
The ASUS Zenbook UX305 Review - ismavis
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9104/asus-zenbook-ux305-review
======
mladenkovacevic
So basically a fanless, ultraportable, 13" laptop with an IPS HD screen that
beats the 2014 Macbook Air on both performance and battery life, has more than
one USB port and costs between $700 and a $1000.

Seems like a winner to me.

~~~
drudru11
Unless this has great, zero-issues unix support, I'll have to pass.

Is there a laptop like this that is supported by linux or any of the BSDs
well?

~~~
tdicola
The 2015 Dell XPS 13 sputnik edition is similar and will have full support for
Ubuntu 14.04 LTS out of the box. It's still in the last stages of development
& bug fixing from what I understand though:
[http://en.community.dell.com/techcenter/os-
applications/f/46...](http://en.community.dell.com/techcenter/os-
applications/f/4613/t/19613910?pi22229=6)

~~~
wtbob
Yeah, but 'full support for Ubuntu' doesn't necessarily mean 'full support for
Linux'; I've learnt that the hard way.

~~~
icebraining
What do you mean?

~~~
pwnna
Sometimes vendors will include proprietary kernel modules that's only licensed
to Ubuntu or works only on Ubuntu.

I think this happened to some broadcom chips.

~~~
icebraining
Can't they just be copied? It's not like other distros use a different kernel
(maybe a different version, but that's usually easy to adapt to).

~~~
hobarrera
Copying binary kernel modules isn't guaranteed to work across kernel versions.
There's a stable API, but not a stable ABI.

Heck, Ubuntu's kernel actually has lots of patches, so unless you carry those
along, the modules may even not-work on a same kernel version for some other
distro.

------
nfoz
I love laptops and follow the market quite carefully. But why is this here?

I can understand the discussion about the new Apple Macbook, and the Google
Pixel 2015, and the Dell "Sputnik" linux laptops. Because they all have some
element that's a bit "out there" for discussion. This one... is just another
laptop, there are many laptops on the market.

Why not discuss this one instead? It's much more _interesting_ IMO:

[http://panasonic.jp/pc/products/mx4h/](http://panasonic.jp/pc/products/mx4h/)

The Panasonic MX4, only available in Japan, features: - 2.6lbs (same as this
Asus), but it's durability-tested like it's a lightweight Toughbook, they have
drop-test videos etc. \- 1920x1080 touchscreen \- Flips around to become a
tablet (yoga), pen is included. \- Advertised 12hr battery life, but there are
two batteries: the one that drains first is hot-swappable, leaving you with a
few hours of battery life for you to swap in a replacement. \- An extra
accessory allows you to charge your removed-battery from the wall via USB. So
you can keep the laptop on battery forever, swapping them out and charging
them. \- More connectivity options than anything else: VGA, HDMI, separate
mic/headphones, SD card, 2xUSB3, and physical wireless on/off switch \-
Physical touchpad buttons \- Ample-size trackpad, and the keyboard buttons are
advertised as a decent 2mm of travel distance (deeper than most small laptops
nowadays) \- Optical disc (blu-ray) drive. In that tiny form factor with
exceptional battery, pen-included yoga-tablet, lighter-than-macbook-air
durability-tested machine. Amazing!

~~~
cwyers
If I had to guess:

> The most amazing thing about the ASUS UX305 though is that the company has
> crafted an all-aluminum, thin, light, and capable Ultrabook for only $699.
> With this kind of price point, one would expect sacrifices to be made in the
> specifications, but that is not really the case at all.

~~~
stevenjohns
It was more or less the same with the last two generations, with the first
generation only really suffering from a 'poor' keyboard.

------
Procrastes
I bought this a couple of weeks ago. Works pretty well with xubuntu 14.04.

I don't have it with me, so I will update this comment when I get home with
specifics. Many of these may be xubuntu oddities more than general Linux
issues.

Issues so far:

* wifi does not work out of the box (fixed: add /lib/firmware/iwlwifi-7265-8.ucode[1]).

* top of windows disappear (fixed: turn off composition in Settings/Window Manager Tweaks).

* most "special" keys do not work, (volume and mute work)

* applications menu stopped responding. (still broken)

Otherwise it's fine. Good battery life, and very lightweight. I hardly ever
use the applications menu, and I generally use my desktop for a browser and
terminal windows, so it works well for me.

1\.
[https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/_media/en/users/drivers/iwl...](https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/_media/en/users/drivers/iwlwifi-7265-ucode-22.24.8.0.tgz)

------
barake
Purchased the UX305 about two weeks ago for ~$630 (15% off at the Microsoft
Store) with tax.

I have nothing but good things to say about the hardware - screen, keyboard,
and touchpad are A+, and I'm getting 8-10 hours working in Visual Studio 2013.

Two things not covered in the review: HDMI port is 1.4, and the SD card reader
is half-depth similar to Macs.

The only issue so far is the touchpad gesture software crashing Chrome
sometimes when pressing alt-D to select the address bar.

~~~
imperialdrive
umm... I am surprised you, nor anyone else (yet) mentions the power key being
right above the backspace key... I've turned off or put to sleep that stupid
laptop so many times I went back to using my iPad 1st gen with bluetooth
keyboard and RDP lol

but seriously, how they can continually overlook what clearly is a flaw? if
I've got this all backwards, please share the logic behind it

~~~
dangrossman
Hit the Windows key and type "power button" to open the power options control
panel. Set "when I press the power button" to "do nothing". You can
sleep/hibernate/shutdown from the start menu/screen, or automatically when you
close the lid.

I have a UX301. The first time I accidentally hit the power button while
working, I disabled it.

~~~
joshuapants
This is exactly the fix I would apply if I had this, but you would think
they'd make it so that you had to hold the button down for more than a quick
key press to put it to sleep. Seems like that would be a problem that would
come up in testing.

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avargas
The IPS matte is lovely. I have a touchscreen I impulsively bought and it
can't face a source of light directly, or else it's unreadable.

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franciscop
I will wait for the Skylake version, that should bring the best out of these
beauties. I have the Ivy Bridge version (UX31) and I love it. When I bought it
I wasn't sure if choosing it or Macbook Air, choose the Zenbook for its better
resolution. Same thing is happening now.

------
andrewfong
Sort of off topic, but I'm kind of stuck with Lenovo Thinkpads thanks to my
love of the Trackpoint, but we're a shrinking group and there are many, many
tempting alternatives these days. Anyone know if there's any way to graft a
Trackpoint onto other laptops?

~~~
dorfsmay
I'm the same, can't work without the track point, trackpads are inefficient if
you type a lot.

One of my colleague in the same situation ended up buying a Toshiba.

~~~
r00fus
> I'm the same, can't work without the track point, trackpads are inefficient
> if you type a lot

This is only true if your trackpad driver/software sucks. Good trackpads (like
on Macs) are great at palm rejection and other heuristics to prevent these
issues.

Really good hardware has great software to complete it.

~~~
andrewfong
It's not a software issue; it's physiology. The inefficiency is that using a
trackpad, even one with very good software, requires me to take one hand off
the home row on the keyboard. With a trackpoint, I just move my finger about
an inch.

~~~
dorfsmay
Correct, this is what I meant.

Additionally, I find it more efficient to apply pressure to move the cursor
accross the screen rather than the "put fingers down, rub, fingers up, move
through the air" loop!

------
franciscop
> "ASUS has kept the styling consistent over the years"

Well, they look completely different to me:

1\. Zenbook UX31E
[http://www.techspot.com/images/products/laptops/org/10306327...](http://www.techspot.com/images/products/laptops/org/1030632738_761952150_o.jpg)

2\. Zenbook infinity UX301: [http://cdn.slashgear.com/wp-
content/uploads/2013/06/ASUS-Zen...](http://cdn.slashgear.com/wp-
content/uploads/2013/06/ASUS-Zenbook-Infinity-Ultrabook_1-580x370.jpg)

------
SG-
Ignoring the product which seems to be pretty nice especially for that price,
I found the review which was mostly about showing charts and comparisons to be
pretty poor.

It seems some charts they've omitted models to compare, and they're comparing
it to 1-2 year old models of competitors (no 2015 MBA, sometimes a 2013 MBP).

It would have also been nice to see SSD benchmarks considering how Anand has
typically pretty good at reviewing SSDs in the past.

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olso
Could that CPU handle lets say WebStorm, postgresql, gulp, apache/nginx,
laravel(php-fpm)/rails open all at once?

Running on Ubuntu MATE

I see boost up to 2GHz, so.. yes?

~~~
WildUtah
"WebStorm, postgresql, gulp, apache/nginx, laravel(php-fpm)/rails"

I used to run all that stuff -- or its contemporary equivalent -- on a 400MHz
single core laptop with 128MB of RAM. But that would be impossibly slow today.
I wonder what changed.

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tedunangst
Where can I get one of these for 699?

~~~
freehunter
Newegg seems to have it for that price:
[http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834232...](http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834232393&cm_re=zenbook_ux305-_-34-232-393-_-Product)

Amazon's cheapest is $799 for some reason.

~~~
tedunangst
ah, cool. google "ux305 newegg" only returned a link for the ux31.

