This past week has seem me really put the ASUS K53E laptop through its paces. From 3DMark to PC Mark to boot and battery time tests, the K53E has been given no quarter and pushed to the edges of its performance.
The first test, the most obvious really, was boot time. How quickly did my K53E zoom up to full control of the desktop from the moment that I switched it on? Well it took about 110 seconds to get itself up to the ready position which isn’t great but fits with the specs.
And what are my specs? Yes, it is best that I revisit these so you can see what we are working with here. The ASUS K53E laptop is running an Intel Core i3 2.1Ghz CPU with the Intel HM65 chipset. Windows 7 Home Premium is the operating system of choice and the screen is a 15.6inch HD TFT. The graphics are provided by the Intel GMA HD, memory is 4096 MB of DDRIII with the ability to expand up to 8GB.
The ASUS K53E also has a 320GB hard drive that runs at 5400rpm and then all sorts of lovely ports, built-in speakers and DVD players. However, the tests were not that interested in those.
The next test was to see how well the ASUS K53E performed with 3DMark06. This test was designed by Futuremark to determine the performance of 3D graphic rendering and CPU workload processing capabilities and the higher the number, the better the performance.
The K53E has a built-in graphics set so wouldn’t compare to any level of high-end gaming machine but it did fare well against similar laptops. The 3DMark06 score for the ASUS K53E laptop at these specs sat at 3431 which isn’t as low as I’d expected and sat very much in the higher end of similar laptop results.
To really push the K53E I then ran World of Warcraft at its native resolution to assess the frames per second and it went in at 16. Compared to others of a similar calibre and spec ratio, the K53E performed almost exactly in the middle, with some getting around 44 and others sitting at around 12.
Personally I think that the ASUS K53E laptop has shown that does exactly what it should – delivering a basic level of performance at a superb price point.
What do you think? Would you ask for more gaming performance at this price?
Mrs Mario
Mrs.Mario is a freelance journalist who loves to write about anything and everything. She accidentally fell into the cauldron of technology about eight years ago and has been slowly simmering in there ever since. She’s a geek but still has tons to learn about the wonderful world of technology. She also suffers from a rare disease known as “need to game” that demands it’s sufferers play at least one videogame a week. So far, she’s been coping with her ailment admirably.