> How does the screen look?

It's a pretty normal 12" screen. Mine has two bad pixels. I don't know what its refresh time is, but it must be reasonably fast, because I've played games and watched movies on it, and it's plenty responsive.

I was worried about going from a 15" 1400x1050 screen on my old laptop to a 12" 1024x768 screen, but it wasn't really a problem.

> Is it bright enough and equally bright?

The brightness can be set from the keyboard. I find that it's quite usable in most settings, though in direct sunlight it's hard to see. My solution: get out of the direct sunlight. :) I haven't noticed any hotspots in the backlighting, which is impressive given how thin the screen is.

> How's the keyboard and trackpad?

The keyboard is big enough and deep enough for me. My main complaint about it is that PageUp, PageDown, Home, and End are shifted keys. The trackpad is a standard Synaptics, except that the buttons are brushed metal, and it's mounted flush with the rest of the palm-rest area. It's very pretty and no more or less functional than any other trackpad I've used. I did go out and buy a $30 USB trackball just because I don't really like trackpads in general.

> How about the build quality?

Quite good. I moved to my M5200N from a Dell Inspiron 8100. The Dell felt flimsy and the screen wobbled. The Asus M5 feels quite solid.

A couple of other pros and cons...

Update, Jan 2006: the noisy fan and suspend-to-RAM problems have been solved!

The sleek black lid is just dyed or painted. Be careful not to scratch it. The laptop bag that comes with the M5 has a zipper-pull in a bad place that actually scratched a spot of paint off within about a week, so be sure to put the laptop in a pocket where it's not up against the zipper pull. (If you buy one, you'll see what I mean about the bag. It's not a big problem, just be careful.)

The RAM upgrade slot is a micro-SODIMM, not a standard SODIMM. So upgrades are harder to find. I have just the default 256MB in mine right now, nothing in the upgrade slot. An extra 512MB should cost about $100.

The battery life really is 2.5 hours if you dim the screen and slow the CPU, but if you start playing movies (from hard disk, not DVD) you're lucky to get 1.5 hours. The optional 72-WHr battery runs for 6 to 7 hours.

The battery charges surprisingly fast. It's at least 1% per minute with the machine on and faster with it off.

The most similar laptop I've used that you might be able to see in person is a Dell Inspiron 300m. They're both ~3lb, ~1" thick Centrinos. The Asus is 0.4lb heavier because it has the built-in CDRW.

> Overall, do you think you made a good choice with this laptop?

I do. I would absolutely buy it again. It's better supported under Linux than most other laptops, it's fast, it's light, it's pretty, and it doesn't have any glaring flaws. And it costs hundreds $US less than a similar Dell, IBM, Sony, Fujitsu, etc. I'd be happier if the fan were a little quieter and there were PageUp and PageDown keys.

The other laptop I considered, FYI, is an Averatec. They're a bit heavier, based on the Athlon Mobile XP, and a bit cheaper than the Asus. But the lack of hard drive upgradeability (they come with 30 or 40 GB only, and it voids the warranty if you upgrade) was a deal-breaker.

I bought my Asus through jncs.com. They had a decent price and excellent service, and they got it to me in under four business days. In Canada, ETC Computer may be a better bet. Their prices are about the same.

Here is a helpful review with a bunch of good pictures: http://www.digit-life.com/articles2/asus-m5n/