Asus is pulling out all the stops with its new line of consumer laptops. The company has gone from creating good laptops at affordable prices to manufacturing cutting edge models at extremely competitive prices. Proof of its latest strategy can be seen on one of its most recent launches; the Asus X555DA-WS11.
This new laptop comes with 8 GB of RAM a powerful quad core processor as well as a slick for factor that affords it a comfortable weight of just 4.48 pounds. However, as you know, these are just the bullet points so if you wanna dig deeper go ahead and read our Asus X555DA-WS11 full review just after the break.
The Pros: AMD A10-8700P CPU (i5-6200u equivalent), 8GB of RAM, 1 TB of storage, DVD reader, cheap price.
The Cons: 2 cell battery.
Find out what customers have to say about this laptop here!
Asus X555DA-WS11 Reviewing the Pros, Cons and Everything in between
A modest design that hides a powerhouse laptop
On the surface, the Asus X555DA-WS11 doesn't really scream "powerhouse laptop". On the contrary, it lays low with a discrete design that goes hand in hand with what the company has been letting on in the mid range consumer market.
The screen in place has a 15.6 inch diagonal with an HD resolution and an LED-backlit display. There's no anti-glare technology or anything really new worth noting about the display, it's pretty much your run of the mill display.
The chic-let style keyboard doesn't come with a backlit function but it does include a numeric pad and a very comfortable palm rest, ideal for those of us who spend several hours typing away. We took note of the laptop's weight on our intro where we mentioned it's just 4.48 pounds. Couple that with a 1 inch thickness and you got yourself a pretty portable machine.
Inside the Asus X555DA-WS11 in review we can observe a pretty powerful AMD A10-8700P chipset. This is a processor that features four cores, can work at a base speed of 1.8 GHz and go up to 3.2 GHz when we press it for more demanding tasks. It only has 2 MB of cache but when considering the amount of cores in place that's fine.
If, like a lot of us, you come from an Intel based machine, we'll tell you that in terms of performance the A10-8700P would be closely tied with a last generation Core i5-6200U processor. What this means in christian terms is that we're looking at a processor that's up for any challenge. Doesn't matter if you're looking for a laptop to compile and run a new app or you just want to edit you favorite pics and videos, this processor won't let you down on any of those fronts.
By no means are we saying this is the best processor in town but for a consumer laptop it's in the solid mid to high-range.
Asus wasn't cheap when it came time to assigning system memory to the Asus X555DA-WS11 as we've got 8 GB of DDR3L SDRAM. The good news here is that 8 GB on Windows 10 is more than enough for complex multitasking and running several apps at a time, the bad news is that RAM is not upgradable, 8 GB is as far as it will go though honestly it's hard to see the need for more RAM unless you're intending to use this laptop to run literally dozens of programs at the same time.
Asus X555DA-WS11 and Gaming: the true story
Gaming is not what this laptop was designed to do and we can see that clearly by Asus's choice of graphics chip. Specifically we've got an AMD Radeon R6 GPU. Sure, some modest gaming can apply with games of the 2013 circuit but even at that if the games are graphically intensive we would hardly recommend going down that route. No, this is not a gaming laptop.
Undisclosed battery life and standard storage
There's not much information in regards to battery life. As far as we know, we've got a two cell battery which, according to the set of specs listed on the official spec-sheet should provide a minimum of 3 hours of battery life. That said, as there's no confirmation we wouldn't venture to say that battery life goes way beyond that.
Storage is no surprise, the X555DA-WS11 comes with a 1 TB hard drive that works at a speed of 5400 rpm. Quite honestly, this is the standard storage you'll find on 99% of the laptops in this price bracket. We would've really liked to see a 256 GB SSD but sincerely, at this price, that would be as unlikely as you using a unicorn to commute to work.
What about ports?
There's not much to say in regards to the ports. We've got 2 USB 3.0 ports, 1 USB 2.0 port, ethernet port, card reader, VGA out, HDMI, Bluetooth, WiFi b/g/n and an audio combo. There's also a DVD tray as well as a 0.3 megapixels webcam (they really could've gone the extra mile and gone with an HD webcam) which is the standard.
Finishing statements? What do we think? Is it worth it?
It might sound as if this review of the Asus X555DA-WS11 has taken a turn after we spoke of the key internal components. However, the truth is that while storage, battery life, ports and graphics aren't game-changers they are well within what we've come to expect in this price range.
That said, the processor in play is very good and RAM is more than most manufacturers would even consider giving up at this price. At the end of the day that's what really counts because that's what's going to determine the performance of the Asus X555DA-WS11. Sure, a few extra shiny elements would've been nice but that would mean paying a premium price for features that at the end of the day might not make that much of a difference.
The only thing I would improve upon would be battery life but that's personal. For someone who's looking for a desktop replacement to move once in awhile a 2 cell battery won't really matter. On the other hand, the user who needs a laptop to last a whole day without a power plug in sight should probably look elsewhere.
When all's said and done, we believe this to be one of the most competitive models in the market (pricing here) and an excellent choice for both power users and "average users" who want a more "future-proof" device.