Asus eee

[ryanhellyer]

Hi,
Have any of you tried one of these?
ASUS | Eee PC


I bought one the other day, it comes with 1024x600 res. 8.9" screen, 12 GB disk space and Windows XP Preinstalled.

I love it. It's no powerhouse of computing might, but the itty bitty machine is incredibly portable and great for dragging around the house.

I'm travelling on a 50+ hour trip to Israel in about six weeks, so my little baby PC will be an awesome travelling companion Hopefully I can find a handy power socket in the airports I'm stopping in though as the battery life is only for 2-3 hours

[Willemina]

I have a friend with one of those. They look too small and I don't like the keyboard.

I didn't realise they has such high res. screens though, I thought my friends one was about 640x400 or something and I think it had a smaller hard drive, maybe 4gb?.

[ryanhellyer]

The new 900 version comes with all the extra features, higher resolution screen, larger disks etc.

And there are new versions coming out shortly too ... the Asus 1000 and 901 version.

The 1000 models feature a larger screen with corresponding larger keyboard. The killer bonuses though are in the use of the new Intel Atom processor, not only is the speed increased to a point where you could run on Vista on it, but the energy usage has plumetted so much that you can run them for up to 8 hours without recharging the battery! This all be an awesome coup for those on long haul flights. Two batteries will be enough to keep your laptop charged for an entire flight and if you have enough time during stopovers you will be recharge them ready for any extra long trips.

They also come with much larger drives, either 40 GB flash memory or a traditional 80 GB drive.

The 901 is the same size as the current versions, but has the same energy usage advantages as the 1000 model and the 40 GB flash drives. They won't be getting the hard drive though, presumably because there isn't enough room in the box to run it.


I'm not convinced that a larger eee is a good idea though. The whole point of the original was that it is ridiculously small. My guess is that the 901 will be more popular than it's larger 1000 counterpart. I don't think I'll be upgrading though, the more I use my 900 model the more I like it. It is capable of doing ALL of my regular computer activities, including using Adobe Photoshop, some basic video editing etc. In fact I'm tending to use it more than my main machine simply because it's easier to lug around. I usually use a clunky old Dell laptop, but my new computer despite being slower is just so much more convenient to use than I end up using it more often than my regular machine.