Asus Zenbook UX31 latest Notebook Reviews, specs:

 Asus Zenbook UX31 latest Notebook Reviews, specs:

Asus Zenbook UX31 adds just enough pizazz so that you'd never mistake it for Apple's wafer-thin lappie, it is the most Air-inspired contender we've seen so far. Mostly, it's that all-metal build, spacious, buttonless trackpad and razor-thin silhouette that whittles down to some seriously sharp edges. In fact, if you have a gander at our comparison gallery down there, you'll see more of a similarity between the Air and UX31 than the S3, which tapers, but in a less pronounced way. Still, while they're both swaddled in aluminum, the 2.9-pound UX31 feels denser than the 2.96-pound Air.The S3 weighs a smidge more, at three pounds, but we couldn't for the life of us tell the difference when we held that in one hand and the UX3 in the other.

Now that we've acknowledged that fruity 800-pound Gorilla in the room, we just have to say... the UX31 is stunning in person. Here at Engadget, we see more products in a week than we have time to review and in general, it behooves us to take a detached, almost clinical approach to handling gadgets, lest we get distracted by the toys piled high on our desks. With the UX31, though, we couldn't help but feel struck by the tremendous craftsmanship.The UX31's keyboard also isn't backlit, which should be a strike against it when people are deciding between this and the MacBook Air.Before we even started playing with the UX31, we received a note from an ASUS rep, asking us to update the touchpad's driver. We can see why. At that time, the trackpad was so jumpy, so imprecise that it had the potential to hamstring the entire laptop. Fortunately, after we removed the driver and installed version 9.1.7.7 in its place, we noticed a huge boost in usability.