ASUS U35Jc – Hands on subtlety

May 31st, 2010 in .Laptops & Netbooks .Products
Nick Holland
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ASUS’ latest performance mainstream laptop, the U35Jc, may not have the swanky bamboo covering like its U33 brother (more of that here), but it does feature the latest Intel and Nvidia hardware packed between an ASUS styled shell with brushed aluminum cover. Mmm tasty.

ASUS U35Jc

ASUS U35Jc with optional optical drive option (it's a bit thicker)

That aluminum cover adds that “special” element we all need when committing to our latest purchase, and parting with a significant sum of cash. After all, the gadgets you carry and use are always on some level an expression of you and your personality. Unlike the louder Karim Rashid ASUS 1008P netbook, the brushed black aluminum of the U35Jc is a subtle, more professional approach away from other laptops. Inside, ASUS has made a weight and cost saving decision to go back to plastic, however as you can see it’s slightly different to a thin polypropane shell and has a completely different finish to the keyboard, with a pitted texturing on the mousepad area to differentiate it under thumb without looking.

ASUS U35Jc

ASUS U35Jc on display, and looking very lovely!

Speaking of that keyboard, ASUS chooses to use a slightly spaced design with flat keys and softly rounded edges. It looks modern and attractive but can split the opinion of users, especially if they are used to older laptop keyboards, as the extra space needs a bit of retraining for the fingers. Most importantly though the key presses afford a sharp, definite response, and not a spongy press so any lengthy document can easily be fired out.

ASUS U35Jc

ASUS U35Jc front profile

The U35Jc shown features a 13.3 inch LED baclit LCD display, but there’s also a 14.1 inch U45 for those who want the extra realestate. There’s the option of an optical drive which makes the whole form factor fatter, but really, aim to live without (unless DVD backups or DVD watching is an absolutely need). If you are after the ultra-thin model shown, make sure you check before you buy.

Inside, in addition the latest Intel Core i5-450M CPU and Nvidia GeForce 310M 1GB graphics card with Optimus Technology, 2GB of DDR3, a 500GB hard drive and a six cell battery, as you’d expect, ASUS adds its own engineering: the Super Hybrid Engine.

ASUS U35Jc

ASUS U35Jc side profile

ASUS’ Super Hybrid Engine basically offers a free CPU upgrade from Core i5-4xx to i5-5xx thanks to its automatic overclocking and management of its power distribution based on usage. The U35 is up to 11 per cent faster than competitive models and offers up to 11.43 hours of battery life, versus 9.81 from the competition in MobileMark 2007. This is all while improving on the latest Energy Star 5 specification, by running with 32.75% more power efficient.

The ASUS U35Jc balances a subtle style and performance hardware, with an almost all-day battery life to suit most buying needs; whether it’s either personal or business. It doesn’t have the cut of the Bamboo U33, but it’s cheaper and the aluminum is more professional, yet it may not have the aluminum internals of the UL30, but it’s also lighter. Overall, that’s a very pleasant and appealing compromise.

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  • http://deliquios.blogspot.com fran

    any idea of price and disponibility in europe? Im from spain and im followinf this model 2 weeks ago

    thanks

  • John

    Only 2gb of DDR3? I really don’t understand because most of the new laptops have 3 or 4Gb of RAM.

  • http://techinstyle.tv Nick

    Hi John,
    You’ll find most laptops now or future are shipping with 2GB of memory in order to hit the price the market expects. This is because memory prices have increased 2-4x (depending on model) in the last year alone. Unfortunately this trend is set to stay, as memory manufacturers are reducing supply of memory ICs by making NAND for SSDs instead. This keeps the price of both memory and SSDs high.

  • ASUS UK

    Hi, John:

    Thanks for asking. The UK version should be available in Aug, and is expected to have 4G RAM pre-installed.

    tks

  • John

    Oh thanks!

  • Effortless

    How are the speakers? The branding of “Altec Lansing” sounds promising, but they appear to be just small buttons on the top. From my experience with the Acer Aspire 3810T, the sound is squeeky and can’t handle loud volume at all. Does this apply to U35Jc as well?

  • http://techinstyle.tv Nick

    The N-series are fab, but unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to hear the U35s Antec Lansing stuff :-(

  • Damian

    Just because it turbo boosts doesn’t mean it turns it into an i5.

  • http://techinstyle.tv Nick

    Hi Damian,

    It’s not native Turbo Boost – the Super Hybrid Engine offers additional automated-overclocking on top of TurboBoost that gives it the performance of an “540″. It doesn’t change the CPU itself.

    There’s actually very little difference between the 450 and 540.