Since its launch, Asus Eee PC has built a very strong position in the market. These netbooks that come in different configurations and colors are smaller and more attractive than traditional laptops, so people who value mobility and compactness are definitely paying attention to them. Although, they yield to full-size notebooks in processing power, they still provide enough functionality for everyday tasks. The three most prominent features of the Eee PC can be described as Easy to Work, Easy to Learn and Easy to Play.
Thanks to all of that, Forbes named Asus Eee PC the 2008’s Product of the Year, and this was not the only award that this innovative notebook has won. It was also announced as the Gadget of the Year by the Stuff Magazine, the Best Travel Gadget by NBC, Best Notebook of 2008 by Computer Shopper, and also received a G-Mark Award. Basically. Eee PCs have won most of the top awards in the segment of mobile computers, and this certainly is a great success.
Last but not the least, according to sales statistics, this famous Eee PC known as the most affordable portable computer available was among the most popular gifts for Christmas in 2008. The great functionality, features, and popularity suggests that Asus Eee PCs will rock the market in the coming 2009, too. Check out Asus’s site to choose your favorite Eee PC right now.
Asus EEE-PC and EEE-Box series
We recently picked up an EEE-Box, the Asus mini-PC that we’ll be unboxing in the next few days for a series of posts. We talked with the employees at our local store to see how it was selling at the same time and they had a few interesting things to say.
When we asked how the sales for the mini-PC were going they seemed underwhelmed. “Fine” was the answer and it didn’t seem like the things were flying off the shelves. Nothing really flies off the shelves unless it’s made by Apple these days though, so that’s to be expected. They indicated they might have low stock issues as well so we’ll see in the coming months if they can keep up with demand.
Not surprisingly, the demand for Windows based EEE PCs is high with more than 80% of orders asking for the popular Microsoft operating system. The rest are Linux PCs (it’s a little surprising that 20% asked for Linux since it’s generally only used by advanced users. Other local shops had already sold out their orders of the EEE PCs so sales seem brisk, at least in this area.
A Quick Review of ASUS Eee PC S101H
The Asus Eee PC S101H is full-featured version of the luxury Eee PC S101 notebook and, without doubt, it is a beautiful product. Without resorting to any flashy designs, it stands out as a high class product with ultra-thin design and plenty of interesting features.
Here is a small review of this mini-notebook:
Keyboard
The keyboard on Asus Eee PC S101H is quite comfortable as soon as you get a hold of it. But typing for long periods can be bit of a worry. The tiny and misplaced right shift key is somewhat a problem on this otherwise excellent 82 key keyboard.
Hard drive performance
This Pc has got a normally used notebook hard drive that runs at 4200rpm and has 160GB of space to store your stuff onto. It is a tab bit slower than Eee Pc 101 but it records a transfer speed of 19.3 megabytes per second which is a good result.
Battery
This netbook has a 31Wh-rated Lithium-polymer battery that gives the user a good amount of run time. A video run-down would last for about 2hr 24min. Comparing it to the other netbooks, this battery life is quite good.
Wireless connection
The Asus Eee Pc S101H has a 802.11n wireless connection that gives it a supreme speed and also a considerable edge over its competitors.
Screen
This particular netbook has a backlit LED display. But watching videos under the sun is not advisable as they become too difficult to see.
Conclusion
The Asus Eee PC S101H has got a beautiful design, battery life and wireless connection. But for $999 it is still a tad too expensive.
Asustek plans to launch an Android netbook
A recently announced unofficial Android netbook by Asustek has been generating a lot of buzz. While Asus is primarily famous among the Android lovers for its transformer range of tablets, Asus does have a formidable reputation in the computer world for its Eee Pc range of netbooks which basically started the whole trend of netbooks.
One of their machines has apparently developed the capability of running on Android. This is to say the least an unofficial development. It is all part of an Android x86 project that gives this open source operating system the ability to run on machines designed for desktop operating systems. The new Eee Pc netbook has been primarily designed to run Intel and MeeGo operating systems. But it is practically capable of running any x86 based operating system.
No one from either Asus or Google has so far supported this claim. But from the initial demos, the laptop seems to be running Android in a good way. Scrolling and dragging works perfect. A few user interface changes have been done. Apart from that, the screen on this one looks exceptionally good and solid.
This is possibly another chapter in the Android vs Windows battle. Android has no edge whatsoever over Windows but it does move ahead of MeeGo with a larger amount of applications at its disposal. However, Android could possibly be of significant competition with a few experts saying that battery life could increase with the use of Android.
An unofficial Android Netbook by Asustek is a good step forward.
Asus unveiled N10, an Atom-based notebook
The Asus N10 features an Intel Atom processor and despite its 10.2 inch display it’s not quite a netbook. They’re marketing it as such but it’s far more powerful and expensive than a netbook so they’re mostly lying about that. It features 2GB of DDR memory, an Nvidia GeForce 9300M GS card with 256MB of video RAM and a 160GB hard drive. It’s a computer for someone that wants portability but also wants more power. It’s great if you’re on the go and want to play games or run powerful business software that needs a better processor and memory.
The 1024×600 display is a bit limiting as far as video watching and game playing goes but that’s the sacrifice you make when you’re going with a smaller computer. The laptop has seven hours of battery life so it’s great for a cross country flight or a long conference where you don’t have a plug to charge your laptop. If you want more size they offer bigger versions of the notebook. The laptop comes with an HDMI port so you can output your display easily. The usual USB ports are included too. It’s a great little computer and if they keep innovating this line will only get better.
Asus Eee PC 901
Atom-powered Asus Eee PC 901 netbook is expected to go on sale on July 4-th across the North America and we’re going to make a quick overview of this ultra-compact notebook. This model is a successor of the previous Eee PC 701 netbook which became a best seller in the low-cost ultra-portables niche (despite the fact that its selling price was higher than it was announced at the pre-launch). The brand new PC 901 model not only sports a more sophisticated 1.6 GHz Intel Atom N270 processor, but also includes Bluetooth, a capacitive 6-cell 6600mAh battery, 802.11n Intel Wireless Link 4965 Wi-Fi and a 12GB solid state drive. It also has a bigger 8.9-inch display that has 1024 x 600 resolution, its webcam is 1.3 Megapixels, and there are 3 USB 2.0 ports, a card reader and a VGA port for an external monitor.
Users are certainly going to appreciate the fact that the keys of the new Eee 901 are somewhat bigger than on the previous model, although it can still take time to get used to typing on a smaller keyboard. The Asus Eee PC 901 has basically everything that one might require from a portable netbook, it has the connectivity that will suffice you in 95% of the cases, the lightweight and fast SSD drive and easy panel access to all upgradable hardware (be it a hard disk, RAM or a wi-fi card). All in all, this makes the new Asus’ netbook a must-have gadget for mobile users. Let’s cross the fingers though that the price is not too high when the Eee 901 appears in shops.
ASUS unveiled a laptop with a mini-projector
At Computex 2008 Asus has unveiled a prototype of a new laptop with an integrated mini-projector which is certainly going to be good news for movie lovers or businessmen who travel a lot and need to show presentations before small groups of people.
The new laptop features a small swiveling LED projector just above the display, where usually a webcam is. The projector has LED lighting, so it’s not that powerful and can only be used in dark rooms, but we can’t deny that the whole concept is amazing. To some people having a laptop like this would mean not having to take a separate projector with them for a journey. Asus haven’t provided any additional details about the new laptop, but hopefully it will hit the market before the end of 2008.
Asus launches a laptop with a bamboo frame
The newest Asus laptops come with a unique design aesthetic: they’re built with bamboo frames. It’s real wood, which is amazing. It might sound a little strange but when you see one of these in action you’ll be impressed. It gives the laptop a totally different look and on top of that it feels great. The wood is smooth – you don’t have to worry about splinters.
The Asus laptop is a mid-level style meant for casual home computing or work (if you really want to look different at work you should bring in a bamboo laptop). It’s not for the gamers out there but everyone else will be satisfied with the processing power.
- Intel Core 2 Duo Processor
- 800 MHz SDRAM
- NVIDIA GeForce 9300M GS video card with 256MB VRAM
- 12.1″ LED-backlit LCD display
It doesn’t seem like aesthetic should be the number one reason to choose a laptop but you’d be surprised at how big a difference it makes. You want to look at something pretty every day, right? This is the best bamboo-frame laptop.
Asus U6S Series Laptop Launched In US
Asus has recently presented its new laptop for business audience: the Asus U6S. It is a compact yet powerful machine that has a 12.1-inch LED-backlit display, a powerful 2.2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor and a NVidia GeForce 8400M G GPU. Thanks to the LED technology, the laptop is both thin and lightweight, making it easy to take it with you everywhere.
One of the most remarkable features of the Asus U6S is the leather palm rest and a leather wrapped battery. Not only it gives a unique twist to the design and makes the laptop comfortable to hold, it also helps keeping its temperature lower. Asus has blessed this laptop with an excellent connectivity as well, it has 4 USB ports, HDMI port, Bluetooth 2.0, 8-in-1 card reader, 802.11a/g/n wifi and an Express Card slot. The laptop also has a built-in 0.3 Mpx webcam and comes with Windows Vista business installed on it, although I would still recommend downgrading to XP at that point to get the most out of your new laptop.
The price for Asus U6S at online stores starts at $1,799.
Asus Eee PC 701 notebook
On the Computex Taipei show in June Asus has unveiled its new ultra-portable notebook, the Asus Eee PC 701. The announced price for laptop is only $250 USD which makes it hard to believe anything of a decent quality can be sold for that kind of money. With Eee 701, however, Asus have shattered all doubts and the laptop indeed meets all the expectations.
The laptop measures only 22.5×17 cm, weighs only 928 grams and is available in white color that certainly looks very nice. The keyboard is quite small, but nevertheless easy to type on, especially given a fact that the Asus’ Eee series is intended for children. There’s only one mouse button available below the touchpad which might be unusual for people who got accustomed to using a right mouse button, but it doesn’t take much time to get used to the new interface.
Asus Eee PC 701 specifications:
- Atom N270 CPU at 1.6GHz
- 16GB flash hard drive
- 512MB RAM
- 7-inch display
- Linux Operating system (custom build based on Xandros)
- Battery life: 3 hours
Asus Eee PC 701 Laptop for $199
Intel and Asus have joined their efforts and launched a new Eee PC 701 laptop that is intended for children in developing countries. The laptop weighs only about 2 pounds, has a 7-inch display, 4 GB disk space and makes connecting to Internet an easy task even for a kid or an elder laptop user. The price for this laptop is only $199.
Specifications of Asus Eee PC 701:
- 900MHz Intel Celeron CPU
- 512MB of DDR2 memory
- 802.11g WLAN
- 4GB SSD