Well, that time is upon us, ElectricPig readers! It’s my final blog post with the Asus N80Vc. I’ve been using it daily for the last four weeks, and sadly it’s time for me to return it! So in this final blog post I’ll give my concluding thoughts of it, including whether I would buy one myself and whether I would recommend it to you, the ElectricPig readers.
So, my last blog post! These past four weeks have just flown by! I’ve had some good use out of the Asus N80Vc, including a few trips on the train, a couple on a bus (I’ve learned it’s not very easy to type while a bus is driving round small country roads!) and I’ve tried it while sat on the beach promenade too (rather sheepishly though, as I was trying to shield it from any sand – which, may I add, worked!). It really is light enough to be taken just about anywhere – it’s really light and I can easily fit it in my backpack without a noticeable weight being on my shoulders, so it truly is a portable laptop.
I think Asus have really hit the nail on the head with the N80Vc. It’s primarily aimed at business users, but there’s nothing to really make it ONLY for business users. In fact, Asus seem to have worked to make it a business laptop which can also function as a multimedia or everyday laptop too, which really does ensure it can cater for all markets.
I’ve been really impressed – not just by seeing how technology has changed since I bought my previous 1.5GHz single-core laptop about 5 years ago, but by how close the gap between desktop and laptop computers has become. Top-range computers costing £1000 are still at about the same level of performance that this laptop delivers!
If you’re looking to buy the laptop, it’s worth considering a couple of negative points. The screen is quite reflective – it was quite hard to get photographs of the screen without an image of my face or my camera showing up very prominently in the photo! As long as you’re not going to sit in a really brightly-lit area with a light pointing at the screen and then try to read an e-book, it should be fine though. The noise the keyboard makes does take some getting used to, so if you’re used to a computer keyboard where you press the keys in with quite a bit of force you’ll have to learn to adapt if you want the N80’s keyboard to be quieter!
I really don’t want to have to give this laptop back – my computer has sat all but unused over the past four weeks and when it’s returned to Asus I’ll miss the portability the N80Vc provides me with!
In all honesty, the laptop really is brilliant and well worth the £600 it would cost to purchase it. I would recommend it to anybody looking for a laptop who has that amount of money to spend, and if I had the money (I wish I did!) I would buy this laptop in an instant. It presents fantastic value for money and I believe it has enough features to satisfy business users and non-business users alike.
I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Asus and ElectricPig for allowing me to have this laptop for a month. The experience has been fantastic and the opportunity to own a top-of-the-range laptop for the last four weeks has been really great. If ElectricPig does something like this again, I would recommend it to all.
So, this is Mark Dumpleton for Asus and ElectricPig, saying thank you and good night.
Goodbye Asus N80Vc – maybe we’ll meet again someday!
