~U3S Owners Lounge~

[eugenes]

I'll install HL2 and CS:Source tonight to see if I run into the same issues.

[kennyy]

I'll install HL2 and CS:Source tonight to see if I run into the same issues.

that would be great. Cheers

[eugenes]

I can get CS:Source and HL2 up and running just fine.

The U3S is running quite hot, but I'm not experiencing any issues.

[frencholivier]

3:16am??? Wow.
How do CSS and HL2 look on the U3S ?
I'm thinking of hooking up mine to a 40' screen, but I am sure it will drag my FPS down, right? My screen will probably be 1080p.

[frencholivier]

I forgot: very quick question:
The "enter" key on the U3S seems small to me on the pics. On the other hand I have seen some other pics of the U3S keyboard where the enter key is that one in shape of an "inverted L" like that:
!
<---!
I would clearly prefer a bigger enter key. Would you guys who got their U3S please let me know which version of the keyboard you got?

[Jumper]

The inverted L is probably the european version.

[eugenes]

The enter key on the US version is the retangular version. I have a pic of the keyboard linked in the first post.

CS:Source and HL2 looks fine on the U3S (works with both Intel and Nvidia graphics). I only have a 720p TV right now (1280x1024), so I can't confirm if the U3S outputs 1080p signal or not.

[frencholivier]

Great thanks guys. Too bad for the rectangular enter key. Given the prices of the U3S in UK I'll refrain from buying from there

[Redline]

The weird L-shaped enter key is part of the UK standard keyboard layout...A lot of the pics use those; for some reason, Asus likes to use UK spec models for their press pics.

[frencholivier]

Gotcha. Well I'm French (but living in the US) so I am kinda used to my big enter key. For some reason I got used to the QWERTY layout but not to the enter key. I guess getting the UK layout would be too much of a hassle so I am just giving up.

Also I was wondering: On one hand the U3S runs cool most of the time and the fan can become loud, especially in dedicated mode. On the other hand the battery life is OK but not great. So the question is: wouldn't the fan be responsible of low battery life? It would be strange since my guess is that a fan does not consume much power.
On a related subject I have a hard time understanding where the battery time differences between laptops come from. Seriously, take the SZ6 the M1330 and the U3S. They are all in the same category, same weight, almost same specs, same wireless chips, same hard drives or close... The Asus even lacks an internal ODD. I would guess the screens are not the same but could that explain the big battery life differences? It looks to me that the screens are made by the same bunch of manufacturers anyway.
Or could it be that the batteries that ASUS is on the cheap with the batteries it puts in its laptops?
Given the reports here and there, Asus has at least a one hour runtime shortage vs. the M1330 or the SZ6, for comparable specs, on the 6-cell battery.