Asus DH52 review: Asus DH52

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the MacBook Air should be positively blushing right around now. A sudden onslaught of Ultrabooks--the Intel-coined term for thin, MacBook Air-esque Windows laptops with fast boot times and sleek, high-end designs--has hit just in time for the holidays, and one of the most highly hyped ones we've seen is the Asus Zenbook, a product that doesn't shy away from an Apple-like design whatsoever. That's not such a bad thing: who doesn't want a thin, unibody metal lightweight laptop that starts fast and has a great battery life?

8.1

Asus DH52

The Good

The <b>Asus Zenbook UX31E</b> boasts sleek, pristine design, excellent-sounding speakers, a higher-resolution screen than the MacBook Air, and a better price for nearly identical specs.

The Bad

The keyboard and touch pad are weak points; there are equally thin laptops out there with better battery life.

The Bottom Line

The Asus Zenbook UX31E is an excellent-looking Windows Ultrabook laptop that matches the MacBook Air step for step with an even better price. Fans of great audio, high-resolution screens and lots of ports will be happy; keyboard/touch pad aficionados will be disappointed.

The 13-inch Asus Zenbook, despite looking at least as expensive and high-end as laptops such as the Samsung Series 9, has a starting price of $1,099, which includes 4GB of RAM and a 128GB SSD drive. That's $200 less expensive than the equivalent MacBook Air. Smartly, the Zenbook gets that part right: when competing with a product as singularly well-known and highly rated as the MacBook Air, your product has to be either better or cheaper.

Cheaper, it is: as for better, I'd have to disagree. Excellent speakers, sleek design, and a high-resolution screen are accompanied by a finicky keyboard and touch pad, giving the ever-so-slightly-off sensation when working on the Zenbook. It feels like the opposite of the silky-smooth experience on a MacBook Air. Battery life is short of the Air's lofty numbers, too. Nearly 5 hours isn't shabby, but it's not industry-leading.

Those are somewhat minor issues for what's otherwise a very solid and impressive thin laptop, but at a price north of $1,000, these are issues anyone would pay attention to. The 13-inch Zenbook UX31 gets more expensive in 256GB SSD and Core i7 configurations, climbing up to $1,449 at its highest price. If I were buying a Zenbook, I'd stick with our $1,099 review model and live with the limitations, glad that I had a MacBook Air-alike that saved me a few dollars along the way. If your idea of an Ultrabook is a Windows version of a MacBook Air with a slightly lower price, then consider the Zenbook your product: just be forewarned that the keyboard, touch pad, and battery life are less impressive than the audio/visual bells and whistles.