ASUS UL80Jt: Overclocked i3 ULV
by Vivek Gowri on November 17, 2010 1:15 PM ESTASUS UL80Jt—Battery Life
The UL80Jt has a mediocre CPU and a mediocre GPU, but the real question is, can it match its predecessor’s amazing battery life? Sadly, no.
It’s not too much better than the U3x models that we had in the labs previously. Not to complain about 10.5 hours of ideal case battery life, but that’s significantly worse than the previous generation UL80Vt and only about 45 minutes more than the U30/3/5Jc trio. Given the cut in processing performance, I’m seriously disappointed.
I’ve been hearing some things spoken in hushed tones, mostly alleging that the Core 2010 ULV processors aren’t nearly as power efficient as the previous generation CULV processors, and our experience with the i3 and i7 ULV chips is proving this correct. If there’s only 45 minutes to be gained by switching to the ULV processors, it’s far more worthwhile to go for the regular i3-based system, especially if we’re talking about the difference between 9.75 and 10.5 hours of battery.
This isn’t to complain about having 10.5 hours of battery life, which is awesome in its own right, but it’s just not as impressive when viewed in context of the UL80Vt and the U30Jc. Things get not happy when we turn on the overclocking though, as we end up seeing less battery life than the U3x series.
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yzkbug - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
glossy screen? ... neeeext!B3an - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Why have you not included the recently reviewed Dell XPS L501x ? Especially in the LCD tests. Without it, and other reviewed laptops with good or better LCD's, it's makes them tests seem bias towards Apple. As if they are the only ones using a decent LCD.JarredWalton - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Different markets... that's a mainstream laptop with a decent GPU. Plus, this review was started before the XPS ever arrived (shame on Vivek for taking so long).VivekGowri - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
*sigh*.....my bad.setzer - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the chipset noted in the hardware table wrong?As far as I know (and I also checked ARK) the GS45 only applies to the old Core2duo cpus no?
JarredWalton - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Fixed.VivekGowri - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Yeap, my bad - I ripped off the UL80Vt table and simply forgot to change the chipset. Thanks for catching that :)MikeMurphy - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
I have been waiting anxiously for this review but was disappointed that the UL80VT or UL30VT numbers weren't included for comparison.Also re 210 v 310 above, you'll notice many of the 310 Optimus setups have reduced memory clocks compared to the 210 in the UL30/80VT. I suspect this is for battery savings considering the continuous memory copying going on in the background.
Thermogenic - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
I still haven't seen anything more appealing than the Alienware M11x R1. It has the Core2Duo CULV and gets great battery life, as well as a 335M graphics card that powers almost all games at it's native 720p resolution with 30fps. It's screen is terrible, but that seems par for the course in the sub $800 systems. The only thing close I've seen is the $999 Macbook.StrangerGuy - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
Simply put: No offering as potent, as small, and as cheap as a Acer 3820TG. C'mon, ULV and 310m on a 12" may have been nice...but on a 14" incher that is a total joke. Lately they are just flooding the market with unappealing netbooks/laptops that are underpowered for the price.