ASUS Zenbook (UX21) Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 22, 2011 8:00 PM ESTPerformance
Raw CPU performance of the Zenbook's UX21 is obviously within the realm of the 11-inch MacBook Air, however its SSD really pushes it ahead of the MacBook Air in a lot of the PCMark 7 tests. PCMark tends to emphasize the benefits of an SSD but it really does illustrate just how much of a difference an SSD can make. A lot of the faster systems we've reviewed with mechanical drives simply feel slower than the Zenbook as a result of the latter having an extremely capable SSD. If there's any impact that Ultrabooks have on the market I hope it's the more widespread use of SSDs by OEMs.
Gaming performance is not a strong suit of the Zenbook UX21. Pretty much anything with a half-way decent discrete GPU is going to put this thing to shame. While you can play some games on the Zenbook, if you're planning on doing any real gaming with your notebook you probably don't want an Ultrabook.
Boot and Resume Time
ASUS did a lot of BIOS optimization work to make the UX21 boot as quickly as possible. In its default configuration you don't see a POST screen; instead you get a quick flash of the ASUS logo before immediately being dumped into the Windows 7 startup sequence. The whole process from power off to desktop takes 16.7 seconds, which is actually marginally little quicker than a MacBook Air from off to OS X (17.2 seconds).
Resume time is even more impressive. By default the UX21 goes into a suspend-to-RAM state when you shut the lid. Resuming from this state takes just a hair over 2 seconds (I measured anywhere from 2.04—2.22 seconds)—it's quick. The WiFi usually takes a couple more seconds to become active beyond that, and Windows doesn't remember your previous brightness setting just whatever setting the active power plan was set to upon resume. Other than those two hiccups, the experience is just awesome.
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CallumS - Saturday, October 22, 2011 - link
Looks like a brilliant design and in my opinion has better aesthetics than the MBA. What I would really like to see though is Thunderbolt or a decent alternative introduced across the line.Personally for basic web and coding I find ultra-portables perfectly capable at the task, especially with SSDs. However I would still like the option to plug in a maximum of two cables to get >FHD resolutions and everything else connected. I truly believe that including Thunderbolt was a brilliant idea for Apple. It really did open up a lot of opportunities.
BTW: Never owned a Mac and can't use OSX due to work applications. Looking for the best Windows alternative or to purchase a MBA to run Windows 7. The best alternative at the moment that I am aware of being a Thinkpad x220/x1/T420s with SSDs and docking station.
kaiedmek - Saturday, October 22, 2011 - link
A brilliant design!!! Come on, They just stole MBA design.... they didn't work on there own design, wished they did, but instead they just copied others design.To produce brilliant computer they should do their own design, so they can match the internal hardware with the design and of course the software performance.
CallumS - Sunday, October 23, 2011 - link
I never said an original design. =)I do agree though, it does look far too much like the MBA. Probably more so than the Samsung 10.1 tablet and the iPad; Which was banned here in Australia.
However there are key differences and as my post was pointing out, I believe these are to the advantage of the of the MBA; apart from aesthetics.
I think it would also be naive to suggest that the MBA was a completely original design also. There were many other notebooks with similar shapes and ambitions. Apple did however put them together very nicely though. I certainly do respect Apple's ability to accomplish such tasks.
Unfortunately not very helpful when most business applications are purely designed for the Windows environment at present. Hopefully in time we can see that change and some better innovation from Microsoft too. Windows 7 has certainly set a great foundation and Windows 8 is looking promising.
GeorgeH - Sunday, October 23, 2011 - link
Yep, without Thunderbolt and a docking station that allows more connectivity and the ability to attach a real (and hopefully upgradeable) GPU I'm just not interested. Otherwise this is just a slightly more useful tablet - an expensive niche within a niche.So here's hoping that the Ivy Bridge refresh brings a better screen, Thunderbolt, and a reasonably priced (I'm looking at you, Sony) external and upgradeable GPU.
DanNeely - Sunday, October 23, 2011 - link
It's the battery life that really disappoints me. I'd like something with more performance than my netbook; but my 1st gen models 6 hour battery never lasted me a full day at a convention.Roland00Address - Sunday, October 23, 2011 - link
I dislike the term "cells" for laptop batteries for it doesn't really tell you the capacity of the battery like the term Whr does.A 6 cell battery for a laptop would usually have a 40 Whr to 60Whr. This laptop has a 35Whr battery.
4 to 5 hours is pretty good for a 4 cell battery that is not running something dirt slow like atom
DanNeely - Sunday, October 23, 2011 - link
the runtime isn't unreasonable for the CPU+battery combination; but it's well short of what I'd need to be able to retire my netbook for something a bit speedier.netmann - Saturday, October 22, 2011 - link
Thanks for the great review as usual. Is there a chance the future update to this review would include performance comparison of Asus UX21 with 11-inch MacBook Air with Windows 7 (through Boot Camp) and OWC 6 GB/s SSD installed in it? I believe some of like the Apple hardware better than PC but prefer running Windows OS.vol7ron - Saturday, October 22, 2011 - link
Great review, two things:1) I wouldn't trust ASUS testing - thinking back to how horrible it is to contact their support, and how they had issues with their mobo's for the C2D (and so many other things)
2) It looks like the Skype images are on OSX, not Win7 :)
digitheatre - Monday, October 24, 2011 - link
It is because they want to test the UX21's video camera quality, so the screenshot is captured from MBA :P