X-bit labs

Portable Gamer’s Dream: Asus G2 Gaming Notebook Series Review (page 4)

Category: Mobile

by Alexander Britvin

[ 06/01/2007 | 11:15 AM ]

The ASUS G2Pb is equipped with a 17” LCD matrix that has a maximum resolution of 1440x900 pixels and an aspect ratio of 16:10 (WXGA+). The manufacturer declares a matrix response time of 8 milliseconds for a perfect gaming experience. The viewing angles are quite wide both vertically and horizontally. The display has a glassy coating which makes the image more saturated, but also reflects any well-lit object or light source you have behind your back just like a mirror. It means you have to take care about proper lighting when you sit down to play or work with this notebook. The matrix is manufactured using ASUS’ Color Shine technology which is the reason for that “glassiness”. ASUS claims that the use of the special polymer coating ensures an exceptional image quality and color saturation, resulting in a vivid and colorful image.

Besides Color Shine, the notebook features ASUS Crystal Shine and ASUS Splendid Video Enhancement technologies.

Crystal Shine is meant to provide high brightness so that the notebook could yield a bright and sharp image with lively colors – just what you need for watching movies and playing games.

Splendid Video Enhancement allows adjusting the onscreen image by switching between preset modes (you can control this technology with a special Splendid button or with the Fn+F9 key combination).

The notebook’s display offers 16 grades of brightness, just like any other notebook from ASUS, but you can’t use the computer at the lowest values of brightness because it’s virtually impossible to discern anything in the screen then.

We measured the brightness and contrast of the notebook’s LCD panel using a Pantone ColorVision Spyder tool with OptiCAL version 3.7.8 software. We selected the highest brightness setting before this test, but it was considerably lowered when the notebook switched to its battery, automatically enabling its power-saving technologies. The brightness and contrast values are quite high for a notebook’s display:

AC power source:

• 163.8cd/sq.m brightness, 158:1 contrast ratio

DC power source:

• 137.0cd/sq.m brightness, 153:1 contrast ratio

We haven’t seen Audio DJ buttons on ASUS’ notebooks for quite a long time, but the ASUS G2Pb comes with this feature, although it cannot play music without booting the OS up anymore. But when the notebook is turned on, you can use these buttons to control multimedia programs. They include (from left to right):

• Button to enable the Audio DJ block
• Previous track
• Next track
• Stop
• Play/Pause

To the right of the Audio DJ block, on the slanted front panel, there is the first group of system indicators. It remains visible even when the notebook’s lid is closed:

• Power indicator (alight when the notebook is on; blinking when in standby mode; not shining when the notebook is off or in sleep mode)
• Battery charge indicator (alight when the battery is being recharged; off when the battery is charged or fully discharged; blinking when the battery charge is below 10% and the notebook is not connected to the mains)
• E-mail indicator (blinking when you’ve got new email letters in your inbox; this feature requires software setup and is only compatible with Microsoft’s email clients)
• Wireless (blinking when the integrated WLAN adapter is sending out or receiving data packets)

To the right of the front-panel indicators there is a Consumer Infrared port for the remote control you can use to navigate multimedia applications from a distance.