ASUS W5FE Intel Sideshow

One good thing that as reviewers, we have come to look forward to whenever we review an Asus laptop is the care and attention paid to the construction and design. The W5FE is no different in this respect. The body itself is made of a lightweight magnesium alloy body, which makes carrying and using this ultra-portable easy and comfortable to use. In keeping with the magnesium alloy body, the laptop is covered with a dark-grey/black color tone, which while not being as attractive as the finish of an HP laptop looks elegant enough to use even in an executive boardroom without getting funny glances.

The lid of the W5FE is where things get interesting. The top of the lid holds a 2.8 inch LCD screen, with a variety of buttons. While the middle section functions as a D-PAD, there are 3 separate buttons, of which 2 function as “menu” and “back” buttons while the 3rd one is a slider for powering on the screen. Now it was here that we noticed a funny thing. The area just underneath the LCD was a bit thick and a bit ungainly. On further investigation, we found that there is a 1 GB NAND flash drive present on the lid of the laptop which works in conjunction with the external screen. This is a good thing, as it makes the whole side screen concept self contained and less dependent on system memory or caching it via the HDD. The screen itself is well designed and consumes very little power as it does not have a rather bright display and is capable of displaying around 10 lines of text. To activate it, one simply switches on the provided power button and we are all set to go.

The content of the Windows Sideshow is controlled by a series of little applications called gadgets. These are similar in purpose to widgets or gadgets, which are now part and parcel of the Windows Vista desktop. The sideshow gadgets are controlled by a tab in control panel. By default, only 2 gadgets are installed i.e. Outlook and Windows Media Player. Further gadgets can be obtained online. The display icons of the sideshow, for an external interface are surprisingly well designed and look quite smart. They are snappy and scroll in a similar way to the media center application.