Snowman

Join Date 03/2001

+343

ASUS Eee PC

A tiny review...

I displayed my newly purchased ASUS Eee PC in the 'September Desktop Screenshot' thread, and was asked by ama02:

Snowman, I am considering getting an Asus Eee PC, one with XP, how do you like yours? Pros? Cons?

So I thought I'd give it a 'little' review, from an endusers perspective

I absolutey love it - at least for my use. I use it as a fancy pansy typewriter

Pros:
- Lightweight; You'll hardly notice it in your briefcase/bag. It weighs less than a pound (incl. battery)
- Size/dimensions; it'll fit perfectly in any purse/bag/briefcase/schoolbag - leaving plenty of space for anything else.
- Cheap; 400-500 bucks ain't that much, considering what you get.
- Performance; (#1) Despite it's size it performs relatively well. The 900 mhz cpu chucks along just fine, with the 1 gb of RAM, at least for 'normal' office/school use. What surprised me the most was the screen. The tiny 8,9" screen is spectacular for it's size, and very easy to read from. Default res is 1024X768. (Linux)
- It's silent; The only moving internal part is the cooling fan. The 16gb Harddrive is a flash/memorycard.

Cons:
- Battery!! You'd be lucky if you make it last more than 2 hours..... 3 hours idleing. Even when turned off, the battery gets drained. I left it off for about three days, fully charged. When I turned it back on again the battery was almost flatlined.
(Taking out the battery prevents this drain)
- Performance; (#2) Even though there is 1 gb of memory it does seem a bit sluggish to open programs. Low and behold if you've got any music playing, while attempting to navigate around the system or open opening any programs..... This causes the music (MP3) to stutter and cough worse than any older person who've been smoking 3 packs a day for many years.... I have yet to test it with movies.....

How would it perform with XP......
From what I've seen/read on the net, it *should* be able to run it but I kinda doubt it'll be of any use, performance wise after some time. I will definitely be keeping Linux on mine, since it's so 'light' and quite franktly easy to use.

All in all:
A great, cheap little PC for light use, and easy to carry around.
Not for gamers/performance freaks.

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2of3

Join Date 10/2006

+816

something about the name ASUS Eee PC makes me wonder

Nice review, though

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Wait, is it good just for generally surfing the web and doing emails stuff on the go.

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After much research I bought 3 Acer Aspire ONE 's in the last few weeks. The ONE's with the 120GB HD, XP and 1 GB RAM. One of the three has been re-formatted by one of my sons and is now running Ubuntu.

All three have only the 3-cell batter but I'm very happy with the battery performance. You would be lucky to get 2:30hrs. out of it (running Windows), but you won't get less than 2hrs.

In my opinion, these systems are perfect for your daughter etc. around the house/cottage or in my case as my daily-planner that comes with me wherever I go (fits nicely in the briefcase). I'm not getting rid of my real notebook or any of my desktops that's for sure!

the Monk

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Snowman

Join Date 03/2001

+343

these systems are perfect for your daughter etc. around the house/cottage or in my case as my daily-planner that comes with me wherever I go (fits nicely in the briefcase)

Eggsaktlee! For that use they are just perfect!

I'm not getting rid of my real notebook or any of my desktops that's for sure!

Definitely not. It's is not ment as a replacement for your 'big' laptop and definitely not for your desktop.
They are being marketed, over here as the perfect school laptop.

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Hey, thanks for the review! The XP version comes with (I think) 12 GB storage, which isn't much considering there will be lots of updates to add to the base install. I also read somewhere that, for some reason, the XP version has the drive partitioned...possibly with Linux. I like the size and weight though, since I would really just want to use it when I travel for work, to check email, messenger, and do some light web browsing. My current laptop is a Dell Inspiron with 15.4" screen, but it's a bit too bulky/heavy to take on overnight trips around the region.

There are some very nice looking ultra portables on the market. I'll give it a little more time, and check things out...maybe by the time I decide to get one, there'll be more options on the Eee PC. Thanks again for the review!

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The tiny 8,9" screen is spectacular for it's size, and very easy to read from. Default res is 1024X768. (Linux)

That right there would kill me. I have a laptop I use for work only about 1 or 2 days a week, when working from the office instead of home, and going to that 15.4" screen after staring at my 22" monitor at home (about 16 hours a day 5 or 6 days a week) it drives me nuts using that "tiny" of a screen. I couldn't imagine trying to work on 8.9".

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Well I didn't get the Eee PC...but I did get a netbook, the Mini 9 from Dell! Just got it in today, but I'm at work so I couldn't connect to the internet with it, just did the Windows setup and poked around to see what was on there. Of course, Dell loaded too much junk, so I uninstalled some things already. It's really nifty! This will definitely come in handy for traveling!