When I heard that Asus was coming out with the UL80VT’s little brother in early December, I couldn’t pass up doing a review of the UL30VT. I ordered one the day after they came out and got it in that weekend. If the UL80VT had a lot of hype surrounding its release, the UL30VT had even more. When compared to its bigger brother (UL80VT), it was touted to have a lighter build, smaller size, included Bluetooth (something sorely missing on the UL80VT), and a larger hard drive—although it had a 20% smaller battery and did not include an optical drive.  So did the UL30VT live up to all of the expectations in its review? Read on to find out!

For the full gaming round up (including screenshots), head on over to Asus UL30VT/UL80VT Gaming Benchmarks. There is also a article comparing the UL80VT to the Macbook Pro 13″. Also, if you’re interested in the UL30VT, be sure to also check out my first impressions of the UL30VT.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review – First Impressions 10/10

My First impression of the UL30VT was that it was extremely well built. It exhibited minimal/no flex when I tried to make it bend in any direction (more on the build quality later). It was thinner and lighter than the UL80VT and yet had all the same features (except no optical drive + smaller battery). I was very impressed with it. Another thing I noticed right off the bat was that the keyboard exhibited almost no flex, while the UL80VT had exhibited a little more.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Gaming Performance – Rating 9/10 (for an ultraportable)

Okay, so you have to consider the fact that the UL30VT is not specifically designed to be a gaming laptop. It is designed to be extremely portable and light with a long battery life—and yet because of its hybrid graphics card, it can play nearly all of the latest games on decent settings. It most definitely isn’t a portable powerhouse that can make any game cry for mercy—rather it is a ultraportable that can still play games, and play them fairly well.

I have tested the UL30VT out in a number of games, but there’s no point rewriting an entire gaming section when I can just copy the gaming section specifically from the UL80VT (since the hardware is identical on the inside). Yes, you can expect the exact same performance with the UL30VT as you can with the UL80VT. Here’s the section from the UL80VT article:

Over the last view days, I took the UL80VT-A1 out for spin in a series of gaming tests. For in game screenshots, see the Asus UL80VT Gaming Benchmark article.

First, it should be noted that I got a 3461 when I ran 3DMark06. Note: These tests were done in high performance mode withthe SU7300 1.73 Ghz overclocked in Turbo33 mode.

The first game I tested was the ever popular Counter-Strike: Source. I was surprised by the computer’s ability to put out 150 FPS average in the stress stress at native resolution. I had been expecting to get closer to 80-100 FPS. I then tested it with 4x AA on, and it resulted in 99 FPS. In game FPS on de_dust2 varied. It averaged about 60-70 FPS with no AA with occasional dips down to 40 FPS. The game was certainly playable on high and native resolution.

In the Crysis gaming test, the Asus UL80VT-A1 managed an average of 32 FPS at native resolution with everything on low. The game still looked great and was enjoyable to play despite it being on low settings. Of course for the full effect, you really need a high class desktop to run this game at maximum settings.

Left4Dead 2 ran very well (40-60 FPS) at native resolution with textures on high and shaders on medium and no AA. If you bumped up the shaders and effects to very high and high and turned on 2x AA, the game played at about 26-35 FPS, which was still fairly playable though not as smooth with the settings in the medium range.

I was eager to test out the UL80VT’s performance in some of the latest games. I had recently purchased Batman: Arkham Asylum. I loaded it up with the default settings, which were set on Very High at native 1366×768 resolution. Game play was fairly playable, but it was also noticably choppy at times (26 FPS average in the video stress test).  I dropped the settings down to medium. This time it got 40 FPS average in the video stress test and game play was perfectly playable and smooth. In game frame rates on medium varied from 25-35 and had rare dips below 20 FPS, but the gameplay was smooth with no noticable hiccups in combat.

I then downloaded Team Fortress 2. It has been known to give ultraportable gaming machines a tough time due to its high shader requirements. When playing, I averaged about 50-60 FPS at native resolution with everything on High with no AA. I noticed drops down to just under 30 FPS when in heavy combat action, but it was not too disruptive to game play. I don’t think it went below 25 FPS during the time I played. [See screenshots below]

After hearing claims that Asus UL80VT could not run Need For Speed: Shift well. I decided to download the demo to see if these claims were true. I was able to achieve playable frame rates, though it was a little choopy with the default settings, which had the screen at 1024×768 resolution and everything else up in detail. I tried changing the settings, but after changing the settings to lower the resolution to 800×600, the game repeatedly gave me an error and crashed right as the race was about to start.

Unfortunately, I was not able to do a formal test because it kept crashing, but it was clear that the game was getting at least 30 FPS at 800×600 resolution with texture settings on High. I would expect the game to be very playable as long as you are content with 800×600 or possibly slightly higher resolution.

I also managed to squeeze in a little play time in Protoype, another recent game that was released earlier this year. It played very smoothly at the default 1280×720 (which was the max res for some reason) and on the default medium settings. Frame rates were in the 30-40 range with dips down to 25.

Another game I was able to try was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. People will be glad to know that I was able to achieve 30-60 FPS at native resolution 1366×768 with texture settings on “High.” I also turned off all of the extra graphical features, which I didn’t think made much of a difference in visuals anyway.

I fired up Shattered Horizon, but unfortunately it only got around 15-17 FPS on average at 1024×768. If one was desperate enough, you might be able to play it, but for most people it would not be an enjoyable experience.

In conclusion regarding the gaming performance of the Asus UL30VT/UL80VT ultraportable laptop, it has excellent performance for its size and handles most modern games fluently at native resolution with settings varying from high to low depending the game.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Battery Life – Rating 9/10

Sadly, the UL30VT does not include the larger watt hour battery that is included with the UL80VT (both batteries are 8-cell batteries, but the UL80VT has a 5600 mAh battery and the UL30VT has a 4400 mAh battery). This means that you are going to get 2 hours less battery life out of it than you would if you were to get the UL80VT. I tested out the battery and they fit right within the predictions indictated. You can get right around 5.5-6 hours out of it if you have wifi on and are surfing on 80% brightness. If you turn the brightness all the way down and do minimal surfing with wifi on, you might be able to pull 7 hours. If you turn wifi off and the brightness all the way down, you can get close 10 hours of idling time in a word document/etc.

Of course, this is excellent battery life, but it was disappointing that Asus didn’t include the larger battery since it can make a significant difference. For this reason, I only gave it a 9/10 for battery life.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review -Build Quality – Rating 9/10

The build quality on the UL30VT is excellent with minimal to no flex on the chassis. The keyboard only flexes a tad if you press on it fairly hard. It does not flex as much as the UL80VT. The keyboard did not make any rattling noise, although the keyboard was a little louder than the UL80VT. One thing I did notice that lacked rigidity was the bottom plastic between where the speakers are located and where the hard drive enclosure is. I noticed this area of the plastic bend in when I picked up the laptop by the front. It isn’t a big deal because I doubt it would ever be an issue for anyone because I doubt it would break, but I was a little disappointed to find this weak spot in the chassis.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Heat Management – Rating 10/10

The UL30VT handles heat just as well as its bigger brother. Under normal use with the integrated graphics card enabled, you will not be able to feel the heat on the bottom of the laptop, except near the vent on the right side.

The heat on this bad-boy is noticeable but only just barely. I think more heat is generated because it is restricting the airflow over your lap more than anything. Whenever my lap started to feel a little warm, I would feel the bottom of the laptop but the bottom of the laptop rarely seems to get hot while web surfing and word processing. It was always just the fact that my legs weren’t getting as much air to cool them down.

I was also able to do my entire series of gaming benchmarks while on my lap. Though it became mildly uncomfortable, gaming on the lap is definitely doable since the laptop even while under heavy stress only gets about as warm as most other laptops do while idling.

This laptop along with the UL80VT is by far the coolest running laptop I have ever owned (I’ve owned about 15 different laptops…). I give it a 10/10 in heat management.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Sound Quality – Rating 6/10

The speakers on the UL30VT are slightly worse than on the UL80VT. They do not put below average volume and have no bass and only minimal mid-range sound. In an quiet room, they will sound okay and be clearly heard, but if there is any other loud noises, don’t expect to be able to hear them well. Part of the problem is that the speakers are located near the front so that when the laptop is on your lap the speakers are muffled. I’d say you only get about 75 percent volume when on your lap compared to when it is on a table. The speakers were about the same as on the UL80VT, but the front of the UL30VT has more of a slant so that the speakers are more muffled when the notebook is on your lap (compared to the UL80VT).

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Screen Quality 8/10

The screen on the UL80VT is virtually identical to the one on the UL80VT. It’s just a little smaller. I thought that the screen had better overall quality than the last several laptops I’ve purchased, and it was better than the Dell Studio 14z’s screen by a bit, and it was a little better than the dm3z’s screen because it had deeper colors. The main issue with the UL30VT’s screen is a very narrow vertical viewing angle. The screen is certainly very bright, and I am certainly not as picky as some people in this area. Although, some would have preferred to have a better quality screen with better contrast and better viewing angles, I personally give it a 8/10 because I am very satisfied with it and I think most people will be too.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Keyboard – Rating 9/10

I find the keyboard to be excellent with minimal to no keyboard flex. The keys are well spaced apart. It will take some getting used to with the island style keyboard, but once you are used to it, it is a nice typing experience. There has been no issues with keyboard rattling. The other good news is that the keyboard includes a dedicated Home/End/Page Up/Page Down keys. Some laptops sacrifice those keys in order to fit everything onto a 13″ chassis (i.e. HP Dm3t/z, Macbook/Macbook Pro). Have the keys be dedicated really helps writers who are accustomed to having dedicated keys for those functions.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Track Pad – Rating 9/10

I find the track pad to be the best track pad I have ever used on a PC laptop. It does have a glossy surface, but I did not find that the surface was not nearly as sticky as the surface on many HPs (including the dm3z, dv4t, dv5t). I also found the trackpad to be responsive and that the multitouch gestures such as two-finger scrolling to work perfectly nearly every time.

The ELAN touch pad has configurable options to enable you to change the sensitivity of the two-finger scroll as well as enable you to use two and three finger taps to do customizable actions. I have my two-finger tap to do a right click and my three-finger tap to show my desktop.

My only complaint regarding the touch pad is that the uni-button. Although the sides are easier to press down than on the UL80VT, it is still not ideal. The uni-button looks like only one button, but has a left side and right side that makes up two buttons. When the uni-button was pressed towards the middle, it was very difficult to click, but if you pressed it near the ends the button became more usable. This was also the case with the Acer Timeline 4810t that I had owned for some time. I have found that the tap to click function is very usable, especially since I can just use two fingers if I need to right click. Therefore, I hardly use the button anymore anyway. My system works just fine.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Ports – Rating 8.5/10

The ports on the UL30VT include 3x USBs, 1x HDMI, 1x VGA, 1x Headphone, 1x Mic, 1x SDHC card slot, and 1x Networking port. This port selection is great, but is missing an eSata port that is now being included on most laptops today. This was why it only got a 8.5/10 in the ports category.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Other Thoughts

While reviewing the UL30VT, I ran into couple other issues with the user interface that will hopefully be addressed with driver updates. Currently, when I switch to integrated graphics, about 1 min after the switch occurs, the screen goes black on me for about 5 seconds. It has always successfully came back on. I would imagine that the video driver just needs updating and the issue will go away. Also, when switching between dedicated and integrated graphics, you have to sometimes exit out of programs that were using video memory (such as video games, Steam client, internet browser if watching online videos).

TIP: If the graphic cards aren’t switching, right click on the little green icon in the system tray (bottom right hand corner next to the clock) and then click on “Increase/Decrease Performance.” A dialog box will pop up and tell you what program you need to close to get the graphics cards to switch. This is kind of an annoying step, but necessary in order to successfully switch between the graphics cards on the fly.

The other issue is that the track pad sometimes becomes unresponsive. I believe the problem is being caused by dust/oil from fingers/piece of food/etc being on the track pad and registering a touch. To fix this, I usually just wipe my fingers across the pad, and the problem usually goes away instantly.

I’ve also heard that some people have had issues with their Bluetooth signalbeing interrupted when they place their hand on the track pad. This caused their Bluetooth mouse signal to be temporarily interrupted.

Asus UL30VT-X1 Review - Conclusion and Overall Verdict – Rating 9.5/10

The UL30VT-X1 currently is the one of the best buys out there in the ultraportable category. It excels at performance with minimal to no slowdowns. Its video card out performs all other competition in its size category (13” and less than 1” thin). It continues to impress with excellent build quality, a great keyboard, and excellent track pad. Its flaws are minimal (poor speakers, poor vertical viewing angles on the screen). I can’t help but whole heartedly recommend the UL30VT to anyone looking for a sleek, mid-range performance ultraportable at a great price.

Some things to look for in upcoming UL30VT models would be an increased size in battery capacity and the possibility of a silver edition arriving some time in 2010. If you’re looking something very similar to the UL30VT, but you want to have a optical disc drive included. You should definitely check out the UL80VT. Be sure to check out our review of the UL80VT for a comparison.

UPDATE (1/12/2010): The UL30JT with the ULV i7 Quad core processor will be released in the coming months. If you can wait, the UL30JT just might be worth it. Check out the UL30JT article here.

First Impressions 10/10

Gaming Performance – Rating 9/10 (for an ultraportable)

Battery Life – Rating 9/10

Build Quality – Rating 9/10

Heat Management – Rating 10/10

Sound Quality – Rating 6/10

Screen Quality 8/10

Keyboard – Rating 9/10

Track Pad – Rating 9/10

Conclusion and Overall Verdict – Rating 9.5/10

Gaming Performance Article

Asus UL80VT Comparison to Macbook Pro Article

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