Asus K60IJ Reviews
If a laptop is designed keeping price in mind instead of performance, it is natural that it will lack few features that are offered by other laptops in its category. Moreover, it is most likely is to lie at the bottom when it comes to the performance as it is not the main idea behind the design of the laptop. One should not be surprised to see some outdated or low performance components inside casing. The same is true of the new Asus K60IJ-RBLX05.
Priced at just $499, the laptop supports a 16-inch display and provides storage of 320GB. It looks like a good deal if you are looking for an affordable laptop with mediocre performance. The biggest trade-off that this laptop has to make for its low price is its low-performance processor. While most mainstream laptops are powered by Intel Core 2 Duo processor, the Asus K60IJ runs on 2.1 GHz Intel Pentium Dual Core T4300 processor. Though, it is better than solo processors but it is not anywhere near that performance of Core 2 Duo processor. So, you have to be aware that this laptop is not going to provide stellar performance, should you decide to buy.
The K60IJ measures 14.6 inches wide, 10.2 inches deep, 1.4 inches high and it is portable due to its weight of just 5.6 pounds. You can carry it around without any problem. It has discrete Intel GMA 4500MHD GPU and comes with Mobile Intel GM45 Express. The laptop is equipped with 4GB, DDR2 667 MHz memory and 320GB 5,400rpm hard drive. It comes with preinstalled Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit) operating system.
The K60IJ shares it looks with Asus’ recent Eee PC Netbooks. It has similar glossy plastic casing, which is provided with smooth lines. The keyboard and number pad are provided with matte finish but the surroundings are glossy. The keypad has flat but concave buttons, which are comfortable for typing. The touch pad is large and has two separate mouse buttons. The touchpad surface is a bit glossy.
The laptop boasts of 16-inch glossy LED-backlit screen, which has resolution of 1,366×768 pixels. It is standard resolution for most displays of its size. However, the resolution is not perfect for watching 1080p HD video content. Above the display, you will find a 1.3 megapixel Webcam, which is a nice inclusion considering its price.
A VGA-out port, four USB 2.0 ports, multiformat media card reader, Ethernet, and Wi-Fi sums up the ports offered by Asus K60IJ. However, there is no HDMI, Bluetooth or ExpressCard but you do get optical drive.
I bought this laptop and considering the price and the build quality, it’s a great deal. Right now you can’t find a better deal for $499. It can even do some moderate gaming, I have managed to run, for example, Doom 3. What I like best is that it’s very silent, very fast for multitasking, and it’s very easy to open if you ever need to replace the memory or the hard drive, or clean the heatsink. Try that with a Toshiba or an HP and it’s an absolute nightmare! To access the “guts” of this laptop, you only need to remove three screws and pull the bottom lid, which can easily be put back in place with no loose or screeching parts.
I was aware that this is not a laptop for gaming. I want it for work, and so far it suits very well my needs. My only complaint so far, would be the speakers, they could be a bit louder. Love the keyboard, the touch pad, the dvd burner (not noisy at all) and it doesn’t get hot. Much better quality than HP, Gateway or Compaq for sure. And no bloatware to remove, you can start using it right out of the box. If you are on a budget, buy this one, it’s worth every penny!
What three screws need to be removed? I want to take a peek inside and see what’s what. I might even pop in a 500gb 7200 sata drive from a previous machine. Or I’ll case it and use it as external storage. Either way, I removed all the screws and cannot figure out what slides which way to get to the good stuff for fear of breaking something.