Coming in under our stringent pricing scheme, ASUS bettered it by $50 and managed to include some great hardware and features unavailable in some of the more expensive units.
At 14.1 inches, its display is slightly smaller than the other 15.1 and 15.4in widescreen monitors on review this month. Keeping the unit's footprint to a manageable size this notebook is at home either on a desk or on your lap without feeling too bulky. At 2.2kg is also weighs in lightest for a 14.1in, sharing the same weight as the smaller Apple iBook and only marginally heavier than the 12.1in Twinhead E121i Centrino. The M24N comes in lighter than either of the other award winners, making it perfect for anyone on the go. As this is a mobile powerhouse, ASUS have taken usage into consideration and offer a two year international warranty, giving peace of mind with the knowledge that if the unit were to fail during warranty and users are away from local repairers, they can get the unit taken care of promptly.
Making use of the highest clocked Intel Pentium M 1.6GHz processor and 512MB of fast PC2700 RAM the unit is let down slightly by its inclusion of only 64MB shared memory, which draws from the system rather than from dedicated graphics memory as is the case of ATI Mobility RADEON graphics found in the other two award winners. Although outperformed for productivity and 3D during testing by the other two similarly clocked Viewmaster and Protac systems, no other notebook could hold a candle to ASUS when it came to battery performance. It sustained charge for over 5 hours of constant use under a heavy workload of productivity software. ASUS blew everyone else away, its nearest contender, the Targa falling short of the 5 hour mark, managing only 295 minutes to ASUS' 304.
Inside you'll find a sensible 40GB 5400rpm drive which should be more than adequate for business or home use. Should you find you're running out of storage room, use the included optical combo drive to burn off your data and free up space. The supplied copy of Nero 6 will give you all the functionality you'll need to take full advantage of your CD-RW drive, while the anti-virus software will keep your investment safe from internet viruses. The pack comes bundled with an external mouse and 64MB USB flash memory drive to compensate for the lack of floppy disk drive. If you're willing to lose an inch of display, ASUS more than compensate for it, with a mammoth battery life, included extras and great value.
This article appeared in the June, 2004 issue of PC Authority.
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