Communication Breakdown
Communications from the world of, er, communications. And other stuff.
Thursday 6 September 2007, 3:19 PM
The lowdown on Asus' Eee PC
I must admit I got rather excited when Asus announced it was making a super-portable, low cost notebook, the Eee PC (stupid name, but there you go). As a reporter, it seems just the ticket for running around expos and such without shoulder cramp.
And now I can reveal some more details about it, such as price and UK availability! The full specs etc will come out early next week (don't worry, we're on it), but it seems certain that you'll be able to buy one from the middle of October, at the price of £199 for a 10GB-solid-state-drive-sporting model.
Just to recap, the LED-backlit screen measures 7", it has Wi-Fi and a webcam, it runs Linux (a special version worked out between Asus and Intel, no less), it comes with OpenOffice, FireFox and other open-saucy goodness preinstalled, and it also lets the user choose between skins that oddly enough resemble Windows XP, OSX and so on. Startup time is about 5 seconds and - get this - the battery life is a whopping 10 hours.
Asus' rep has told me the Eee has no direct target market as such, but is sort of the "consumer version" of Intel's fabled $100 laptop-for-developing-countries project thingy. The way I look at it, we're talking a piece of kit that can be marketed to the iPod crowd, and after its initial white-only launch we may very well be looking at multicoloured flavours. There are also whispers of a future version with built-in 3G!
PreviousComments on this post
Three things not listed in the spec - does it accept standard USB memory sticks, does it have Bluetooth (or drivers for a dongle), and does it have drivers for printing via USB etc. If it has these, it will be an amazing bargain!
Where did you get the specs from?
I read the current specs for the Eee pc was:
2GB/4GB hard disk
256MB/512MB ram
3 hours battery
Startup time: around 15 seconds
There seems to be some conflicting information.
I got the specs from Asus themselves. I was told that, although the toss-up is between a 5GB and 10GB SSD, the latter is more likely at a £199 price point.
Yes, the battery life and startup time surprised me too - my previous blog post on this subject had also said 3 hours and 15 seconds. Of course, let's see the final product first.
It will have at least 3 USB ports, so yes it will take standard memory sticks and I would assume the ports + the Linux distro will enable Bluetooth, printing et cetera. Asus is quite keen to engage the techier Linux-fiends with this one, by the way...
Oh yeah, one more thing - some reports are circulating claiming that Asus will be releasing a Core2Duo-based version of the Eee in April. Not so, says Asus. Apparently the Merom processor would run too hot for the wee little Eee.
What you can expect is a bigger screen, but now we're talking something closer to a laptop replacement and it may not be branded "Eee"...
As far as I can tell, this isn't the same thing they're offering for our US and Canadian Cousins, under the brand "EMBARGO", the eee pc is now up for preordering by the company NCIXUS.com...
http://www.ncixus.com/search/?categoryid=0&q=25885
$385 gets you 512mb ram (nice) 3 hours of battery life (not stellar given this is solid state but for the price not too bad), and 4Gb of solid state storage, converting to sterling brings it in at around £192 or thereabouts.
So, for what.... £7 you get an extra 6Gb of flash drive *and* another 7 hours of battery life? Something doesn't sound right there.
Also, the 5 seconds boot time, mmmm, nah: Youtube has vids of these things firing up: 20-27 seconds (http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZxQD8BWLnM ). Which is still not bad, but certainly far short of the 5 second mark quoted by Asus. Me thinks the marketing droid you collared may have exaggerated a bit, because being in rippoff Britain, I honestly cant see us getting the above improvements in spec for essentially the same price. I'd love to be wrong, genuinely, but I just can't see it somehow.
My review about ASUS EEE PC:
I became one of very few privileged consumers in Canada to own the Asus EEE PC model 701 version with 4 GB drive. This is a *** pre-production *** model and I bought it from a company that did an online review for Asus. I LOVE THIS MACHINE. Overall look - it looks sexy, tiny, light, plesant to hold.
SYSTEM INFO:
Bios version 0155
Bios date: 09/10/2007 (this is after I flashed Bios today. Flashing Bios on EEE Pc is easy).
Software version: EEE PC 1.0
Build info: 2007-09-20 06:00. That means this EEE PC was built like 8 days ago.
CPU Type: Intel Mobile
Memory: 512 MB
Mother Board verion x.xx
Screnn - it is matt and looks and feels like a laptop screen when you bought a laptop 3 years ago.
Wherever I go peoples eyes are glaring. I better watch or it gets lost;-)
It boots fast. YES. The boot time when I received it new was something like 20 seconds. The EEE has special verison of Linux (made by Xandros).
.. You might remember Xandros signed a strategic aggreement with Windows. So no wonder that this laptop can run Windows as well as Linux.
The desktop (GUI) linux comes in two flavors. One is simplified (with big icons for email, gmail, gaim, firefox, Open office, player etc... It is very easy to understand. This desktop is for kids, and new computer users. The other flavor is Normal (full) desktop mode. This mode is like any other Windows mode or KDE. It is actually based on KDE and looks like any other Linux.
Switching between both modes is easy. But it requires restart (20 seconds ordeal).
I didn't test the battery yet (I just got the PC today). It is little bit warm. Not hot, but the tiny fan is running. The screen resolution is OK, the colors are OK. Don't expect high definition. This is a small device and a relatively low priced subnotebook. OK, what else, camera is so-so. The sound is perhaps some complain. Even using Headphones, the sound level is low. But this might be application dependend. So for example listening to anything in Firefox - the sound level was too low. Playing some games installed - the sound was OK.
A bug:
I discovered already a bug in EEE. If I wan to use external mouse (USB) and plug in and then plug out at some point, the touch pad and keyboard stops working. If I plug in the mouse again, it works, but the touchpad and keyboard don't. To get both working again, I have to shut down the EEE, take out the battery for a few seconds and then restart (to be honest, this is not a nightmare, it only takes like 20 seconds ;-)
Not sure why this behavior.
The EEE color (white) is nice.
Another thing - If you shut down the eee into stand-by mode, the laptop will still remain hot. Not quite sure why. I thought the system sleeps. But this laptop keeps relatively warm in stand by mode. Which is OK in winter, when it's freezing.
The screen doesn't tilt to 180 degrees (flat). Why? Because it is heavier than the keyboard. So limiting the tilt angle you prevent it from flipping over;-)
The button (which is actually a double button) on the touchpad is little bit tricky. Not easy to handle. Also, it is pretty loud. Oh my... It pretty much sucks... It is noisy. Click Click Click....
The touchpad itself is great.
EEE has 3 USB ports. Not 4. I don't know who saw EEE with 4 ports but this one has 3.
Multicard reader is great. I plugged in my SD card from my Nokia phone. EEE didn't recognize it however. I guess because it is not formatted properly. More testing needed for this.
Microphone is underneath the touchpad from the bottom. There might be another one besides the camera. I am not sure about this.
The hinge - perfect. Perfectly tight. Closes good and easy. Good job ASUS.
Bottom - there is a cover. Under the cover there is 1 DDR II 512 MB memory. This seems to be a standard laptop memory that you can replace. (Correct me if I am wrong) .. I believe Max is 1 GB. Besides memory there is Express card slot. This could be used for anything, like a GSM or 3G card or even a memory module. I read a post that said there are already 32 GB express cards coming on the market.
By the way, it is very easy to set up a 3G or HSDPA connection when you have the card. This can be setup in control panel.
The keyboard. The keyboard looks like a sugar candy. I'd like to eat it. Not that I would have masochistic desires, but the keboard really look like made out of sugar. Typing - well - some nightmare. But probably I need to get used to this. My fingers are like XXXL size, so you might find typing OK. One very negative thing about this keyboard is that is relatively noisy. So if you are in a quiet room or university lecture, you might be annoying when tying on this keyboard.
There are 3 USB ports, so you might consider plugging in another full size keyboard, if needed. I didn't try that though. There are many functional keys. The keyboard I have comes with English and small Chinese letters.
The Back-Space button should have been much bigger. Perhaps bigger than the Enter. Because you will make lots of typos on this keyboard. Other than that - the keyboard is a little bit swimming. So it's not that feel like keyboard is firm in place. But what can you expect for 300 dollar machine??
Application-wise - I didn't have much time to discover this but couple of intersting things:
Software update - it's easy. There is a utility that you can start and update your software. So far, there is not much to update, just the BIOS.
Skype. Hmmm. I wonder how will be the quality. Need to test this as well.
Games - nice set of sweet games.
Media Player - SMPlayer comes preinstalled.
There are other typical KDE applications.
Comes with an antivirus (from Xandros, the maker of this Linux distro)
The software takes lots of space. There is only like 1.3 GB left out of 4 GB for my files. Of course I can use SD or MMC cards or express canrd but.. anyway. There might be a way to put it on a diet by uninstalling some applications? Not sure I didn't try that yet.
Also I am not clear about how to the complete system backup of this laptop.
The EEE I have has a Webcam. I attempted to start the Web Cam application that came with the machine, but it doesn't start. Not sure why.
The carger. It looks nice (like some LG and Samsung laptop chargers). The power cord is long enough (thanks ASUS).
The power cord plugs from the back of the EEE. ..Which I don't like, but this is a matter of preference. I think it can break easily and it would be better if it is on the side. But this is a matter of preference, I guess.
And that's probably all I have to say. I think many people will love EEE PC and some of them will find that after intial excitement this PC is simply too small and thus a useless gadget that due to low price became a staple and thus a must-have shelf sitter.
If you need extreem mobility and always access to your stuff, work, school, internet, WIFI, movies on subway, then you are going to like EEE PC.
Hope this helps and good luck to buy yours soon. I hope Asus is not going to postpone the release date until after xmas.
Greetings from Canada.
Polocanada
Awesome - thanks for that, Polocanada. I look forward to getting my hands on one...
