Asus K55A DS71 15.6 inch
via Amazon
You'll find a great blend of modern style and powerful performance in the ASUS K55A DS71 laptop. It can be used for browsing the net, word processing, music, video, playing light to intermediate games and some multimedia. It comes with more than sufficient storage space, is easy to set-up and use and offers a very decent battery life.
Asus K55A offers plenty of power and memory with its Intel quad core i7 and 8 GB DDR3 RAM. Turbo Boost Technology lets you go from 2.6GHz to 3.4GHz speed depending on your tasks on hand. Super Hybrid Engine II is worth a mention here for its instant-on functionality which allows the machine to wake up in only two seconds. You may improve video performance by allocating more memory to video card, from the default 32mb to 512mb, for instance (Adjust settings by pressing F2 when the computer boots up). It is a wonderful laptop to run multiple apps at the same time (8GB RAM). 750GB SATA hard drive is quite a lot, which you could always upgrade to an ultra fast solid state drive- SSD.
Clear screen and great viewing angles on its 15.6 inches wide with HD LED-Backlit TFT LCD anti-glare Display (1366 x 768 pixel resolution at 16:9 cinematic ratio). Chiclet style keyboard with touch palm rest is rather comfortable- I'd say the keys are at just the right stiffness. It has a 10 key number pad- which is very handy for number heavy tasks. Touch Pad features Multi-touch Control (Intuitive fingertip control). Operating system is Windows 8 (64-bit), which is still not the favorite of many.
Wireless Type 802.11bgn, DL DVD±RW/CD-RW, 1 x USB 2.0 port, 2 x USB 3.0 ports, Ethernet LAN, Integrated 0.3MP Webcam, Bluetooth 4.0, Built-in Altec Lansing Speakers & Microphone, Multi-in-1 Memory Card Reader (SD), RJ45, VGA and HDMI port are what is offered in terms of connectivity. Mocha color aluminium body with a textured fit and finish is attractive to look at, feels solid and durable. It weighs 5.8lbs and is only 1 inch thick. I didn't encounter any overheating problems- this laptop stays ice cold even during intensive multimedia tasks, heatwise it is very comfy to use.
Pros: Asus brand / quality - Good performance - Beautiful picture / screen - IceCool Technology - Super Hybrid Engine II function to wake up in 2 secs - Great price.
Cons: No Touch Screen - Windows 8 can take a little getting used to.
Conclusion: ASUS K55A - DS71 is a great laptop for everything you may need. It is powerful and fast, looks nice and offers some great features. It is rather affordable for an i7 processor, 8GB RAM,750GB hard drive system. It is basically pretty much what you should expect from a decent notebook.
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