Bought this a week ago when it was £229.99 and its dropped now to just less than £200. I think its a decent little laptop for a student or light user.
Specifications:
Intel Pentium Quad Core N3700 CPU (up to 2.4GHZ)
2GB DDR3 RAM
32GB eMMC memory
14 hour battery life
Aluminium construction
1366 x 768
USB 3.0 x 1
USB type C x 1
USB 2.0 x 1
HDMI 1.4 x 1
802.11 b/g/n wifi + BT 4.0
less than 18mm thick
CPU passmark of ~2000 makes it perfectly usable for day to day tasks, about 16GB of available storage out of the box, expandable with SD card slot. Battery life is very close to advertised, even when streaming from Youtube etc
Build quality is what drew me to this model and feels much more sturdy than other notebooks in this price range along with double the performance of the likes of the HP steam. Slim and light means its great for travelling and portability.
Top comments
fishmaster
27 Mar 163#17
Horses for courses. I use OSX, Windows 10 and Linux (currently Ubuntu), the OS I mostly use at home is OSX as it has Ruby and Python built in, ready to go and I like how the OS functions. I don't notice OSX getting slow ever and I like how I have a proper terminal.
Now I can counter all the above arguments I'm making for OSX by saying well I can easily get Python and Ruby working on Windows 10 and once they're setup, they're setup and if you want a powerful command line then you have Powershell.
So what am I saying, I'm saying I use what I need and I'm not prejudice against any one OS, there is no perfect OS and there likely never will be, just as there's no one programming language for anything. You can roughly adapt all of the above to do just about anything you want, however all of the above are slightly better for one purpose or another, the trick is knowing your workload and choosing the correct way of executing that workload, so keeping things simple and efficient and this comes with experience as does most things. I'm still learning and will never stop learning, the same is true of all of us.
Si__
27 Mar 163#3
Shame this is the 2GB RAM model. Note - these can not have the RAM upgraded.
While Windows 10 can, and will run fine with 2GB of RAM, Once you start loading on non-app stuff, like 3rd party print drivers, chrome/firefox, symantec/avg anti-virus etc they'll start sucking the ram up as soon as you boot the machine.
Otherwise, if you can live with the offerings Microsoft give you by default, and apps, you'll have a really nice machine for the price.
All comments (50)
amour3k
27 Mar 16#1
I agree, these eMMC Memory Laptop's have ridiculously LONGGGGG Battery Lifes attached to them for real!, luvvvvvvvv it!.
If only some of them could have BIGGER Internal Memories built-in to them, huh?, lol. :-)
uptwisting to amour3k
27 Mar 16#23
Thanks, I didn't know that.
rvcshart
27 Mar 16#2
Not bad for what it is.
Si__
27 Mar 163#3
Shame this is the 2GB RAM model. Note - these can not have the RAM upgraded.
While Windows 10 can, and will run fine with 2GB of RAM, Once you start loading on non-app stuff, like 3rd party print drivers, chrome/firefox, symantec/avg anti-virus etc they'll start sucking the ram up as soon as you boot the machine.
Otherwise, if you can live with the offerings Microsoft give you by default, and apps, you'll have a really nice machine for the price.
adamspencer95 to Si__
27 Mar 16#6
i agree with you on this point. ive been using chrome/spotify/office and windows defender (+ all windows services) all running at the same time and not maxed the 2GB RAM, usually around 1.6GB
as long as the expectations are reasonable its a decent little machine
kingstongold to Si__
27 Mar 16#9
So I guess the RAM and the eMMC ssd chip (if you like) are both soldered to the board and irremovable?
Can anyone actually completely confirm that this is the case because whilst I don't doubt the memory I'd like to think the ssd could be changed although could be quite costly due to the size of the part
Tylocco to Si__
31 Mar 16#47
Bought one today and just installed Chrome on it. (McAfee on by default). RAM usage at 1.4GB (of 1.9GB) with Chrome open with bbc, wired.com and hotukdeals (!).
But I agree 2GB is really not much, so sticking to MS apps is probably the best bet.
Build quality seems good, darkish aluminium case. Screen no better or worse than the £200ish Acer ES1-512 that my son uses. Keyboard fine but space-bar needs a firmer push than the rest of the keys.
Really like the thinness, silent operation and good battery life. Seems like a good deal.
Bossworld
27 Mar 16#4
Balls, I just pulled the trigger on the e402MA from John Lewis for £170. Looks like this has a slightly better CPU and the USB C thing.
flobbadob to Bossworld
27 Mar 16#15
I would definitely return the e402ma (luckily john lewis are good with this). I owned both laptops and the e403 has the same performance but 50% longer battery, no surprise as looking at the specs it has a much bigger battery! e403 = 57 watt hours, e402ma = 32 watt hours.
e403 is also thinner by a few mm and lighter by 150g, not to mention the really nice brushed aluminium finish which imo is lovely
DirtyQwerty
27 Mar 16#5
Anyone know how this would compare with the Toshiba C40-C? Looks like a similar spec (including 14 inch screen) but the Toshiba has a Intel Celeron N3050 processor. I'm guessing this Asus would be more powerful.
Only asking as I'm looking for a cheap laptop for around the house and the C40-C is £150 at Very at the moment.
adamspencer95 to DirtyQwerty
27 Mar 16#7
the N3050 was the alternative i was looking at, but has about half the theoretical performance of the quad core in this notebook. the N3050 should be okay doing 1/2 thing(s) at a time but this notebook can deal with a handful of programs at a time quite handily
plewis00
27 Mar 16#8
The Linx 7 (and other similar tablets) with 1GB RAM are surprisingly efficient - for all the slating Microsoft gets, their latest OSes are very frugal with resources, dare I say it, better than OS X these days (which seems to almost demand 4GB and an SSD to be remotely useful). The Intel Atom Bay Trail and Cherry Trail processors are perfect for light-use and never really feel slow either.
adamspencer95
27 Mar 16#10
completely agree, i have 2 'hipstreet w7' tablets (which are essentially copies of the linx 7) for HTPCs in the lounge and bedroom, only £49 each and they have only maxed their RAM when trying to stream high bitrate files due to caching to RAM. the atom Z3735 really is a remarkable little SOC, and the CPU in this notebook is essentially the new version of that on the braswell architecture (quad core, passive cooling with respectable performance). its processors like this which dont really reflect their actual performance in benchmarks
adamspencer95
27 Mar 16#11
both soldered unfortunately, however i am on the hunt for a low profile SD adapter which sits flush with the housing to augment the internal storage without sticking out the side of the chassis. once i get one of those it should be fine
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Opening post
Specifications:
Intel Pentium Quad Core N3700 CPU (up to 2.4GHZ)
2GB DDR3 RAM
32GB eMMC memory
14 hour battery life
Aluminium construction
1366 x 768
USB 3.0 x 1
USB type C x 1
USB 2.0 x 1
HDMI 1.4 x 1
802.11 b/g/n wifi + BT 4.0
less than 18mm thick
CPU passmark of ~2000 makes it perfectly usable for day to day tasks, about 16GB of available storage out of the box, expandable with SD card slot. Battery life is very close to advertised, even when streaming from Youtube etc
Build quality is what drew me to this model and feels much more sturdy than other notebooks in this price range along with double the performance of the likes of the HP steam. Slim and light means its great for travelling and portability.
Top comments
Now I can counter all the above arguments I'm making for OSX by saying well I can easily get Python and Ruby working on Windows 10 and once they're setup, they're setup and if you want a powerful command line then you have Powershell.
So what am I saying, I'm saying I use what I need and I'm not prejudice against any one OS, there is no perfect OS and there likely never will be, just as there's no one programming language for anything. You can roughly adapt all of the above to do just about anything you want, however all of the above are slightly better for one purpose or another, the trick is knowing your workload and choosing the correct way of executing that workload, so keeping things simple and efficient and this comes with experience as does most things. I'm still learning and will never stop learning, the same is true of all of us.
While Windows 10 can, and will run fine with 2GB of RAM, Once you start loading on non-app stuff, like 3rd party print drivers, chrome/firefox, symantec/avg anti-virus etc they'll start sucking the ram up as soon as you boot the machine.
Otherwise, if you can live with the offerings Microsoft give you by default, and apps, you'll have a really nice machine for the price.
All comments (50)
If only some of them could have BIGGER Internal Memories built-in to them, huh?, lol. :-)
While Windows 10 can, and will run fine with 2GB of RAM, Once you start loading on non-app stuff, like 3rd party print drivers, chrome/firefox, symantec/avg anti-virus etc they'll start sucking the ram up as soon as you boot the machine.
Otherwise, if you can live with the offerings Microsoft give you by default, and apps, you'll have a really nice machine for the price.
as long as the expectations are reasonable its a decent little machine
Can anyone actually completely confirm that this is the case because whilst I don't doubt the memory I'd like to think the ssd could be changed although could be quite costly due to the size of the part
But I agree 2GB is really not much, so sticking to MS apps is probably the best bet.
Build quality seems good, darkish aluminium case. Screen no better or worse than the £200ish Acer ES1-512 that my son uses. Keyboard fine but space-bar needs a firmer push than the rest of the keys.
Really like the thinness, silent operation and good battery life. Seems like a good deal.
e403 is also thinner by a few mm and lighter by 150g, not to mention the really nice brushed aluminium finish which imo is lovely
Only asking as I'm looking for a cheap laptop for around the house and the C40-C is £150 at Very at the moment.