A well-known way to attract more customers to the same product is to release it in several versions or flavors or something. Even books may come out with two or three variants of the cover. Someone may like one particular version more than the other or people may get attracted to a differently looking product in the shop window. So there is a chance that more customers will get interested in the product.

This approach is quite widespread among PC hardware manufacturers who often introduce devices with similar specs but different exterior designs. This hasn’t been a common practice among notebooks makers, however, because the internal configuration can be varied widely enough, avoiding the need to extend the model range by means of the exterior alone.

Yet the notebook we are going to review today, the ASUS F5R, is very similar to the X51R we reviewed earlier in its specs. The two models seem to differ on the outside only: one is slimmer, the other is sleeker. The shades of gray in the coloring of the case differ, too. So is it a new model or a slightly redesigned old one? We’ll try to find it out.

The exterior design of the notebook draws upon the F3 series. Like the Asus X51R model, the F5R may come with Intel’s Celeron M (Merom core), Pentium Dual-Core and Core Duo (Yonah core) processors. The single-core Celeron isn’t far inferior to these dual-core CPUs except in multi-threaded applications which are not usually run on inexpensive notebooks. And the notebook’s ATI Radeon Xpress 1100 chipset with an integrated graphics core looks mature in comparison with the older Radeon Xpress 200M. All of this indicates that the ASUS F5R is meant for serious office work – and it’s also clear that it offers but limited gaming options. You’ll see how the notebook performs in comparison with its close relation and competitor ASUS X51R in the appropriate section of the review. Right now we’ll describe the notebook and its accessories for you.