Notebook Trio: ASUS A8JS and G2P and ABS Mayhem Z5
by Jarred Walton on December 29, 2006 12:15 PM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
Support and Warranty
There are only a few things left to discuss before we wrap up this article. While we have saved discussion of the support and warranty service offered by ASUS and ABS for last, it is definitely not less important than the other factors. In fact, warranty and support are in many ways one of the most important factors to consider when purchasing a laptop. Where it is relatively easy to build your own desktop system and repair/replace parts as necessary if anything should break down, laptops are inherently prone to a lot more abuse and they are much more difficult (and expensive) to get repaired. For any moderately expensive laptop, we would strongly encourage buyers to consider getting an extended warranty. If you can get a warranty that covers the replacement of the LCD as well, so much the better, although at that point you may be looking at $400 extra in warranty costs. The alternative is that you risk damaging your laptop and turning it into an expensive paperweight, or at the very least getting stuck with a relatively large repair bill. Of course, getting an extended warranty doesn't do you much good if the service provided is of poor quality.
The good news is that we didn't have any problems with any of the laptops breaking down during testing, but that really isn't all that uncommon, as most laptops will usually last at least a year before they start having problems. In order to test the service department, we placed anonymous calls to the companies and reported hardware issues and asked for a replacement. Both companies were easy to deal with, and in both cases all we needed to do was provide them with our sales order number and they would send us the RMA information. We didn't actually have a sales order, so of course we couldn't test turnaround time for getting something replaced. However, the fact that both ABS and ASUS talked with us for 10-15 minutes without us providing them with an order number is a good sign. In the case of ABS, they also agreed to cross ship a replacement battery when we reported battery problems.
Without owning and testing a laptop from either company for months or perhaps years, it is difficult to gauge the true level of support end-users might receive. Our initial experience however leads us to believe that they will provide warranty coverage with a minimum of hassle. The phone was answered in a prompt manner every time we placed a call, and the technicians we spoke with from both companies seem to be reasonably well informed. ASUS' phone service was actually exceptional, as we were actually speaking with a real person in less than a minute every time we called, and we didn't have to wade through a bunch of computer menus first. ABS took a bit longer to answer at about 3-5 minutes, but that's still a lot better than what we have encountered at a few other companies where hold times can easily be longer than 15 minutes.
Answering the phone promptly and providing reasonable technical support is a good place to start, but not everything is "perfect" in support land. Neither company offers 24/7 technical support, although you can always send an email and wait for a response. ASUS phone support hours for notebooks are from Mon-Fri 6:00AM-6:00PM PST and technical support is available Mon-Fri 5:30AM-9:00PM and Sat.-Sun. 6:00AM-3:00PM. That's really not too bad, as you at least get the opportunity to call technical support every day of the week, but if you predominantly use your notebook at night that could be a bit more difficult, especially for anyone on the East Coast. ABS' support hours are even more limited: Mon-Fri 8:30AM-7:30PM PST, and Sat. 8:30AM-5:30PM PST. If you want 24/7 support, you'll basically need to purchase a laptop from a major OEM or else purchase a separate support contract.
The other factor in the warranty/support equation is how long the warranty lasts. Unfortunately, in the case of ABS the standard warranty is one year only, and as far as we can tell there's no way to get an extended warranty from them. That's a pretty critical flaw, as the first year of use is likely to be the most trouble-free. ASUS does better, offering a standard two-year warranty, and after registering your notebook (within the first 90 days after purchase) you get an additional one-year warranty bringing the total to three years. This two (or three) year global warranty comes standard on all ASUS notebooks starting in 2006, and it's difficult to complain about a three-year standard warranty. The cost of this warranty is already included in the price of any ASUS notebook, so while they may cost a bit more than roughly equivalent models from other companies, once you factor in the need to purchase an extended warranty for most other laptop manufacturers, the final price is about the same as what ASUS is charging. For ABS, we can only recommend that they set up some form of warranty extension package, and give the users the decision on whether or not they want to pay extra to get that service. As it stands, we would be very nervous about purchasing a high-end laptop that could break down any time after the first year and leave us stuck with the repair bill.
There are only a few things left to discuss before we wrap up this article. While we have saved discussion of the support and warranty service offered by ASUS and ABS for last, it is definitely not less important than the other factors. In fact, warranty and support are in many ways one of the most important factors to consider when purchasing a laptop. Where it is relatively easy to build your own desktop system and repair/replace parts as necessary if anything should break down, laptops are inherently prone to a lot more abuse and they are much more difficult (and expensive) to get repaired. For any moderately expensive laptop, we would strongly encourage buyers to consider getting an extended warranty. If you can get a warranty that covers the replacement of the LCD as well, so much the better, although at that point you may be looking at $400 extra in warranty costs. The alternative is that you risk damaging your laptop and turning it into an expensive paperweight, or at the very least getting stuck with a relatively large repair bill. Of course, getting an extended warranty doesn't do you much good if the service provided is of poor quality.
The good news is that we didn't have any problems with any of the laptops breaking down during testing, but that really isn't all that uncommon, as most laptops will usually last at least a year before they start having problems. In order to test the service department, we placed anonymous calls to the companies and reported hardware issues and asked for a replacement. Both companies were easy to deal with, and in both cases all we needed to do was provide them with our sales order number and they would send us the RMA information. We didn't actually have a sales order, so of course we couldn't test turnaround time for getting something replaced. However, the fact that both ABS and ASUS talked with us for 10-15 minutes without us providing them with an order number is a good sign. In the case of ABS, they also agreed to cross ship a replacement battery when we reported battery problems.
Without owning and testing a laptop from either company for months or perhaps years, it is difficult to gauge the true level of support end-users might receive. Our initial experience however leads us to believe that they will provide warranty coverage with a minimum of hassle. The phone was answered in a prompt manner every time we placed a call, and the technicians we spoke with from both companies seem to be reasonably well informed. ASUS' phone service was actually exceptional, as we were actually speaking with a real person in less than a minute every time we called, and we didn't have to wade through a bunch of computer menus first. ABS took a bit longer to answer at about 3-5 minutes, but that's still a lot better than what we have encountered at a few other companies where hold times can easily be longer than 15 minutes.
Answering the phone promptly and providing reasonable technical support is a good place to start, but not everything is "perfect" in support land. Neither company offers 24/7 technical support, although you can always send an email and wait for a response. ASUS phone support hours for notebooks are from Mon-Fri 6:00AM-6:00PM PST and technical support is available Mon-Fri 5:30AM-9:00PM and Sat.-Sun. 6:00AM-3:00PM. That's really not too bad, as you at least get the opportunity to call technical support every day of the week, but if you predominantly use your notebook at night that could be a bit more difficult, especially for anyone on the East Coast. ABS' support hours are even more limited: Mon-Fri 8:30AM-7:30PM PST, and Sat. 8:30AM-5:30PM PST. If you want 24/7 support, you'll basically need to purchase a laptop from a major OEM or else purchase a separate support contract.
The other factor in the warranty/support equation is how long the warranty lasts. Unfortunately, in the case of ABS the standard warranty is one year only, and as far as we can tell there's no way to get an extended warranty from them. That's a pretty critical flaw, as the first year of use is likely to be the most trouble-free. ASUS does better, offering a standard two-year warranty, and after registering your notebook (within the first 90 days after purchase) you get an additional one-year warranty bringing the total to three years. This two (or three) year global warranty comes standard on all ASUS notebooks starting in 2006, and it's difficult to complain about a three-year standard warranty. The cost of this warranty is already included in the price of any ASUS notebook, so while they may cost a bit more than roughly equivalent models from other companies, once you factor in the need to purchase an extended warranty for most other laptop manufacturers, the final price is about the same as what ASUS is charging. For ABS, we can only recommend that they set up some form of warranty extension package, and give the users the decision on whether or not they want to pay extra to get that service. As it stands, we would be very nervous about purchasing a high-end laptop that could break down any time after the first year and leave us stuck with the repair bill.
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unclebud - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
"Seems all the usual suspects are on a holiday"more than likely they were just thrown speechless by such extreme bias in this "review"...
newsflash - it can have a sorry gma 900 in it that can barely play rollercoaster tycoon and call it a "gaming laptop" if they want...
ugh. i tried skipping around to get something valuable out of this "article", but there aren't any pictures of the models even...
going to reread mr anand's review of his laptop to cheer myself up -- now that's a thorough review!
JarredWalton - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
"but there aren't any pictures of the models even"Umm... what? There are 36 images (with enlarged shots) in the article, plus another 30 or so graphs/charts. If you're not seeing them, either your browser is incorrectly configured and is blocking the images, or else the servers are having issues. And if someone called a GMA900 a "gaming notebook" they would be lying; calling an X1700 laptop a gaming laptop is more of an exaggeration, but it's clearly not the fastest mobile GPU.
I honestly have no idea what you mean by bias, so I'd be happy if you would point out areas that are "biased" rather than just giving a blanket label to the article.
mino - Friday, December 29, 2006 - link
Overall a nice review, those ASU are getting some serious popularity here in Europe while the reviews are nowhere to find..However, ranting for half a page about 14inch not having numeric keypad? I would have thought it was under you level of knowledge...
While the KB is NOT perfect in any sense - small enter, small keys.. - the absence of numeric keypad is natural.
Maybe you should spend a few weeks on road with some 17inch baby of yours to see how "important" numeric keypad really is...
One thing I hate about A8J is that transreflective (CrystalSomething) screen. It is pretty much unusable the moment the sun shines, and it does shine a bit too much in the summer.
JarredWalton - Friday, December 29, 2006 - link
I wasn't really complaining about the lack of a numpad on the 14" A8Js, merely pointing out that it's not there and you really can't fit one into such a chassis. My "rant" for half a paragraph was dedicated to the Fn key - and mostly I was just talking about the uses and making a minor complaint about it not being switched with the Ctrl key location. Unless you're looking somewhere else?I tried to discuss my feelings about the keyboards on each laptop, as that's pretty important with long-term use. Given what I do for a living (writing), I would actually avoid purchasing the G2P (as tested) and the Mayhem Z5 purely on the basis of the keyboard alone. The US G2P might actually be fine, as the primary issue I had was with the mixed up locations (relative to most keyboards) of the \ and " keys.
As for the G2P, that's where I complained about the missing numpad, and it's a 17" model notebook. I complained about this same issue on the Dell XPS M1710 and E1705, as I use numpads on a regular basis and find them to be important. Ironically, the ABS includes a numpad, which I liked, but the other missing keys (Home - PgDn) were at least as irritating to me as the lack of a numpad. Obviously, my taste in keyboards isn't the same as every other person's, which I why I started the article talking about the importance of trying out laptops in person where possible - or try a similar laptop if that's all you can do.
Ideally, I'd like a 17" notebook to have a numpad and a layout very much like the ABS, only shrink the width of the Backspace, \, Enter, and Shift keys and put in a column with Home, End, PgUp, and PgDn similar to how the two ASUS laptops do it. There's plenty of room there for those keys... or just extend the keyboard area down a bit and put the keys right above the cursors like on a regular keyboard.
As for the two ASUS laptop LCDs, I didn't find the LCD on the G2P to have problems in bright light (sunlight is a stretch but possible). Hopefully all newer ASUS laptops have LCDs more like the G2P. The A8J on the other hand is definitely the worst LCD of the bunch and really suitable for indoor use only (or on overcast days). When I first used it I didn't think too much about the LCD quality, as most laptop LCDs can't compete with desktop LCDs in terms of brightness and color quality. After playing with the other notebooks, however, I became quite unhappy with the A8J LCD. Sure, it helps battery life, but all you need to do is have more brightness levels to allow for lowered battery use on LCDs like the G2P.
mino - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
Seems all the usuall suspect are on a holiday :)Maybe I should read a bit more thoroughy, and sllep more too :). Point taken.
As for the display, the are two things. I am yet to see an glossy surface LCD to be usable on sunlight. They are nice and sharp for movies and indoors. But my observation is that the moment sun shines (also through an unprotected window) the display changes to a mirror - well, it called an "mirror effect" dispaly sometimes :). At the same conditionas even a poor-quality anti-glare one retains usability.
That said I will have to pass the A8J, otherwise it is pretty solid bundle(I like the BT+DVI+14"WXGA+ combo).
Should the time come when the notebook are regularly of built-to-order variety such is it with cars now. That way most of these "issues" with manufacturer isung bad display, VGA, CPU and so on would be a thing of the past.
It would not even increase the price too much provided good automation is employed. Actually this would greatly simplify the abundance of notebook based of the same chassis with a bit different internals only.
Hell, just ASUS has 5+ series with the same 15.4inch chassis...
mino - Saturday, December 30, 2006 - link
spelling, here you come :(francisco54 - Friday, May 16, 2014 - link
hola mepodeia mamdar los draivers de este ordenador