I saw the new, ultra portable PC at Aberdeen Center today in Richmond (for those curious, it's on the top floor in front display case of "Cube Inc" near the atrium).It's so light and portable. It came as quite a suprise to me since, though I knew of the EEE PC (which stands for "Easy to Learn, Easy to Work, Easy to Play"), I hadn't known that it was available in Canada from a brick and mortar store. Cube Inc, however, isn't like any other retail store in that they rent out little shelf spaces with glass encasements (cubes, if you will) for a few hundred bucks and then sell whatever owners are displaying without commissions.
Anyways, I'm guessing the owner of that "cube" is shipping the EEE PCs in from Taiwan directly.
What's all the hype?
Well for one thing the EEE PC runs off a solid state hard disk which, fundamentally is no different from flash memory in Mp3 players. This means that there are no moving parts, and that the processing, storage, and retrieval of data is much more reliable.
It's tiny too, and thus very light and portable at a little over 2 pounds. Finally, here's a small pc actually worthy of the "book" euphemism, used so rampantly by manufacturer in non-book like products on the market today.
Also, the EEE PC is very affordable. The price quoted at Cube Inc was listed at $430 CAN (the Holiday Special until Jan 10th, 2008), though it is listed at $349 US and $399 US depending on the configuration options (i.e., webcam, number of battery cells).
Oh and it's uses the open source alternative OS called Linux--which allows it to be very affordable and user-friendly. Hence, "Easy to Learn".
Here are the Specifications (from the ASUS website):
| Model Name | Eee PC 8G | Eee PC 4G | Eee PC 4G Surf | Eee PC 2G Surf |
| Display | 7" | 7" | 7" | 7" |
| Intel CPU & Chipset | ● | ● | ● | ● |
| Operating System | Linux Windows XP compatible | Linux Windows XP compatible | Linux Windows XP compatible | Linux Windows XP compatible |
| Ethernet Communication | ● | ● | ● | ● |
| WLAN | ● | ● | ● | ● |
| Memory | 1G (DDR2) | 512 MB (DDR2) | 512 MB (DDR2) | 512 MB (DDR2) |
| S.S.D. Storage (Solid-State Disk) | 8G | 4G | 4G | 2G |
| Camera | ● | ● | - | - |
| Audio | Hi-Definition audio Stereo speaker Microphone | Hi-Definition audio Stereo speaker Microphone | Hi-Definition audio Stereo speaker Microphone | Hi-Definition audio Stereo speaker Microphone |
| Battery | 4 Cells: 5200 mAh, 3.5hrs* | 4 Cells: 5200 mAh, 3.5hrs* | 4 Cells: 4400 mAh, 2.8hrs* | 4 Cells: 4400 mAh, 2.8hrs* |
| Weight | 0.92 kg | 0.92 kg | 0.92 kg | 0.92 kg |
Unfortunately, I couldn't get any pictures of the Asus EEE PC in the wild. Nevertheless here are some pictures snagged off of the ASUS Website:
The OS (which includes some popular applications like Skype, while Google Docs, Wikipedia and other work right out of the bundled browser):
Everything in the box it ships with (which believe, is the size of most laptop cases):
And, lastly, a video review by JKKMobile:Obviously, the EEE PC has many drawbacks. It can't trump the best laptops out there in speed (though it's performance is still breathtaking considering it's simplistic hardware), it doesn't have an optical drive (you probably won't need it), and the screen resolution is a tiny 800x480 pixels (it can be attached to a larger monitor with a step-up to 1024x768 resolution). Even so, for your most basic computer tasks such as checking email, updating your blog (anywhere there's wifi), listening on online radio, surfing the web, updating your calendar, looking at pictures etc., it's processing power a' plenty.
For a full review check out these links:
ArsTechnica Review
PCPro Review
Detailed Review by HotHardware
Trusted Reviews' Review
If, however, you're not sold since you prefer having a more conventional, yet, still ultra-portable laptop, look into Everex's Cloudbook (the name seems akin to a hybrid between Final Fantasy hero and a Macbook): they're still affordable, but have a speedier processor, RAM, and 30 gig HD. Available at Wal-Mart all over North America at the end of this month.
