Notebook Trio: ASUS A8JS and G2P and ABS Mayhem Z5
by Jarred Walton on December 29, 2006 12:15 PM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
Feature Comparison
With several different laptops to compare, the easiest way to highlight their differences is to begin by looking at features. Before we do that, however, it is interesting to note how marketing looks at these laptops. The ASUS A8JS is marketed as an all-around multimedia/entertainment laptop suitable for just about any use; although it may not always be the best laptop for a particular job, it does well as a jack of all trades. The ASUS G2P on the other hand is marketed as a "gamer's laptop". The larger display and exterior styling does perhaps fit that market better, and there are a few other areas that make the G2P more suitable for gaming purposes. Oddly enough, perhaps the key component in any gaming computer is going to be the graphics card, and here the G2P definitely falls short. The ABS Mayhem Z5 is also supposed to be a gamer's notebook, only here the component selection seems to justify the categorization, as it comes equipped with NVIDIA's GeForce Go 7900 GTX.
You can almost always guess at some of the basic features and components that are going to go into a laptop with knowledge of only two areas: display size and price. Laptop chassis are almost always built around the display, with the case being slightly larger than the LCD. Depending on how far you want to break things down, there are several classifications of laptop sizes. The smallest models are ultraportables, with LCDs that are 12 inches or smaller and a total laptop weight that's usually under 4 pounds (not including all of the potential accessories). The most common laptops feature 14"-15" displays and weigh somewhere between 4 and 6 pounds, perhaps slightly more. Finally, you have the notebook/desktop replacement models that come with 17" or larger displays and usually weigh 8 pounds or more. Equivalent performance generally becomes more expensive as laptops become smaller, and performance options also become more limited with the smaller units. This makes sense, as the more powerful components that go into desktop replacement models are simply too large and hot to fit into an ultraportable chassis.
The A8JS is a typical 14" widescreen laptop, while the G2P is a 17" widescreen notebook. Despite the various differences we will outline shortly, retail prices on both of these laptop models (as tested) should be about the same - $1900 give or take, although we will have more to say concerning pricing in a moment. The ABS Mayhem Z5 is also a 17" notebook, but the higher-end components bump the price of our particular configuration up to around $2900. Here's a quick overview of the features.
Most of the included components are nearly identical, with the same T7200 CPU in all three laptops, as well as similar DDR2-667 memory. The laptops all list 2GB of RAM as the maximum supported, and while they really should support 2GB SO-DIMM modules, right now such memory is so prohibitively expensive that it's not a major concern for most people. Whether or not a BIOS update will add such support in the future is unknown, so don't count on it - if you need 4GB of RAM in a notebook, get a model that officially supports it and be ready to fork out $1000 or more for 2x2GB of RAM. While all three have different hard drives, that generally won't affect performance except in a few hard disk intensive applications/benchmarks.
The A8JS is obviously a smaller chassis along with the 14" display. Both ASUS models still come with a native resolution of 1440x900 (WXGA+) though, which is a rather low for a 17" laptop display. However, the response time on the G2P display is rated at 8ms, which is better than most other laptop displays. The ABS Z5 goes with a much higher WUXGA (1920x1200) resolution LCD, which is more common on high-end 17" notebooks, although the response time seems to be closer to 16ms and it's not nearly as bright. In practice we found the response times were not a serious factor in choosing between the displays, but the image quality still varied quite a bit.
Going along with the difference in displays is the aforementioned change in graphics chips. As we'll see later the G2P's Radeon Mobility X1700 ends up being quite a bit slower than the A8JS' GeForce Go 7700, and it's hardly surprising that the GeForce Go 7900 GTX is significantly faster than the 7700. The added speed of the 7900 GTX is definitely necessary if you want to game at the native LCD resolution. Besides the chassis and keyboard differences and a few miscellaneous extras that we'll cover in the individual sections, about the only other noteworthy area where the laptops vary is the audio.
The G2P supports 5.1 audio output via three audio jacks, while the A8Js only provides two audio jacks limiting it to 2.1 audio. ASUS does support S/PDIF optical out via the headphone jack on both laptops, so users looking to connect to digital speakers can still get 5.1 audio that way. The ABS Mayhem Z5 does the right thing and includes four audio jacks, allowing the use of 5.1 audio along with a microphone, or 7.1 audio without a microphone. One of the jacks can also support digital audio out, though not via an optical connection. The only problem with the ABS audio implementation is the location of the jacks, as two are on the side and two are on the rear, with about 10 inches between the two; getting many speakers cables to reach all the necessary jacks can be very difficult (i.e. Logitech's Z-640 and X-530 both have to stretch and you end up with taut wires running underneath the laptop). We would like to have all four ports close together, but even more important we want to see ASUS and others add at least a third and preferably a fourth jack, as even on a 14" chassis there is ample room to add a couple extra ports.
As far as first impressions go, all three laptops offer a good set of features and performance. Unfortunately, as we will see later, the choice of graphics chip definitely makes the G2P unworthy of the "gaming laptop" marketing. ATI's X1600 graphics chips have always offered lackluster performance relative to the competition - X1600 XT cards were only slightly faster than GeForce 6600 GTs, and the 7600 GT is easily able to maintain a performance lead. The situation has not changed much when comparing the Radeon Mobility X1700 with the GeForce Go 7700. The X1700 could have other advantages over the 7700, for example it might require less power allowing for increased battery life, or it might provide better multimedia functions. If 3D performance is lower than the competition, however, most gamers aren't going to care about getting more battery life from their laptop.
Immediately then, it appears that the target market of the G2P will not be satisfied; whether or not the G2P can provide compelling performance and features that others might still want remains to be seen. As is typical of true gaming notebooks, the cost of the ABS Mayhem Z5 is quite a bit higher than competing models. Looking at the market pricing, the inclusion of a GeForce Go 7900 GTX appears to add well over $500 to the total cost of a laptop, which isn't surprising considering desktop 7900 GTX cards cost about $400.
Having finished this quick overview, we want to take a closer look at each laptop. Even though many of the features are the same, at least on the surface, there are still some noteworthy differences - and similarities - that a features table glosses over. After we have finished looking at the details of each laptop, we will provide some real-world performance comparisons between these laptops as well as some of the other recently reviewed notebooks.
With several different laptops to compare, the easiest way to highlight their differences is to begin by looking at features. Before we do that, however, it is interesting to note how marketing looks at these laptops. The ASUS A8JS is marketed as an all-around multimedia/entertainment laptop suitable for just about any use; although it may not always be the best laptop for a particular job, it does well as a jack of all trades. The ASUS G2P on the other hand is marketed as a "gamer's laptop". The larger display and exterior styling does perhaps fit that market better, and there are a few other areas that make the G2P more suitable for gaming purposes. Oddly enough, perhaps the key component in any gaming computer is going to be the graphics card, and here the G2P definitely falls short. The ABS Mayhem Z5 is also supposed to be a gamer's notebook, only here the component selection seems to justify the categorization, as it comes equipped with NVIDIA's GeForce Go 7900 GTX.
You can almost always guess at some of the basic features and components that are going to go into a laptop with knowledge of only two areas: display size and price. Laptop chassis are almost always built around the display, with the case being slightly larger than the LCD. Depending on how far you want to break things down, there are several classifications of laptop sizes. The smallest models are ultraportables, with LCDs that are 12 inches or smaller and a total laptop weight that's usually under 4 pounds (not including all of the potential accessories). The most common laptops feature 14"-15" displays and weigh somewhere between 4 and 6 pounds, perhaps slightly more. Finally, you have the notebook/desktop replacement models that come with 17" or larger displays and usually weigh 8 pounds or more. Equivalent performance generally becomes more expensive as laptops become smaller, and performance options also become more limited with the smaller units. This makes sense, as the more powerful components that go into desktop replacement models are simply too large and hot to fit into an ultraportable chassis.
The A8JS is a typical 14" widescreen laptop, while the G2P is a 17" widescreen notebook. Despite the various differences we will outline shortly, retail prices on both of these laptop models (as tested) should be about the same - $1900 give or take, although we will have more to say concerning pricing in a moment. The ABS Mayhem Z5 is also a 17" notebook, but the higher-end components bump the price of our particular configuration up to around $2900. Here's a quick overview of the features.
| System Configuration Options | |||
| ASUS A8JS | ASUS G2P | ABS Mayhem Z5 | |
| Processor | Core 2 Duo T7600, T7400, T7200, T5600, T5500 | Core 2 Duo T7600, T7400, T7200, T5600, T5500 | Core 2 Duo T7600, T7400, T7200, T5600, Core Duo T2600, T2500, T2400 |
| Chipset | Intel 945PM + ICH7M | Intel 945PM 64-bit Dual-Channel | Intel 945PM 64-bit Dual-Channel |
| FSB Speeds | Up to 667 MHz | Up to 667 MHz | Up to 667 MHz |
| Memory Speeds | DDR2-400, DDR2-533, DDR2-667 | DDR2-533, DDR2-667 | DDR2-533, DDR2-667 |
| Memory Slots | (2) x SO-DIMM, up to 2GB, DDR2, Dual Channel supported | (2) x SO-DIMM, up to 2GB, DDR2, Dual Channel supported | (2) x SO-DIMM, up to 2GB, DDR2, Dual Channel supported |
| Graphics | NVIDIA GeForce Go 7700 512MB Physical VRAM 2D Clocks: 100/270 3D Clocks: 450/800 |
ATI Mobility Readeon X1700 GPU 512MB Physical VRAM 3D Clocks: 459/990 |
NVIDIA GeForce Go 7900 GTX 512MB Physical VRAM 2D Clocks: 100/220 3D Clocks: 500/1200 |
| Display | 14" WXGA+ (1440x900) ColorShine LCD | 17.0" WXGA+ (1440x900) ColorShine TFT LCD | 17" WUXGA (1920x1200) SuperClear LCD |
| Expansion Slots | One ExpressCard 54 | One ExpressCard 54 | One ExpressCard 54 |
| Hard Drive | 80/100/120GB 7200 RPM | 80/100/120/160GB 5400 RPM | 80/100/120/160GB 5400 RPM or 80/100/120GB 7200 RPM |
| Optical Drive | 8X DVD+/-RW | 8X DVD+/-RW | 8X DVD+/-RW |
| Networking / Communications | Integrated 10/100/1000 PCIe Gigabit Ethernet and V.90 56K Modem Intel 3945ABG (802.11A/B/G) Mini PCI Wireless |
Integrated 10/100/1000 PCIe Gigabit Ethernet and V.90 56K Modem Intel 3945ABG (802.11A/B/G) Mini PCI Wireless |
Integrated 10/100/1000 PCIe Gigabit Ethernet and V.90 56K Modem Intel 3945ABG (802.11A/B/G) Mini PCI Wireless |
| Audio | SoundMax HD 2.1 | Realtek ALC882 5.1 HD | Realtek ALC880 7.1 HD |
| Left I/O Ports | 1 x USB 2.0 1 x Firewire Microphone Headphone Flash reader (SD, CF, MS) ExpressCard 54 |
None | None |
| Right I/O Ports | 2 USB2.0, Infrared | 1 x RJ45 LAN 1 x RJ11 Modem 1 x USB 2.0 1 x Firewire 1 x e-SATA 1 x TV-In Headphone Microphone Line-In Flash reader (SD, CF, MS) ExpressCard 54 |
2 x USB 2.0 1 x Firewire Headphone Microphone Flash reader (SD, CF, MS) ExpressCard 54 |
| Back I/O Ports | 1 x RJ45 LAN 2 x USB 2.0 1 x RJ11 Modem 1 x DVI-D 1 x VGA 1 x TV-Out |
4 x USB 2.0 1 x DVI-D 1 x VGA 1 x TV-Out |
Line-In Line Out 2 x USB 2.0 1 x RJ45 LAN 1 x RJ11 Modem 1 x DVI-D 1 x TV-In 1 x TV-Out 1 x Serial |
| Keyboard | 86 Key QWERTY | 88 Key QWERTY | 99 Key QWERTY plus Numpad |
| Battery | 6-Cell 53WHr/4800 mAHr Lithium Ion | 8-Cell 71WHr/4800 mAHr Lithium Ion | 8-Cell 65WHr/4400 mAHr Lithium Ion |
| Dimensions | 1.5"x13.2"x9.6" (HxWxD) 5.3 lbs. |
1.8"x16.2"x12.4" (HxWxD) 9.7 lbs. |
1.8"x15.6"x11.5" (HxWxD) 9.35 lbs. |
| Power Adapter | 90W | 90W | 130W |
Most of the included components are nearly identical, with the same T7200 CPU in all three laptops, as well as similar DDR2-667 memory. The laptops all list 2GB of RAM as the maximum supported, and while they really should support 2GB SO-DIMM modules, right now such memory is so prohibitively expensive that it's not a major concern for most people. Whether or not a BIOS update will add such support in the future is unknown, so don't count on it - if you need 4GB of RAM in a notebook, get a model that officially supports it and be ready to fork out $1000 or more for 2x2GB of RAM. While all three have different hard drives, that generally won't affect performance except in a few hard disk intensive applications/benchmarks.
The A8JS is obviously a smaller chassis along with the 14" display. Both ASUS models still come with a native resolution of 1440x900 (WXGA+) though, which is a rather low for a 17" laptop display. However, the response time on the G2P display is rated at 8ms, which is better than most other laptop displays. The ABS Z5 goes with a much higher WUXGA (1920x1200) resolution LCD, which is more common on high-end 17" notebooks, although the response time seems to be closer to 16ms and it's not nearly as bright. In practice we found the response times were not a serious factor in choosing between the displays, but the image quality still varied quite a bit.
Going along with the difference in displays is the aforementioned change in graphics chips. As we'll see later the G2P's Radeon Mobility X1700 ends up being quite a bit slower than the A8JS' GeForce Go 7700, and it's hardly surprising that the GeForce Go 7900 GTX is significantly faster than the 7700. The added speed of the 7900 GTX is definitely necessary if you want to game at the native LCD resolution. Besides the chassis and keyboard differences and a few miscellaneous extras that we'll cover in the individual sections, about the only other noteworthy area where the laptops vary is the audio.
The G2P supports 5.1 audio output via three audio jacks, while the A8Js only provides two audio jacks limiting it to 2.1 audio. ASUS does support S/PDIF optical out via the headphone jack on both laptops, so users looking to connect to digital speakers can still get 5.1 audio that way. The ABS Mayhem Z5 does the right thing and includes four audio jacks, allowing the use of 5.1 audio along with a microphone, or 7.1 audio without a microphone. One of the jacks can also support digital audio out, though not via an optical connection. The only problem with the ABS audio implementation is the location of the jacks, as two are on the side and two are on the rear, with about 10 inches between the two; getting many speakers cables to reach all the necessary jacks can be very difficult (i.e. Logitech's Z-640 and X-530 both have to stretch and you end up with taut wires running underneath the laptop). We would like to have all four ports close together, but even more important we want to see ASUS and others add at least a third and preferably a fourth jack, as even on a 14" chassis there is ample room to add a couple extra ports.
As far as first impressions go, all three laptops offer a good set of features and performance. Unfortunately, as we will see later, the choice of graphics chip definitely makes the G2P unworthy of the "gaming laptop" marketing. ATI's X1600 graphics chips have always offered lackluster performance relative to the competition - X1600 XT cards were only slightly faster than GeForce 6600 GTs, and the 7600 GT is easily able to maintain a performance lead. The situation has not changed much when comparing the Radeon Mobility X1700 with the GeForce Go 7700. The X1700 could have other advantages over the 7700, for example it might require less power allowing for increased battery life, or it might provide better multimedia functions. If 3D performance is lower than the competition, however, most gamers aren't going to care about getting more battery life from their laptop.
Immediately then, it appears that the target market of the G2P will not be satisfied; whether or not the G2P can provide compelling performance and features that others might still want remains to be seen. As is typical of true gaming notebooks, the cost of the ABS Mayhem Z5 is quite a bit higher than competing models. Looking at the market pricing, the inclusion of a GeForce Go 7900 GTX appears to add well over $500 to the total cost of a laptop, which isn't surprising considering desktop 7900 GTX cards cost about $400.
Having finished this quick overview, we want to take a closer look at each laptop. Even though many of the features are the same, at least on the surface, there are still some noteworthy differences - and similarities - that a features table glosses over. After we have finished looking at the details of each laptop, we will provide some real-world performance comparisons between these laptops as well as some of the other recently reviewed notebooks.
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unclebud - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
"Seems all the usual suspects are on a holiday"more than likely they were just thrown speechless by such extreme bias in this "review"...
newsflash - it can have a sorry gma 900 in it that can barely play rollercoaster tycoon and call it a "gaming laptop" if they want...
ugh. i tried skipping around to get something valuable out of this "article", but there aren't any pictures of the models even...
going to reread mr anand's review of his laptop to cheer myself up -- now that's a thorough review!
JarredWalton - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
"but there aren't any pictures of the models even"Umm... what? There are 36 images (with enlarged shots) in the article, plus another 30 or so graphs/charts. If you're not seeing them, either your browser is incorrectly configured and is blocking the images, or else the servers are having issues. And if someone called a GMA900 a "gaming notebook" they would be lying; calling an X1700 laptop a gaming laptop is more of an exaggeration, but it's clearly not the fastest mobile GPU.
I honestly have no idea what you mean by bias, so I'd be happy if you would point out areas that are "biased" rather than just giving a blanket label to the article.
mino - Friday, December 29, 2006 - link
Overall a nice review, those ASU are getting some serious popularity here in Europe while the reviews are nowhere to find..However, ranting for half a page about 14inch not having numeric keypad? I would have thought it was under you level of knowledge...
While the KB is NOT perfect in any sense - small enter, small keys.. - the absence of numeric keypad is natural.
Maybe you should spend a few weeks on road with some 17inch baby of yours to see how "important" numeric keypad really is...
One thing I hate about A8J is that transreflective (CrystalSomething) screen. It is pretty much unusable the moment the sun shines, and it does shine a bit too much in the summer.
JarredWalton - Friday, December 29, 2006 - link
I wasn't really complaining about the lack of a numpad on the 14" A8Js, merely pointing out that it's not there and you really can't fit one into such a chassis. My "rant" for half a paragraph was dedicated to the Fn key - and mostly I was just talking about the uses and making a minor complaint about it not being switched with the Ctrl key location. Unless you're looking somewhere else?I tried to discuss my feelings about the keyboards on each laptop, as that's pretty important with long-term use. Given what I do for a living (writing), I would actually avoid purchasing the G2P (as tested) and the Mayhem Z5 purely on the basis of the keyboard alone. The US G2P might actually be fine, as the primary issue I had was with the mixed up locations (relative to most keyboards) of the \ and " keys.
As for the G2P, that's where I complained about the missing numpad, and it's a 17" model notebook. I complained about this same issue on the Dell XPS M1710 and E1705, as I use numpads on a regular basis and find them to be important. Ironically, the ABS includes a numpad, which I liked, but the other missing keys (Home - PgDn) were at least as irritating to me as the lack of a numpad. Obviously, my taste in keyboards isn't the same as every other person's, which I why I started the article talking about the importance of trying out laptops in person where possible - or try a similar laptop if that's all you can do.
Ideally, I'd like a 17" notebook to have a numpad and a layout very much like the ABS, only shrink the width of the Backspace, \, Enter, and Shift keys and put in a column with Home, End, PgUp, and PgDn similar to how the two ASUS laptops do it. There's plenty of room there for those keys... or just extend the keyboard area down a bit and put the keys right above the cursors like on a regular keyboard.
As for the two ASUS laptop LCDs, I didn't find the LCD on the G2P to have problems in bright light (sunlight is a stretch but possible). Hopefully all newer ASUS laptops have LCDs more like the G2P. The A8J on the other hand is definitely the worst LCD of the bunch and really suitable for indoor use only (or on overcast days). When I first used it I didn't think too much about the LCD quality, as most laptop LCDs can't compete with desktop LCDs in terms of brightness and color quality. After playing with the other notebooks, however, I became quite unhappy with the A8J LCD. Sure, it helps battery life, but all you need to do is have more brightness levels to allow for lowered battery use on LCDs like the G2P.
mino - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
Seems all the usuall suspect are on a holiday :)Maybe I should read a bit more thoroughy, and sllep more too :). Point taken.
As for the display, the are two things. I am yet to see an glossy surface LCD to be usable on sunlight. They are nice and sharp for movies and indoors. But my observation is that the moment sun shines (also through an unprotected window) the display changes to a mirror - well, it called an "mirror effect" dispaly sometimes :). At the same conditionas even a poor-quality anti-glare one retains usability.
That said I will have to pass the A8J, otherwise it is pretty solid bundle(I like the BT+DVI+14"WXGA+ combo).
Should the time come when the notebook are regularly of built-to-order variety such is it with cars now. That way most of these "issues" with manufacturer isung bad display, VGA, CPU and so on would be a thing of the past.
It would not even increase the price too much provided good automation is employed. Actually this would greatly simplify the abundance of notebook based of the same chassis with a bit different internals only.
Hell, just ASUS has 5+ series with the same 15.4inch chassis...
mino - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
spelling, here you come :(francisco54 - Friday, May 16, 2014 - link
hola mepodeia mamdar los draivers de este ordenador