asus zenbookux305fa

Somewhere between the ever-growing Chromebook market to the new one-port MacBook, a new ultra-portable machine from Asus has arisen so you can bring Windows with you anywhere.

With a 1920×1080 13.3-inch display, 8GB RAM, a 256GB solid-state drive and three 3.0 USB ports standard, you’d expect the Zenbook UX305FA to be priced in-line with other ultrabooks. But at $700, it’s $200 less than a MacBook Air that has just 4GB RAM, 128GB storage and a non-Retina 1366×768 11.6-inch display.

It’s also one of the cheapest laptops to use the Intel Core M processor, notably found on the new MacBook and the Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro. The chip allows for fanless construction, cutting down size and noise, but is also a little underpowered in this unit at just 800MHz. Another con is the keyboard, which doesn’t have much key travel and isn’t backlit.

asus ux305fa keyboard

Design-wise, the 12.3mm-thick UX305FA is svelte, with a silvery metallic top lid and a spacious trackpad. The screen top does prop up the back of the laptop when opened, ostensibly to increase airflow, but it also makes the whole thing slide around on slick surfaces.

No, it’s not a gaming machine, and it might struggle when streaming HD movies, but it won’t choke when editing huge spreadsheets or opening a ton of browser tabs for your next research project. You can get the Zenbook UX305FA running Windows 8.1 now.

Note: This post has been updated to reflect that our recommended model does not have a touchscreen. (A higher-end version does, but might not be worth the extra cost.)

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