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Asus K42J Review

Asus’ new line of laptops brings a number of the latest Core i3 and Core i5 processors. The Asus K42J is among them — a typical 14-inch laptop, running a Core i5 430M @ 2.26GHz.

The laptop feels a bit heavy and thick on the side — not something you’d prefer lugging around with. The unit has a black glossy finish (with a slight dark printed accent) from the lid right up to the palm rest (expect this to be messy with finger-prints).

The usual ports are found on both sides — 3 USB 2.0 ports, an HDMI port, VGA and LAN. The SD/MMC card reader is slightly hidden smack in the bottom front, right below the trackpad.

The full-sized keyboard comes with chiclet-type keys, spaced generously for comfortable touch-typing. Keyboard orientation seems normal with no odd placement of keys or additional special keys although would have been nice to have a bigger Enter key in here.

The trackpad is a little flushed to the left and inherits the same design and polished surface as the palm rest but is a bit recessed. The trackpad area is a bit small considering the size of the laptop and the clickers are not separated between the left and right buttons.

The 14-inch display is bright and clear, with a basic resolution of 133×768 pixels (which is usually the standard resolution of most laptops nowadays).

For a summary of the laptop’s specifications, here’s a screenshot from Speccy:

Asus K42JR A1 specs:
14.1″ display @ 1366×768 pixel
Intel Core i5 430M @ 2.26GHz (2 Cores, 4 Threads)
3GB DDR3 RAM
500GB HDD
EG Park (ATI Radeon HD5450 1GB DDR3)
WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
Bluetooth 2.0
DVD+RW
Weight: 2.2kg
Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit

The processor is a dual-core 2.26GHz Core i5 with 4 threads and can go up to 2.53GHz on Turbo Boost.

On a related note, this is the second time I’ve encountered that “EG Park” in the specs but if my additional digging is correct, it looks like an ATI Radeon HD5450 with 1GB DDR3 RAM.

The Radeon HD5450 is an entry-level graphics card for laptops that supports DirectX 11. It should be able to perform just barely enough (low to medium detail settings) at its maximum resolution of 1366×768.

Windows Experience Index gives the Core i5 430M a sub-score of 6.7 and a base score of 4.9 due to the graphics performance.

PassMark Ratings:
CPU Mark: 2630.4
2D Graphics Mark: 281.9
3D Graphics Mark: 338.0
Memory Mark: 559.2
Disk Mark: 826.8
Passmark Rating: 1019.7

The laptop comes with only a 4400mAh Li-Ion battery, which is not really that much so it’s not a surprise that the unit can only do around 2 hours of battery life on a full single charge.

The unit also comes with a pre-installed facial recognition software that works using the built-in webcam so you can login to Windows by merely posing at the camera when prompted.

We’re not sure with the actual price of this specific model (there are like over a dozen different configurations) but if my guess is right, it’s between Php39k to Php42k.

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Avatar for Abe Olandres

Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines. He is also a technology consultant, a tech columnist with several national publications, resource speaker and mentor/advisor to several start-up companies.

101 Responses

  1. Avatar for caye caye says:

    kapag nagnenet po ako uisng smart bro or wifi, may lumalabas na SSL error message using Asus K42J model.

    please help.

  2. Avatar for james (ygv) james (ygv) says:

    specs ng binili kong laptop from ASUS store:

    around march this year ko pa sha binili
    (exactly 31,000php w/o freebies but who needs it anyway?) and guess what? included na ang genuine windows 7 ultimate (x64) na accidentally pa nga dahil nasama sa package ng box ung hard copy. which is babayaran mo pa ng plus 5000php)

    asus laptop k42jc-vx167

    intel core i5-460m 2.53ghz with turbo boost up to 2.8ghz

    2gb ddr3 ram
    intel hd graphics 6

  3. Avatar for james (ygv) james (ygv) says:

    sir how did you flash ur asus k42jc laptop? its a very critical/risky job to do so pls make sure you flashed your bios properly.. you may have to use a latest winflash program.

    also if you’re having problems about the most discussed nvidia problems.. search for the lasest drivers of this “nb9x/nb10x optimus”. matagal ng rumours sa gilmore ave. ang incompatiblity ng latest drivers sa nvidia cuda 310m particularly. (at first i thought some of samsung’s working crew are just sabotaging asus products so people wont buy their laptops..) but sadly to discovered that it was really true. nagulat ako ng half of my whole files from drive c: were gone before my eyes. oo nawala while im using my desktop..

  4. Avatar for p0tp0t p0tp0t says:

    i have an asus k42jc, inupdate ko ung BIOS sa version 214, after nun naghhang na ung windows ko di na mkalogin. help pls? im using Windows 7 64 bit

  5. Avatar for reinfrooze reinfrooze says:

    im having problem with asus k42jc with windows xp 32/64bit version, i sick and tired for the nvidia video card issues coz i cant find the right driver for it, but when you used win7 32/64bit you can used the CDs that came with the laptop. how can i make the nvidia video card issues on windows xp, i want to make it work coz i need it on my job.

    can somebody help me with this. thanks.

    • Avatar for spylder spylder says:

      It is not designed for winXP.
      No problems with win7 32/64.

    • Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

      If your having problems with the Nvidia driver(even w/ windows XP), here’s what you need to do:

      1) Update your BIOS to the latest version
      2) Update your Nvidia driver(from the official nvidia website).

      If you still encounter problems, let me know.

  6. Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

    @havegara, nope. Any OS will work.

  7. Avatar for havergara havergara says:

    pre…WINDOWS 7 64BIT lng b pwede sa K42JC-VX167?

  8. Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

    search mo sa start mo ung “control deck” dun, pde ka mamili ng mga options kng anong power4gear mode ang ggmtin mo. Pde mo ring ipress ung “Fn” button + “Space Bar” pra magshift sa different power4gear options. Hope that helps.

  9. Avatar for Jaymar Jaymar says:

    San po mkikita yong power 4 gear sa laptop asus?

  10. Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

    @mandirigma: yes,obviously, “Windows 7” is the 32-bit.^^

  11. Avatar for pingoi pingoi says:

    p.s. the exact model i got was an Asus K42Jc VX-167

    solved the optimus drivers freeze issue (updated to v214 BIOS) and can install latest forceware even from nvidia site

  12. Avatar for pingoi pingoi says:

    bought my k42jc at sm marikina, i returned the first one because of a dead pixel on screen, some k42jc’s on market has different configurations, first one i got has (aside from the processor, memory, and video which is an nVidia 310M 1gb)

    320gb seagate 5400 rpm hdd (second one has a WD scorpio 320gb 5400rpm drive)

    TSSTCorp(SAMSUNG ?) DVDRW Optical drive (second one has Slimtype DVD A DS8a4S)

    weird whilst the same model, the first one only installs upto v189 geforce drivers for nvidia optimus(newer versions just freezes and have to resort into a driver rollback), while the second one can have upto v257 forceware drivers, all from the asus site

    bios versions differ 1st one has v210 and second one has v208

  13. Avatar for Mandirigma Mandirigma says:

    hindi po yan sir, dito po sa site na to:

    http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us

    ung sa pag pili ng OS,

    Select OS
    Windows7 <- 32bit ba to?
    Windows7 64bit
    Others

    Thanks

  14. Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

    Yung shortcut key eh, “Windows + Pause/Break”, dun ung System Information. Pde ring i-right click ung My Computer > Properties. Mkkita dun kng ilang bit ung OS nyo.

  15. Avatar for Mandirigma Mandirigma says:

    sir dun sa dialogue box na may mga option kung anong OS, e malamang ung windows7 (ung walang nakalagay na 64bit) ay 32bit?

    thanks :D

  16. Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

    pnta ka sa asus support site.^^

    http://support.asus.com/

  17. Avatar for Mandirigma Mandirigma says:

    salamat sir

    Mga sir, alam nio po ba kung san pwede makadownload ng mga drivers neto for 32bit? :D

  18. Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

    @mandirigma: try DBAN…here: http://dban.org. Also, here’s a guide:

    http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/dban.html

  19. Avatar for Mandirigma Mandirigma says:

    @digiknowzone: pwede ba ung wintoflash? can you please suggest one?

    sir naguguluhan kasi ako sa bios ng lappy ko e haha. Paano ko iseset ung mga priorities sa pag boot dun?

  20. Avatar for digiknowzone digiknowzone says:

    @manidirigma: gamit po kyo ng bootable usb program

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