Asus launches its U36 laptop in the UK

TAIWANESE HARDWARE MAKER Asus has launched its U36 laptop in the UK, which is only 19mm thin to rival laptops from Apple and Samsung.

The Asus U36 laptop is designed to be ultra-thin and powerful. It is 2mm thicker than the fruit themed firm's Macbook Air and a bit heavier too at 1.44Kg. However, it is only around half the price at £699.

Asus said, "The U36 has broken the mould in design innovation by unleashing the superior performance of a standard voltage Intel Core i5 processor from within a delightfully sleek 19mm chassis."

The Samsung Series 9, which we recently reviewed, also has an Intel Core i5 processor and is a little thinner at 16.3mm. It is also slightly lighter than the Asus U36 at 1.31Kg but similar in cost to the pricey Macbook Air.

The U36 comes with a 13.3in TFT display with 1366x768 resolution. There is an Nvidia graphics card with Optimus technology and 4GB of DDR3 RAM.

Asus touts a long battery life of 11.5 hours because of its Super Hybrid Engine technology, which "intelligently manages energy consumption".

The laptop ships with a 500GB SATA hard drive, a USB 3.0 port and a 0.3MP webcam. There are also two USB 2.0 ports, an HDMI output, a VGA connector and a 5-in-1 card reader.

The Asus U36 laptop comes with Windows 7 Professional 64-bit edition and Asus said it is available in-store and online now. µ