Review - ASUS U20A - Mobile World Magazine

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Review - ASUS U20A

by Charles F.Moriera

Friday, 05 February 2010 14:54

A netbook-like notebook

In light of Intel’s Consumer Ultra-Low Voltage (CULV) processors, vendors have been introducing thin-and-light notebooks that could easily be mistaken as netbooks. The ASUS U20A is stylish and compact with a 6-cell battery that claims to last up to 8 hours. At press time, the notebook isn’t available in Malaysia yet.

Look
The top of its cover, screen border and palm rest are made of a glossy black plastic, whilst its bottom is matte black. A trade off for looking sleek is its glossy surfaces, readily collect unsightly fingerprints and grease marks.

A single USB port, Ethernet LAN port and its DVD writer/readers adorn its right side, whilst two USB ports, external VGA port, 5-in-1 multi-card slot, microphone and earphone jacks adorn its right. Its webcam is above its screen, whilst its pair of Altec Lansing stereo speakers is at the front below its keyboard and illuminated touch-pad with large chromed mouse buttons.

Our review unit comes with a QWERTY keyboard for the UK market and has large, well-spaced, matte-black keys which are comfortable and tactile to type. It has two buttons above the upper right and left corners of its keyboard respectively. The upper right button powers it up into Windows, whilst the upper left one boots its embedded ASUS Express Gate micro-OS.

Media Capabilities
The ASUS Express Gate micro-OS isn’t new, being based on the Splashtop instant-on Linux distribution. It lets us have a much more convenient access to web-based applications with its Firefox browser; chat using Google Talk, ICQ, MSN,Yahoo! and other instant messengers; make and receive Skype calls; play online games; view photos and play MP3 music files. However, it didn’t let us copy files between storage devices or folders and it does not play videos.

Its configuration panel lets you connect to WiFi networks as well as wired networks either directly via the DSL modem or via a router; set date, time, languages, keyboard layout, screen layout, volume control, power management, camera calibration and so on. We made a Skype test call and successfully ran MSN chat, whilst sound quality through notebook speakers aren’t much to shout about and for that rich, hi-fi experience you’ll need headphones.

Life Frame
ASUS LifeFrame lets you switch between still and video camera, voice recorder and so on the fly. In camera mode it either takes a single shot or series of up to 15 shots in succession with its in-built webcam above the screen and it stores them as BMP, JPG or GIF images at resolutions of up to 1.3 megapixels (1280 x 1024 pixels). While in video mode it captures videos of up to 640 x 480 (VGA) resolution in ASF, WMV or AVI formats.

Other configuration settings include flash, colour filters, frames and so on. It also has special effects where it intelligently superimposes accessories such as glasses, moustache, a hat, a wig, thought balloons etc over the subject’s eyes, mouth or on top of his head.

Verdict
Battery life isn’t as great as the Acer Timeline we tested a while ago and 1080p videos turned out choppy. Its saving grace is its micro OS and its well-built chassis.