Test
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Asus N53SN with Intel® Core™ i7 Processor
I finally bought a new laptop during PC Fair 2011 at KLCC Convention Centre!!! I decided to get Asus due to its reliability and excellent built quality whereby I been getting good reviews on Asus laptop products.
I got myself the Asus N53SN with the specification listed below:
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7 2630QM
Operating System: Windows® 7 Home Premium
Chipset: Intel® HM65 Express Chipset
Memory: 8GB (This model support up to 16GB)
Display: 15.6" 16:9 HD (1366x768)/Full HD (1920x1080) LED backlit Asus Splendid Video Intelligent Technology
Graphic: NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 550M with 2GB DDR3 VRAM
HDD: 640GB 5400rpm
Optical Drive: Super-Multi DVD
Card Reader: 3 -in-1 card reader ( SD/ MS/ MMC)
Camera: 2.0 Mega Pixel web camera
Network: Integrated802.11 b/g/n
Interface: 1 x Microphone-in jack, 1 x Line-in Jack, 1 x VGA port/Mini D-sub 15-pin for external monitor, 1 x USB 3.0 port,
3 x USB 2.0 port(s), 1 x RJ45 LAN Jack for LAN insert, 1 x HDMIAudio: Built-in Speakers And Microphone, Bang & Olufsen ICEpower®, SonicFocus
Also with freebies:
Also with freebies:
- Asus wired moused
- Asus plastic tumbler
- Asus Umbrella
- Asus sling bag
- Trend Micro Titanium Internet Security (Software)
- Starcraft II: Wing of Liberty (Starter Kit Game)
- Lola laptop bag (Seriously one weird laptop bag)
I also got a '3 days, 2 nights to Beijing, China'. Basically its a free accommodation, breakfast and free tour guide whereby flight to Beijing is not included. It's a very good deal as lots of stuff given and the trip to Beijing is from the so called Wheel of Fortune that I had to spin.
So~ here is all the screen shots:
 |
| Yes! I truly made a smart choice =P |
 |
| The Asus N53SN laptop specification |
 |
| Burnished aluminium effect with the metallic Asus logo |
 |
| Front view of the Asus N53SN and the capability to switch on and off the webcam |
 |
| Left side view: LAN, Card reader, USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 Not forgetting the awesome Intel Core i7! =D |
 |
| Right view: Microphone, earphone , USB 2.0 x 2 and DVD-RW drive |
 |
| Strong and solid hinge Also the wireless on and off switch |
 |
| Asus Wired mouse Extra heavy charger (Believe me.. its very heavy) Mushkin 4GB RAM (Free add-on during PC Fair) |
 |
| Trend Micro Titanium Internet Security Starcraft: Wings of Liberty Starter Kit |
 |
| Asus laptop sling bag Lola laptop bag (Looks cool from outside by bright green from inside...) |
 |
| Freebies: Umbrella, tumbler and car sunscreen |
Good built and durable laptop with high specification is what really makes this laptop an award winning powerhouse laptop. Yet it's not much for mobility since it weight a whooping 3kg with battery and not forgetting a near 1kg for its jumbo size charger. To some user, the USB 3.0 is optional but for me it's a must to have when I rely heavily on transferring lots of virtual hard disk and gigabyte size movies. The USB 3.0 port comes great with my Buffalo MiniStation Lite USB3.0 =)
Having the processor to have four cores/eight threads is crucial when needed to run virtual environments and I bet gamers would fully utilize this multi-core processor. Not forgetting this laptop is packed with 8GB RAM and I do love the fact it does support up to 16GB RAM. The hard disk given is a bit disappointing as the speed is 5400rpm which near future I'm sure to upgrade it.
Let me point out another thing, which is the wireless b/g/n. I'm currently using the Linksys WRT610N Simultaneous Dual N Band Wireless Router, and it would be great to have that 300mbps speed to my advantage on this laptop for video streaming out transfer data within my network.
Overall this is one superb product with lots of freebies given when I bought it during PC Fair 2011!
Next I will cover the performance and features once I upgrade the Operating System to Windows 7 Ultimate.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Papa John's Pizza
Not too long ago I had a farewell lunch at Papa John's Pizza (Tropicana City Mall). Basically celebrate two interns last working day from my company. All of us was there ordered quite a number of pizza and while waiting so I took the chance to snapshots nearly the whole menu (I practically playing around with my HTC Desire HD while waiting for food).
Papa John's Pizza Menu
According to Wikipedia, Papa John's is the third largest take-out and pizza delivery
John Schnatter the owner and his huge pizza on the menu
Get two in one with their Half & Half
Appetizers Menu
Appetizers/Snack Menu
Snack Menu
Baked Rice and Pasta Menu
Drinks Menu
Dippings - Garlic Butter Sauce, Tomata Pasta Sauce and Green Pepper
Dippings for the Garlic Butter is alright but having the Green Pepper and Tomata Pasta Sauce is just weird. The Tomato Pasta Sauce is the same sauce they use on the pasta and pizza...
Snack - Breadsticks (RM3.50)
The breadsticks was alright, quite dry and not much of flavor. Tried dipping into the Garlic Butter sauce seems to taste better a little.
Snack - Potato Wedges (RM3.90)
This is one of the smallest potato wedges I seen so far. It still look so small even after I zoom for a close up shot. The wedges is crunchy but I still find the KFC wedges taste better.
Snack - Sweet and Spicy Chicken Wings (RM8.00)
Menu wrote chicken wing yet gave us drumstick and again.. it's so damn small! Another record breaking tiny drumstick and chicken wing but I do admit that it does taste better than Pizza Hut's chicken wing.
Chicken and Mushroom Pizza Pocket (RM8.90)
I surely don't want to put this in my pocket but overall this was the best food I tasted there which includes the pizza I tried.
Specialty Pizza - Chicken Super Papa's
Classic Pizza - Garden Special
Specialty Pizza - BBQ Chicken & Beef
Classic Pizza - Papa's Pizza
Chicken Alfredo Pasta
Baked Seafood Deluxe Pasta
This is the dude that was busy making our pizza
Overall the pizzas looks nice but taste quite dull as compare to Pizza Hut, Domino and Yellow Cab. Snack portion was the smallest I seen so far also I did waited for a long time before the first pizza reached my table. I enjoyed the Chicken and Mushroom Pizza Pocket but I don't have any reason to go back there again.
Maybe the focus on Papa John's Pizza is the freshness of the ingredient used, yet again... When comes to franchising food here in Malaysia, it's normal for my perspective to think that quality and services is below average.
Check out the link below for Papa John's Menu:
Sunday, January 09, 2011
Buffalo MiniStation Lite USB3.0 (HD-PEU3 Series)
Just got myself a Buffalo MiniStation Lite USB3.0!
Check out the specification:
- Support for legacy USB 2.0 and SuperSpeed USB 3.0
- Preformatted hard drive is ready for immediate use with Windows® and Mac®
- Connect to your computer for additional storage or backup of your music, photo, video and data files
- Perfect comopanion for your laptop or netbook - No external power supply needed
- Enhance the overall perfomance of your PC and increase file transfer rates up to 135% over USB 2.0 hard drives
- Eco minded power management tool regulates power usage, conserving energy and battery consumption
- Buffalo's Backup Utility for automatic backup of your PCs, and Time Machine® support for continuous backup of your Mac computer
The USB SuperSpeed portable HDD + USB3.0 Mini Connector + Manuals
USB 3.0 A side Mini Connector and B side connector
The USB 3.0 is like an extension of micro USB B. It's easy to identified the USB 3.0/SuperSpeed cable since the inside plastic is blue and the indicator of 'SS' on the USB sign.
USB 3.0/SuperSpeed is backward compatible with USB 2.0/1.1
I have tried using my micro USB from my HTC Desire HD cable and it fits
LED light indicator
LED emits white light for the Buffalo logo and kinda like greenish/yellow light on the left side when loading data. There is a short blue light emitted when I plug in the cable to my laptop USB port.
Application and Utilities for the Buffalo MiniStation Lite USB3.0
BuffaloTools - Utilities for better performance
I would mostly use the TurboPC and TurboCopy as it does improve the performance of file transfer. This is done by configuring and managing well on the data caching. At the moment I can't really test the performance as I don't have a USB3.0 port on both my laptop and desktop yet it's good to have it once USB 3.0 is more widely available in the market.
 |
| Buffalo TurboCopy |
The installed utilities actually improve the User Interface and additional features shown when copy or move files. This actually apply to all file copy or move the the cached being use when transferring file.
I personally like the sleek and compact design of the portable HDD yet this is the MiniStation Lite which lacking Encryption Model available at the HD-PXTU2 Series. Still! The LED emitted light on the Buffalo logo is very solid and bright =P
USB 3.0 was release more than a year but the adaptation for this SuperSpeed for the mainstream consuption is so laggard due to the complication of Intel updating their chipset specification. Right now most USB 3.0 port available in the market is not direct support from the native chipset and Windows 7
Intel basically have their own plan on the development of Light Peak technology.i Rght now, Intel basically change their mind and finally adopt USB 3.0 in the Sandy Bridge chipset. I guess this is due to the overall demand from the mainstream consumer and pressure from AMD to adopt USB 3.0 to their Fuzion chipsets.
Tuesday, January 04, 2011
RockMelt - A Social Media Web Browser
I'm very sure that those who constantly and addicted to Facebook or Twitter will surely love this social media web browser - RockMelt.
Got to know about RockMelt few months back as that time I'm only allowed to sign up to receive invitation using my Facebook account. Till now I have not receive any invitation yet i revisit http://www.rockmelt.com
To my surprise, I was able to download it once I log in with my Facebook account.
After checking around, I found out that this social media web browser developed by Tim Howes (Co-inventor of Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) and Eric Vishria (Co-founder and CEO of RockMelt)
RockMelt is based on Google's open-source project Chromium, current integration mainly on Facebook, Twitter and Feeds which uses Push Notification Service.
At the moment you need to have a Facebook account to receive an invitation.
My Facebook and Twitter account on RockMelt Web Browser
YouTube video by TheRockMelt
It's fascinating to see how well the integration of Facebook and Twitter done on this web browser. I believe it can be improve further to support other social media but for now I will try it out and give more review.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)