones. Our ASUS N75SF laptop is equipped with a quad-core Core i7-2630QM processor, its clock speed is 2 GHz, and the volume of L3 cache is 6 MB. This CPU is built on the basis of the Sandy Bridge microarchitecture in a 32nm process technology. In addition, this central processing unit has high performance and can quickly cope with simple and complex computational operations. Note that even with the simultaneous launch of several resource-intensive applications, it will work smoothly and without delays.
The CPU supports advanced technology.For example, using the multithreading function, it is possible to process up to eight data streams simultaneously, and thanks to Turbo Boost, the nominal frequency can be increased to 2.9 GHz.
The processor is supplemented with 8 GB DDR3-1333 RAM. The laptop has two slots for installing memory sticks. The first of them contains a 4GB bar made by Hynix, and the second contains a Samsung with the same capacity. In order to provide high performance this amount of RAM is quite enough. Such a large volume can be "vital" because in our time resource-intensive applications are quite common. However, thanks to the Core i7-2630QM processor present in our package, the system performance will be maximum.
The ASUS N75SF laptop uses hybrid graphics. It consists of a discrete graphics card NVIDIA GeForce GT 555M with 2 GB of its own video memory and integrated Intel HD Graphics 3000, using dynamic memory in the amount of 64 to 1500 MB. The discrete video card is built using 40nm technology based on the Fermi architecture, and the integrated one is based on a 40nm process technology.
Before we take a closer look at the capabilities of the video subsystem, one important point should be noted. IN ASUS N75SF laptop the discrete graphics card is not soldered into the motherboard, but is located in a separate slot. As a result, if necessary, it can be easily replaced with another video card.
Overall, both graphics controllers have their merits. For example, the integrated controller is great for office tasks, while the discrete controller can smoothly play Blu-ray video, decode dual-stream video, transmit Dolby True HD audio to a Hi-Fi receiver without loss of quality, and also supports 3D Vision technology. By the way, if the display itself cannot support 3D graphics, then you can always connect your laptop to an external 3D display or TV.
The GeForce GT 555M video card has no less striking advantages and excellent gaming capabilities. A full confirmation of this was the test for and gaming performance. All the games launched showed excellent results. In particular: the games Crysis 2, DIRT 3 went with a native resolution of 1920 × 1080 pixels and at high settings. They can be played with 24-28 frames per second in the first case and 30-34 in the second. Interestingly, other modern toys are played at Ultra settings and at Full HD resolution. For example, the game The Elder Scrolls 5 Skyrim showed 27-30 fps, and Need For Speed The Run - 24-26 fps. We would like to note that the largest number of fps (100-104) at maximum settings was achieved by the Fifa game, while the screen resolution was not changed. But with the game Battlefield 3, the screen resolution had to be lowered to 1366x768 pixels. This was done due to the fact that the Full HD game began to slow down noticeably. As a result of the actions taken, the number of frames per second became acceptable and amounted to 29-35 fps.
In order to find out how efficient the video card and processor are, we used the Cinebench R11.5 application. You can see the results obtained in the screenshot. The graphics got 35.14 fps, and the processor is 4.93 pts. These figures can be considered high.
Note that thanks to NVIDIA Optimus technology, the laptop has the ability to automatically switch between video cards. This will allow you to choose the most optimal option for a particular graphics, because it is better to use a discrete video card for games, and an integrated video adapter is well suited for working with office applications.
The laptop is equipped with two hard drives called Seagate Momentus ST9750423AS. These drives have a volume of 750 GB and a standard speed of 5400 rpm. Note that the HDDs are not combined into a Raid array and are connected via the SATA II interface. On such capacious drives, you can store a huge amount of different data.
Using the HD Tune Pro 4.50 utility, we found out that each of the hard drives has a minimum read speed of 43.4 MB / s, a maximum of 94.4 MB / s.
More details can be seen in the screenshot.
The CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1 program helped us to evaluate the performance of the drives. It cannot be said that the results were high, but, nevertheless, the data read speed was 83.37 MB / s, and the write speed was 78.3 MB / s.
It is interesting that all the main components of the laptop, the operating system has given quite high marks. The "weakest" links were the hard disk and the integrated graphics, which received 5.9 points each. All other components received the following marks: graphics for games - 6.8, RAM - 7.6, processor - 7.4 points. The overall performance index score is 5.9 points.
Ports and communications
The laptop cannot boast of a variety of ports. It has neither a 1394 (FireWire) port nor an ExpressCard expansion slot.
On the left side, you can see a ventilation grill for exhausting warm air and a small number of ports. There are two USB 2.0 interfaces and a built-in MATSHITA BD-MLT UJ240AFW optical drive.
The optical drive can read and write discs in all formats except HD DVD-R, HD DVD-RW, HD DVD-ROM. The drive and ports are well positioned as the wires from the connected equipment will not get in the way during operation.
The right side of the laptop is filled to capacity. The first are two audio jacks for connecting headphones and a microphone. Behind these interfaces, you can notice two more USB, but already working in the high-speed 3.0 standard, as well as a digital HDMI port.
The second half of the right side is occupied by a built-in card reader that reads SD, MMC, MS, MS Pro Duo cards, a 15-pin VGA port and an RJ-45 network connector. There is also a connector for a subwoofer, a power jack and a Kensington lock hole.
The front end of the laptop has no ports. There is a group of LED indicators duplicating a row of LEDs located to the left of the keyboard. If the device is closed, then with the help of these indicators it is possible to understand whether it is working or is in the off state.
The rear panel, like the front panel, is free of ports and connectors.
Working with wireless communications is provided by a Wi-Fi adapter of the 802.11 b / g / n standard and a Bluetooth V3.0 + HS module.
Heat
The HW Monitor utility helped us understand how hot the internal components of the laptop are. The results were as follows. The processor averaged 45 to 93 degrees Celsius. The video card in the process of work also underwent significant heating, its minimum temperature was at 42 degrees, and the maximum reached 85 degrees. The Winchester was the least hot compared to these components.
If we talk about heating the bottom and working surface, then in idle mode the temperature did not exceed the threshold of 29 degrees. Overall, we didn't even feel heating.
But with increasing load, the temperature began to increase, but this did not affect the comfort of work. In some places, we recorded a significant rise in temperature. This point turned out to be the upper left corner on the bottom. In this place, the temperature has risen from 27.3 degrees to 44 ° C. At this time, the absolute indoor temperature was 24 ° C. However, the center of the keyboard turned out to be the same hot spot. Here the maximum reached 43 degrees. At other points, the temperature has risen, but not so critical.
Battery
The ASUS N75SF notebook comes with a 6-cell 5200mAh (56Wh) Li-ion battery and a 120W power supply.
According to the results of the tests carried out, we can confidently say that the laptop does not have an extremely long battery life. Although in this case, one should take into account the presence of a high-performance "filling". Such indicators are a kind of retribution for high performance and functionality.
The Battery Eater program was used to test the battery.With the "Energy Saving" power plan, the results were as follows: in "Read's" mode, the laptop worked for 3 hours and 5 minutes, and in "Classic" - 1 hour and 10 minutes. After the power plan was changed to “High Performance”, the battery used up less. This is more noticeable in the "Read's" mode, in which the result was 2 hours and 38 minutes. And in the "Classic" mode, the operating time practically did not differ from the previous result and amounted to 1 hour and 2 minutes.
Conclusion
Taking a closer look at the N75SF notebook, you understand that it really deserves the right to be called multimedia. This truly successful model has advantages that will be appreciated by both music lovers and real gamers. That only is a good video card and high performance, which is realized by a powerful quad-core processor. And the Bang & Olufsen audio system is beyond expectations, as the sound quality surpasses all expectations. To watch movies, you do not need to connect an external audio system because the laptop comes with an excellent subwoofer. By the way, using a separate row of buttons located to the left of the keyboard, you can easily manage media content. Separately, I would like to note the magnificent display, which impressed with rich colors and high brightness. Thus, for watching movies or playing games, it suits perfectly.
Unfortunately, not everyone may like the rather heavy weight and the easily soiled glossy lid, which requires frequent maintenance. But in general, the ASUS N75SF laptop has so many advantages that such moments cannot reduce interest in it. In addition, the chic exterior will be a true decoration for any interior.
So, if the need to replace your computer is ripe, and you are ready to give a decent amount, especially if your weakness is that you cannot imagine a day without music or games, then the ASUS N75SF laptop is what you need.
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