I have just upgraded to this latest model Asus Centrino 2 notebook. I was using a 18 month old 2ghz Asus Laptop that was incredibly reliable. I do most of my daily net tasks(like writing this blog) on my Acer netbook but use my laptop for Music production, Video editing and now some gaming.
The N50vc has a Nvidea 512 mb graphics card, where my old laptop only had a 128mb, so struggled with video editing, and wasn’t up to gaming. I bought a couple of new games to test it capabilities. I got Grid( a car racing game) and Mirrors Edge, a game that’s like doing virtual Parkour(the french named sport of running around and jumping off walls and urban features).
Mirrors Edge ran flawlessly but I needed to adjust the screen resolution for Grid to run smoothly. It still looks awesome graphically, and runs a treat. I hooked up my trusty Logitech wingman formula force steering wheel and I was up and racing.
Mirrors edge was another story. I am not a fan of playing using a keyboard, so after a quick play I pulled out my old Microsoft strategic commander. Now this a seriously old relic and wouldn’t run under vista(ultimate 32bit) at first. After a bit of googling I found a very handy thread that got it running at vistax64.com , that involved running it in compatabilty mode and creating a shortcut to the exe.
After messing around I tried playing using this, which was better than keyboard but still wasn’t what I had hoped. I looked around and ended up buying a Nosrtromo N52te. This made a huge difference. I also changed my mouse from the Logitech MX revolution to a Logitech G9 gaming mouse.
The main difference I have noticed(apart from speed and zippier performance) is going from home premium to Ultimate. Ultimate is nice but I wouldn’t pay for it. I have set up dreamscene, which is where you have an animated wallpaper. After messing about with microsoft standard dreamscenes, I googled a bit and now have a really cool matrix background.
I really like the feel of the keys on this laptop and built in number pad, although now I have the laptop setup, I don’t use them except when mobile. I am running the laptop, closed sitting underneath my monitor shelf, most of the time. I have it running into an Asus 20″ LCD monitor via HDMI. I use a Logitech DiNovo edge keyboard and normally a logitech MX revolution mouse (and swap to G9 for gaming).
The unit comes with express gate, which is basically a quick internet access mode that uses a version of linux on a chip. As the laptop doesn’t need to boot up, its a quick way to get online and do basic net related tasks like surfing chatting email etc. I had a quick play and although it maybe handy for road warriors, its not a feature I would use very often, if at all.
The unit also has Asus Super Hybrid Engine, which allows you to balance power versus battery life and its a simple yet effective tool, but its geared towards road warriors, and I use this laptop as desktop replacement so again its not a feature i will take advantage of much.
One of the nice features is the touch sensitive media controls, that are on a section between keyboard and screen. The volume control(for example) is used by sliding your finger across this section and it works a treat.
This model has the Asus smart logon technology that uses face recognition to log you into the computer. It seems to work well enough but I am not using this function as I use the laptop with the lid closed.
The laptop is fitted with a fingerprint scanner, which is very handy for logon, although it takes a little bit of practice to get the speed right that you slide your fingertip across the sensor. The inbuilt web cam provides a very clear image, being a 2 megapixel unit.
The laptop features an Ionizer, which generates negative Ions. This is what you feel after a rain storm, and is meant to help keep you refreshed when using laptop for long periods. I’m not sure how effective this is but it certainly doesn’t hurt, and I have noticed that I haven’t felt stale, when using the laptop for extended periods, so its probably helping.
The unit features an LED backlit LCD screen, which enhances battery life, but I did find you needed to have the screen on correct angle or it wasn’t ideal. I doubt this is a major issue and for the road warriors the better battery life, will be worth the small trade off.
The laptop has a built in TV tuner, and I use this to record shows when I am out, using windows media centre. I have this hooked up to my roof antenna, as the travel antenna is pretty much useless for digital TV. The unit has a hybrid tuner that has analogue tuner as well as digital and so the travel antenna may prove handy if I’m traveling and using analogue reception.
Overall I absolutely love this laptop, its amazingly fast, works flawlessly, looks great, and is a joy to use, with features that are functional.
Specs: 2.53 Ghz Intel Centrino 2 processor with 1066 FSB and 6mb L2 cache, 320Gb 5400rpm HDD, 4 Gb 800Mhz DDR2 ram, 802.11 agn dual band wireless, Bluetooth, 15.4″ WXGA LED screen, Hybrid TV tuner, includes remote and IR receiver, 2 Megapixel web cam, Nvidea Geforce 9300 GS 512Mb dedicated graphics card. Firewire IEEE 1394 port. eSata connection, 3 x USB, SD/MMC card reader, HDMI out, S/PDIF out, express card slot, Gigabit ethernet port.
KewlHunter.com 
hey, nice post, i have agree with most of what u have said. i got mine in dec last yeah and i like the look and feel of the note book.
a few things need to be said though, even though the key board feels great to type with, it seems to skip some key strokes, as in not recognise the input.
plus my remote isn’t working!!!!
is there some itr driver i need to install or something.
mostly use mine as a desktop replacement and rarely as a laptop but I haven’t had any issues with keyboard, but I am using an external bluetooth keyboard about 90% of the time. If you find its the same keys that fail to register your keystrokes then its definatly a waaranty issue.
For the remote to work you need to plug in the white circular device that came with your laptop. Its the Infra-red receiver. It also comes with some stick on transmitter leads, and will act as remote extender for other devices. The idea of this is if you had laptop(as a media centre) and surround amp(forexample) in a cupboard below your TV, and have only IR receiver visible.
By attaching the transmitter lead(s) to where your amp receives its IR signal, you can use the asus IR receiver to receive the IR from your amps remote. This will work with any IR device you want tucked out of site.
Hope this helps
1. walmatic – March 22, 2009
hey, nice post, i have agree with most of what u have said. i got mine in dec last yeah and i like the look and feel of the note book.
a few things need to be said though, even though the key board feels great to type with, it seems to skip some key strokes, as in not recognise the input.
plus my remote isn’t working!!!!
is there some itr driver i need to install or something.
Reply
yeah i havnt had many problems with mine.. seems to work well and run extremely well.. only 2 problems i dont like about it.. are 1} speakers in it are really crap.. and 2} ive noticed that like in your post the keys sometimes dont type. bt other then that it is a really good laptop
I mainly use mine with a Di Novo keyboard so haven’t had issues with the keys, as I use them very rarely. I have to agree with the speakers being rubbish but also find virtually all laptops suffer this issue. I have mine hooked up to my stereo so avoid using them too. Thanks for the feed back
cheers
Kewl Hunter
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