::Review-> Zenith Director Plus Ultra Laptop

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Nishant

Broken In
(UPDATED)Review-> Zenith Director Plus Ultra Laptop

hello everyone..
i am really sorry for not updating this thread in time. You wont believe but my company gave me a 3 day notice to fly to Taiwan to replace my buddy there at customer company.
so as u can understand that i had to complete a hell lot of work before and after coming to Taiwan. So could not come online and could not test the lappy.

First i thought that how unlucky i am... if i knew before that i would be going to taiwan i would have bought my laptop from taiwan itself...(i see every 2nd electronic thing in india have "Made in Taiwan" stamp). So one day i went shopping here... i was surprised to see that laptops are more expensive here than india!! i got some relief. Then thought of buying mobile phones... they are *exactly* the same price as in india!! It remindes me of mangos in india... i mean india produces so much mango but all get exported and we get then at high price. May be the same case here with laptops..

anyways i will not bore u more... but i have some bad news for all of u waiting for the review... I do not get even a single minute here to play games on my laptop...... and i put a hell lot of programming/heavy applications.. MySql server, java ides, Qt creator, visual studio, bitdefender 2009 internet security, on the lappy.

the lappy runs fast even these applications running in background. I have not shutdown this laptop for the last 3-4 days coz did not got time in the day and in the night there is regular download going on for movies/games (although i do not watch them, saving for future:) ).

It heats up only a little when not playing games... but i remember when palying games it heats like anything(only the fan side which blows really hot air that i can use it for hair dryer). but know i am confident that nothing will happen to it. Once it slipped from my bed... nothing seem to be broken... it was mishandeled in the flight as well... lucky me...!!

The booting time of this lappy is very long. After the winxp logo comes up the bar animates about 10 times and then there is a 30 sec black screen before coming to login screen.. this happed after i installed many applications and antivirus.

the palmrest attracts dust and fingure prints too easily.. i hv stopped cleaning it.

The shortcut buttons on the keyboard requires a software utility which is very slow in response... the bluetooth button does not work so i hv to on/off it through the utility.

as soon as i will get a chance to play games.. i will try to update. currently i do not hav any games here but i started downloading them.

ps:-
somebody asked where i bought this lappy... i bought it from "Bits n Bytes" jayanti market Jaipur.



original post:-
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hi friends...
so finally after two long delays i got my laptop last sunday. i am writing this on this laptop only...

guys i am not a good writer, i have never written any review before. i am busy these days so first i will write a quick intro and elaborate this post later. I just wanted to post this becoz so many ppl are confused about this laptop and like me they have not seen anybody using zenith laptops.

I was buying the laptop with C2DP8400 2.2Ghz processor but that was 44k, in 40k i got T5800 @2Ghz. (will update about the FSB of this later). Why?? becoz i read somewhere that 4k is too much for 200Mhz increase and i am always near to power socket so i dont need much battery life.

here is the config.

C2D T5800 @2Ghz (800mhz FSB(not sure about this, may be 1066mhz))
4Gb ram
320Gb hdd sata 5400rpm
15.4 1280x800 screen
and rest everything u expect

although it has 4Gb ram but 32bit windows only shows 3gb ram, i google it and found out that this is the case with 32bit, the total addresable is 4gb but windows assigns some parts of its address lines to address other things..(google it for more info). the customer care says that if u install 64bit OS than only u get 4gb ram

Looks:
I like the looks, not as good as dell or hp, but definitely better than lenovos i hv seen. I have the pure black color with small white circles here and there.


Build quality:
the keyboard is ok. the keys responds well and have nice feedback.
screen is good and gives just about the right brightness
the laptop is heavy but the body do not look tough.
the dvd writer tray plastic is very very poor quality.

Bad points:

one really annoying thing is that they hv put mouse tracker not in the center but slightly towards left. every now and then my thumb or palm touches it while typing and the cursor goes here and there. i need to always keep my left hand a little up on the palm rest.


the speaker have very low sound output. but the sound quality is ok.

there are no shortcut buttons on the panel, i dont know why? there is lot of empty space on top. all the shortcuts are merged in function keys, so u hv to use "Fn" + function keys to use simple thing like mute.

the carry bag can only carry this laptop, no extra pockets.. ok they do hv some but really of no use. forget about the looks. but build quality is very good.

More bad points:
..coming soon, (only used this lappy for two days, plz tell me what more u want tested)


Good points:
ok so lets see why i like this lappy..

Games:
for now i only played GTA4,, call of duty 5, nfs carbon... no problems at all... at 1200x800 res all was blown away... gosh... i luv my laptop..

the system is very fast... windows xp runs like win98. will test Fedora 10 and vista soon.

all my prgramming softwares like visual studio 2008, eclipse, ran like anything.

More Good points..
..see "more bad points"..

guys i am very sorry i could not give a good review.. i will edit this post this weekend. plz tell me what to write.

final verdict;-
i strongly recommed this laptop.
just a word of caution.. be prepared to be the victim of remarks from your surroundings like these:
"what ?? tune zenith kyo liya?'
"abe hcl le leta"?
"zenith is chepo.. no quality".

but remember, those ppl really dont know that u have 9600GS inside. and they never will want to know.
 
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abhisheksohal

Red till Death..
A big thanks for the review man...and congrats on your purchase! I would have got the laptop last week too..but I was gettin the one with T6400(2 ghz,800 mhz fsb, 2mb cache) processor..but I didnt' want that...that one i was getting for 38k all inclusive!! But I have booked the one with P8400 processor now..and hope to get it in 3-4 days..but can't say..it can get delayed more.. :-(
And also try to post some pics of the laptop from every angle and also please use cpu-z and gpu-z to find out temps. at which it runs idle and during gaming etc.
Also can you feel the heat while playing?!? Is it too much to bare?!? And post the exact settings for the games you have played..like low,med etc. and resolution...also post the vista experience scores..
I think I still can change my choice of processor but only till tomorrow...what do u people say...should i change it to T6400 coz i can get it right away??...and I cant w8 now coz i've already waited for weeks now! :-x
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And try all the latest or heavy games that u can...like farcry2, crysis,Prince of Persia, Fallout 3 etc. etc. and post your settings for smooth play :D
 
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tarey_g

Hanging, since 2004..
Detailed games benchmark will be good , like fps and stuff at different resolution and settings (high/med/low).
 

desiibond

Bond, Desi Bond!
1) xp startup and shutdown times
2) Battery times (switch off AC power, play a movie and see how much time battery lasts)
3) 3DMark score
4) install Fraps and find our fps for games that you play
5) Some video and audio encoding tests (jetaudio can be helpful here)
6) sisoft sandra benchmarks on HDD and memory
 

abhisheksohal

Red till Death..
Arre yaar tell me should i go for T6400 or P8400 processor?? How big is the difference in performance?!?! Coz i can get T6400 tomorrow itself...but for P8400 i dunno how long i may have to wait...i've got just tomorrow to inform the guy im buying from..so please help me out ASAP! thanks...
 

abhisheksohal

Red till Death..
@desiibond
T6400 aint faster man!! Its 2 ghz,2mb cache,800 mhz fsb ...while P8400 is 2.26 ghz,3mb cache,1066 Mhz fsb!! Anyways...i'll keep with P8400...but lets see how soon i get the laptop...will post my review too once i get it..
 
Congratulations.

BTW, In Bangalore, Acer Aspire 4530 with nVidia 9100GS GPU, AMD Turion X2 1.9GHz got a price drop to 25K plus 4% vat. :D

But am still waiting for COMED-K exam on May 17th to be done with so that I can peacefully buy a laptop. Before that I need to deal with AISSCE-Mathematics, AISSCE-English(Core), IIT-JEE, AIEEE, VITEEE, ENAT, Amrita Entrance and Karnataka-CET examinations to pass. :cry:
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Congratulations.

BTW, In Bangalore, Acer Aspire 4530 with nVidia 9100GS GPU, AMD Turion X2 1.9GHz got a price drop to 25K plus 4% vat. :D

But am still waiting for COMED-K exam on May 17th to be done with so that I can peacefully buy a laptop. Before that I need to deal with AISSCE-Mathematics, AISSCE-English(Core), IIT-JEE, AIEEE, VITEEE, ENAT, Amrita Entrance and Karnataka-CET examinations to pass. :cry:
 
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threeonethree

Journeyman
I would really appreciate if you could run a linux distro live cd on it like ubuntu , mint , fedora , sabayon and tell us if everything works out of the box.
 

izzikio_rage

Technomancer
congratulations dude......waiting eagerly for some benchmarks et all..(3d mark, and fps for some of the newer games like crysis and fear 2) ......
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hey dude .....am also from jaipur .....how is the zenith service there? I went to the whiteline computers shop that is the service center of zenith ....didn't come out too impressed.......the laptop is amazing and the only question is the after sales support....
 

izzikio_rage

Technomancer
hey dude .....am also from jaipur .....how is the zenith service there? I went to the whiteline computers shop that is the service center of zenith ....didn't come out too impressed.......the laptop is amazing and the only question is the after sales support....
 

praviinhans

Right off the assembly line
DEAR NISHANT,

Nice review brother !!
But in ur review u have not mentioned anything about Graphing card ! I guess this lappy has got 512 MB Nvedia Graphic Card....Right???
Anyways plz do let me know from where did u purchase this laptop from Jaipur....if possible plz give me the dealer's contact no. As im from Ajmer and planning to buy Zenith Lappy from jaipur itself.
 

izzikio_rage

Technomancer
it has a Nvidia 9600 gfx card .......one of the best available in india......waiting for the review ....someone ping nishant
 

Silicon Chip

Broken In
Bullshit 9600M GS is nt the best available in India, it is equal to 9500GT Desktop which is a ton slower than my HD 4870.

The laptop has:
¤Poor Build Quality
¤Excessive heat
¤No Safety Features for HDD like shock absorbers
¤Low Res

I am dead sure he is playing GTA IV or Crysis at ultra low settings.
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Posted again:
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Bullshit 9600M GS is nt the best available in India, it is equal to 9500GT Desktop which is a ton slower than my HD 4870.

The laptop has:
¤Poor Build Quality
¤Excessive heat
¤No Safety Features for HDD like shock absorbers
¤Low Res

I am dead sure he is playing GTA IV or Crysis at ultra low settings.

Better go for MSI GT627 for 55k.
It has 9800M GS 1GB DDR3
 
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abhisheksohal

Red till Death..
Bullshit 9600M GS is nt the best available in India, it is equal to 9500GT Desktop which is a ton slower than my HD 4870.

The laptop has:
¤Poor Build Quality
¤Excessive heat
¤No Safety Features for HDD like shock absorbers
¤Low Res

I am dead sure he is playing GTA IV or Crysis at ultra low settings.
Better go for MSI GT627 for 55k.
It has 9800M GS 1GB DDR3

HAHAHA!! :lol: In 40k you expect a company to provide you features like HDD shock absorbers! High resolution screen!! Woah!! :shock: And people don't have big budgets like u have!! OK!?!? And that MSI GT627 laptop ain't available in India for 55k!! U're just converting the price from some international site into INR! :lol: Its for around 93k in india!! :razz: We're taking about a budget gaming laptop here so better not barge in with suggestions about higher expensive laptops from other companies..every1 knows bout em..
And how the heck are u asserting that crysis and gta 4 can be played only at ultra low on this laptop! :lol: I know other people online too who have this laptop and its certainly not ultra low that they are playing gta 4 and crysis on... and i advice u to check this link...just see here that this asus laptop has the exact same config. as this laptop( just 1gb of vram compared to 512 mb on zenith, but that doesnt make a big diff.) Just check the customer reviews(80 of them!) *www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220340
and many have said that crysis is running easily and smoothly on med-high settings! 8)
 

Silicon Chip

Broken In
MSI GT627 is available via order in Advance in India and is very much under 60k.

And in 93k you can buy
MSI GT725
HD 4850
P8400
Full HD LCD
is for 85k and this is indian price and no conversion.
You got to keep yourself updated.

If 9800M GS is 9600GT OC then for your knowlege the GTX 280M the fastest laptop card is just a 9800 GTX+.
 
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