Asus Q500A-BHI7T05

Asus Q500A-BHI7T05

A price of $950 is more than the average laptop shopper wants to pay, but the Asus Q500A-BHI7T05 which costs that much delivers more than the average notebook does. The 15.6-incher supports multi-touch input and has the full HD screen resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels, both considered premium features. Under the hood, the Q500A-BHI7T05 is also a premium machine. Its built upon the quad-core 3rd Generation Intel i7-3632QM processor and includes more than sufficient 8GB of RAM memory and a generous 750GB hard drive. Unfortunately for gamers, the notebook doesn’t have a dedicated video card for 3D games like first person shooters or racing titles. It sports the Intel HD 4000 integrated GPU, which is a solution oriented toward 2D graphics.

However, the CPU is pretty much potent, registering 7,259 PassMark points. With that score, it beats the 3rd Gen i5-3210M by a wide margin, not to mention AMD’s mobile-class processors. The chip is clearly among the best choices if you do video editing or professional photo editing or you convert lots of video and audio files from one format to another, for instance.

Intel Core i7-3632QM PassMark Benchmark

On the exterior side, the Asus is a stylish and sleek, with a chassis that appears to be made of brushed aluminum and with thickness of 1.3 inches at the thickest point. Other good stuff worth mentioning are its white chiclet keyboard with backlight, for effortless typing in dim environments, and Intel Wi-Di technology for wireless media streaming to external displays.

Overall, the Q500A-BHI7T05 is a true powerhouse with luxurious looks and convenience of touchscreen input, enabling you to run programs, do your work, and even create digital art with your fingers.

Q500A-BHI7T05 left

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Asus Q500A-BHI7T05 Specifications

  • Display: 15.6″ LED-backlit HD widescreen multitouch display (1920 x 1080 resolution)
  • Processor: 3rd Gen Intel Core i7-3632QM, 6MB L3 cache, 2.2GHz CPU speed, 3.2GHz max Turbo Frequency
  • Graphics: Intel HD 4000 integrated graphics
  • Memory: 8GB DDR3 system memory
  • Storage: 750GB HDD (5400 rpm)
  • Optical drive: DVD burner
  • Webcam: 1.0MP webcam
  • Audio: stereo speakers
  • Network: Wireless-N, Gigabit Ethernet LAN, no Bluetooth
  • Input: Backlit Keyboard with wide 16:9 touchpad
  • Ports and Slots: 2 x USB 3.0 ports, 1 x USB 2.0 port, 1 x HDMI, 1 x VGA, digital media card reader
  • Battery: 6-cell battery
  • Dimensions: 1.3 x 14.9 x 10 inches
  • Weight: 5.7 pounds
  • OS: Windows 8
  • Warranty: 1-year

25 thoughts on “Asus Q500A-BHI7T05”

  1. I have owned this laptop for nearly a year now. I think a lot of people are getting this laptop confused. Here are the misconceptions.

    It does have Bluetooth built in.

    It does have and HDMI port.

    The battery life was fine. Mine lasted upwards of 2 hours up to 4 dependimg on usage.

    Yes, it is a tad heavy, but that is what you expect from such a well built laptop, that also happens to be a bit large.

    I hope this helps people.

    Reply
    • I also have this laptop, and as far as I can tell, it does not have Bluetooth. If I am overlooking something, please tell me how to get to the Bluetooth function, because I love this machine but am just about ready to give it up because of the lack of Bluetooth.

      Reply
  2. EASY SOLUTION FOR TOUCH SCREEN FAILURES!

    I love this laptop for all the reasons so many other reviewers have indicated, such as its considerable power and its incredibly beautiful, resolute screen. Thankfully, my unit seems to have mostly escaped the issue where the upper left corner of the screen comes unglued (knock wood!) – I’ve got a very minimal protrusion there, but it doesn’t seem to be worsening over time so far, and it’s a minor enough issue that I’d probably just glue it if it got worse. Unfortunately, I was plagued by the maddening “touch screen stops working when the lid is closed and doesn’t work until next cold-boot” issue, and after some time, the touch screen stopped working entirely, save for occasional very erratic points where it would spring back to life. I thought for sure it was a hardware problem and was tearing my hair out wondering whether to get another one or just jump ship to another model, which would have been a terrible shame as I absolutely love this machine. But I’m a stubborn SOB, and had a feeling there might be something more going on than meets the eye. After way too many hours spent trying everything imaginable, I finally stumbled upon the solutions to both forms of touch screen failure – the failure upon closing the lid and more semi-permanent failure – are both caused by simple, stupid bugs arising from the particular combination of Asus’ touch screen interface design and Windows’ USB power management algorithms. If your touch screen is going out when you close the lid, you probably have set the computer’s power settings so that it “does nothing” upon closing the lid. Changing this setting to “sleep” – after first restoring touch functionality, of course – fixed the problem instantly and permanently for me, though this will probably only work if you first go into the Windows Device Manager and find the touch screen device – it’s a “USB Input Device” under the “Human Interface Devices” heading – right click and go to “Properties”, go to the “Power Management” tab, and uncheck “Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power”. The more permanent-seeming touch screen failure was instantly resolved by disabling the “USB Selective Suspend” feature in the power settings and cold-booting. So if you’re having touch screen problems, chances are excellent that your touch screen is actually fine, and all you need to do is change all the settings as I’ve indicated here, cold-booting first if necessary to bring the touch screen back to life before you start. Hope this helps someone!

    Reply
  3. And the display issues seem to be software related in most cases and many issues are just ppl not knowing how to operate win 8…I was lost at first and considered returning it but for the price nothing comes close imo…wish I could add discrete graphics and it would be top of the line

    Reply
  4. The laptop does have Bluetooth ..and this thing hasn’t been available for 5 month as some have indicated …I think ppl may be confusing this model for other q500s

    Reply
  5. Like others, my ASUS Q500A touch screen has failed on two different computers and only during periods of time when the lid is closed and then re-opened. There is no single common factor that I can find. I have written to ASUS but no response so far. When filling out the form, the touch screen started working. When I closed the lid and came back about 30 minutes later, no touch screen. It is frustrating but why is this happening to two different computers. Could it be software instead of hardware?

    Reply
    • I bought the Q500A at Best Buy exactly one week ago and I’m on my third one already. The first had bad USB ports on the left side, the second had a broken ‘r’ key and the touch screen stopped working. As I sat down to write this, the touch screen on the brand new one I got yesterday stopped responding. I’m going to take it back and go with a different model. I really tried to give this a chance because I love the specs on this machine and the display is amazing, but this is ridiculous. I’m just glad it failed now so I can return it with no problems.

      Reply
      • Any news? I’m on my second q500a and have same problems with the touch screen dying randomly. Mine only comes back if I do a system restore.

        Reply
        • do a system restore. this will clear out all programs you have downloaded and take you back to factory but saves all of your files. IE will save a list of all deleted programs. once back running go to device manager and find usb input devices. the touchscreen is connected by usb so disable turn off device when lid is closed. this should clear up any programs. also set power options to sleep when lid is closed. i know personally i like mine to do nothing when closed but it beats a system restore every couple of weeks because i forget

          Reply
        • the usb input device is uner human interface devices. to get to device manager right click on computer and choose manage. last option under system tools

          Reply
  6. Can an owner of this laptop tell me which wireless card or chipset it uses? There is at least one Intel Centrino Wireless-N 2230 model wifi card that does not support the 5GHz band and I’m wondering if the ASUS Q500A uses it. There evidently is some wireless IEEE interoperability requirement with laptops that have the wireless display option (WIDI) functionality (which uses the 2.4GHz band) that they can’t simultaneously use the 5GHz band to connect to WiFi because only devices certified as Access Points are allowed to do so. (http://www.intel.com/support/wireless/wlan/sb/CS-031809.htm).

    To check what wifi card you can open up a Command Prompt and type: “netsh wlan show interfaces” which will list out the details of your Wireless network connection including the name of the wifi card in the description.

    Reply
  7. Its pretty common for laptops to weigh between 5 and 6 pounds, don’t see why people complain about that so much in a full size laptop. If your looking for lightweight go zenbook or ultrabook for the light weight and portability as well as longer battery life. This computer DOES have an HDMI out to hook up an external monitor or television. I work at a retail store and sell this laptop on a weekly basis and have had multiple customers come back and tell me how great a machine it is. As far as 802.11n, it is compatible with b/g, my store uses wireless g through out the store and this computer is hooked up to our network just fine. ASUS is a great company and make an exceptional product. People will have defaults from the factory sometimes and that’s just part of buying a piece of technology from any company rather it’s ASUS, HP, Samsung, Toshiba, Dell or any other company. I’ve seen multiples in all of them come back, ASUS being the least. I have a side business building extreme gaming rigs and use just about any ASUS components I can and have never had a customer call with a failed product. Do realize this is technology and you’ll never find anything 100% perfect. Even purchasing a top end Macbook isn’t 100% reliable.
    End thoughts and opinion is this Q500 is a great machine set aside one thing. The lack of a dedicated graphics card, slap a GTX 650 or 660 in this thing and we have a great all around long lasting laptop computer.

    Reply
    • I build a computer with asus motherboard, the system was crashing all the time. When I read reviews about the motherboard I had to return it because of random crash problems.. also the graphic card slot was so close the the other cards so it touch other cards, bad design.. so ASUS is not top of the line hardware..

      Reply
  8. I bought this laptop a month ago from online. The lower half of the touch screen was not responsive to touch. I thought it would be simple to get an exchange from ASUS because the 1 year warranty was valid for another 7 more months.

    It was a nightmare, trying to get support from ASUS. Most of time the phone wouldn’t go through and when contacted via email, I never got a reply from them.

    So I had to sell it online as ‘parts or repair’ for 300 dollars less than what I paid for.

    I will stay away from ASUS.

    Reply
  9. I don’t know what the comments are talking about maybe an older model of the q500a. But this model DOES have hdmi. Look at the pictures above on left side. It does have Bluetooth 4.0. The machine is on my lap as I type this. I believe you are correct about only having wireless n. I didn’t realize when purchased but not an issue for me at this point. I haven’t had it long enough to test battery life but I’m sure it isn’t the greatest. So far I’m happy with the machine, will put it to the test over the next week and decide if I will keep for sure.

    Reply
  10. This laptop is good for only those people who look for speed and nothing else. But as you use it you will want more, not just the speed.

    I had to buy a new Wireless Router for this laptop because this laptop doesn’t work with wifi 802.11 a/b/g. which are common in most households. This works only on 802.11 n. The router costs atleast 120 bucks.

    No bluetooth – you have to buy your own bluetooth dongle and stick it in one of the USB ports all the time.

    Battery lasts only 1 and half hours.

    And also very heavy.

    I returned it and bought Samsung.

    Reply
    • wow why would the router not connect to most wifi routers out there..? When I travel I use a TP link external router because it picks up a stronger signal so I connect faster and it only cost me $35

      Reply
    • battery lasts aleast 2 and a half doing anything, its fairly light for 15.6 inch size, and it connects to all routers.. and has Bluetooth so your wrong on all aspects..

      Reply
    • Hi Sean,

      I can tell you that, after reading these posts, I went back into my laptop to find out if indeed there is built-in Bluetooth. And guess what; there is! I have been using a bluetooth dongle with Blue Soleil drivers for a couple of years now. Today I removed the dongle but turned on the Blue Soleil application, and it found the built-in Bluetooth device. My guess is that ASUS did not install proper drivers to run the device. My recommendation is to purchase the Blue Soleil drivers. Working great for me without the dongle! I know this is a very late post and you may have figured this out already, but for those who still don’t know, now you know.

      Reply
  11. I will just give a short description :

    – No Bluetooth

    – Very poor Battery

    – There s no HDMI port. You can’t connect second monitor if that monitor doesn’t have VGA connector. Today’s monitors come with HDMI input.

    -The other thing that i didnt like was its weight. Too Heavy to carry around.

    – And i also realized that the Bus speed wasnt 1600 MHz, it was 1333.

    So it lacks most of the common features that home users would seek in a laptop.

    Reply
    • I think you’re thinking of a different laptop. This one has HDMI, Bluetooth and tons of features even today’s laptops have.

      Reply
    • everything you described about his laptop is wrong and if its to heavy it is a 15.6 inch I think its light for that size if you want light go for a 13.3 inch..

      Reply
  12. I bought this laptop a few months ago. Liked everything else except one thing. It doesnt have Bluetooth capability. These days most laptops come with Bluetooth 4.0, and you can do whole bunch of things with your smart phone if you own one of those Android smart phones. You can answer calls from your laptop connected via Bluetooth to your Android Smart phone, you can remote control your smart phone etc etc. But this laptop doesnt have Bluetooth.
    The other thing that i didnt like was its weight. Too Heavy to carry around.
    And i also realized that the Bus speed wasnt 1600 MHz, it was 1333.

    Reply

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