Asus Eee PC as 'hard to get your hands on as a Wii' Asus' elfin Eee PC is coming to Japan and it's going to get 16GB of solid-state storage, it has been claimed. Meanwhile, in the UK availability has reached Wii-like limits, according to insiders. A report by Akihabara News today claimed Asus' Japanese operation said that the Linux-based sub-laptop will be released over there …
I presume the 8G is the PC702 (as the 2G and 4G are 700 & 701 respectively ). I wonder it this will have the name Eee PC703 16G?.
There is mention of the increase in hard drive space, I was hoping for some information on the ammount of main memory it will/may have, as I belive they can take standard PC667Mhz DDR2 2Gb ram modules. (the G8 having a 1Gb module).
An increase in main memory seems quite possible if they want to run Vista on it.... buy why would you ewww give me XP please.
As a note you can easyly tell the CPU to run at 900Mhz in XP, its just clocked down to save your battery. There is mention that it is clocked down in the Linux version because its a bit more power hungry, I belive it is/was an issue with the sleep setting, not being set to 'suspend to disk'.
I wonder if it will be priced like the Wii as well, as in more expensive here than anyware else?
There is a few other questions about the Eee I would love to know, for example the 8G has two PCIe slots as far (as I am aware) but the newer 4G's have only one, due to supply issues. (model A has B has not). Also I have never found an good answer to the questions about them adding Bluetooth and 3G (or similar) add in modules to there current Eee's. - as in, are they and if so when?
-ano
It depends how you define "hard to get your hands on". If you expect to just walk in a high street store and get one, you'd have to be very lucky and get there virtually the day they receive them in stock, as they sell them very quickly. If you can wait a couple of weeks, just order it online and one will come your way as soon as they have them in stock. That's exactly what I did with Micro Anvika: they couldn't tell me when they'd have one in store but there was no problem getting one from their web site and 2 weeks later I had my Eee PC. Of course, a 2 week wait means you can't get one in time for Xmas anymore.
Compared to other electronic equipment I bought recently, waiting 2 weeks for an Eee PC is not that long: a couple of years ago it took me 6 months to acquire a very popular Canon EF lens that was so badly out of stock no vendor in London could get his hands on one and they all had a customer waiting list a mile long for it.
It's no big loss. I have one or should I say had one. It is less than one
month old and the thing doesn't work already.
I bought it from Overclockers.co.uk and I am having trouble getting it
replaced. Overclockers say Asus will deal with it, Asus say nah! that's
down to Overclockers as the supplier. (They are right but OC won't
admit it)
So you can't get your hands on an unreliable piece of crap?
Don't worry! Be Happy!
The review unit I had wasn't remotely unreliable, FWIW. I have one of my own now, bought and paid for by myself (Xmas prezzie) so I'll see how that goes.
However, in nearly 20 years of IT journalism, there isn't a single vendor who I've not heard at least one buyer grumble about s**t product, s**t support, s**t customer service, etc, etc.
There will always be duff units, always be staffers who appear unwilling to help you get it replace/fixed. Be patient, and usually you'll get what you want.
I tend to agree with what you say....
but....
When you get the supplier and the manufacturer playing "support ping-pong" you tend to lose the will to deal with either company again.
And get frustrated. And then angry. Especially when they are playing support ping-pong on 0870 numbers!
No reason to be stuck in that situation, just remember to pay by credit card - the card issuer is jointly liable under Sec.75 of the consumer credit act once the cost gets above £100 (as low as £50 for some card issuers), and if the vendor plays hardball or acts dumb, you simply go to the credit card company and tell them to get sort it out.
Going for the card issuer not only puts the ball in their court, but it also lets them know a vendor is unreliable and unwilling to fulfill their legal obligations.
Those with a long enough memory will remember extended warranties bought with a computer from Tiny had to be paid for by the credit card companies.
Have been on the lookout for both an Eee (for myself) and a Wii (for the wife) and they are both as rare as hens' teeth at the moment.
Although I learnt a trick yesterday and got lucky - many Toys R Us have stock of both! Very strange to see the Eee PC being displayed next to the Leapfrog Bash-And-Learn-Fortran systems, but there you go!
Good hunting!
I don't understand why there is so great a desire for the highest possible spec for the eee, unless it's part of the tiresomely male "Mine is bigger than yours".
The eee is a useful very light-weight note-taker, web-surfer, email client, skyper, pretty robust and very tolerant of what you plug into it. The provided Linux installation is perfectly understandable by Windows users and there's an expert mode if you really wish to play around. There seems little benefit in installing XP - you don't get any extra real-world functionality and you do have tweak it to delete unecessary files, swap files etc. I've upgraded the RAM to 1 GB but I am not sure what benefit I have got. A 8 GB memory card contains a reasonable collection of current documents - I don't positively need every single Star Trek episode constantly about my person. Another 8 GB usb card holds a few DIVx movies.
Yes, I have read the blogs with all the hardware hacks, but that's for hobbyists, not regular users.
we got an email from a supplier saying that they were looking for preorders first come first served. we ordered 3 and eventually were shipped 1. the programmer who got seriously loves it.
when picking it up we got the spiel from the supplier. they had 160 preorders so had ordered 200. they were shipped 16 with the rest promised at a later date. rare as hens teeth this side of the pond.
as for wii. i pass a games shop every morning and have seen queues of 20-30 people at 8am waiting. luckily my company writes video software so when last year a guy went looking he phoned a customer who found one in the arse end of ireland and had it shipped to dublin for him. really nice guy to do that for him.
Well, that depends... First of all, it's not 4 GB, it's more like 2 to 3 GB really available (don't remember the exact number) after you discount the OS and app sizes.
I myself will not want less than 16 GB because I see this machine as a nice on the road way of unloading my DSLR's card and quickly reviewing the pics (gotta save that battery, another problem). And, frankly, 2 GB is enough for barely 100 photos in raw + JPEG (17 and 3 MB, approx.)
I mean, seriously. It's not like its a real picture anyway; this would get you a ribbing on B3ta for the lack of shadow behind the laptop; always a sign of n00bness at Photoshopping.
It's boring, it's old, it's not big, it's not clever.
Could there be a BandWagon icon please?
<quote>Japanese don't much like windows - it's Mac terretory.</quote>
I disagree. Windows is everywhere. Many Japanese web sites are IE only. Sure, Macs are on the up, but that's just an iFashion thing. Japan loves windows much more than the begrudging west does.
<quote>Also they are rather use to small high quality laptops </quote>
True. Walk into any high street electronics store and you will find a dinky little sub notebook by Sony, Toshiba or Panasonic. The price is double (or more) the eee, but they are fully featured.
To use the bloody thing. But I certainly don't.
I'm a relatively experienced nerd. I touch type fairly quickly on qwerty or dvorak keyboards. I can use most controllers I've ever gotten across, my hands are apparently a bit under normal size for an adult - but despite 20 minutes of trying - I couldn't get a sentance out that wasn't more typo then what I was trying for due to fat fingers.
The big department store near my office remains the only place in town to actually have the bloody things - most of my preferred vendors can't get stock - by the department stores seem to have them out the wazoo.
Regarding the comments on why they underclocked the processor to 630mhz I don't believe it's because they're trying to extend the battery life, using setfsb on this Eee it crashes if it's pushed faster than 750mhz, to the point where the power supply (PSU & battery) has to be removed before it'll then properly reboot. There has been talk about the ram speed and BIOS affecting the clocking of speeds above the standard 630mhz but this one's still on 0401 BIOS and haven't upgraded the memory because of that damned warranty sticker (which isn't going to be put on US/Canada units in the future)
As for running Vista, I'm in full agreement with Nick, this Eee is running an unmodified (nothing removed) XP without fuss and I have just over 2GB spare on the internal SSD. I can't see why anyone in their right mind would want to put Vista on these things.
Toys r Us got them in stock here in Sheffield.
Colleague across the desk went and bought one, the guy next to him went and bought 5, which he's sold making about £180 profit in total.
I had a look at the one across the desk and the small low resolution screen has put me right off. I'd rather spend a little bit more (okay, a fair bit more) and a have a usable 10" or 12.1" screen and a fully featured laptop at the same time. The screen just seems too small to actually be pleasant to use, even for just browsing el reg.
I've been trying to get one, out of stock everywhere except (rumour has it) a few isolated branches of toysrus (I refuse to spell it with that obnoxious 'r as a word'). My local branches have sold out unfortunately, and have even pre-sold the next batch of a whole 5 units due in this week.
I got mine from Toys'R'Us too, although the local Leeds branch was sold out and I had to go to Wakefield instead (fortunately also within range of my train ticket).
I was very impressed with the staff falling over themselves to talk to me about my prospective purchase!
Forgot about my Xandros concerns amid all the buzz though ... wonder if that's my previous Reg submission getting a mention-in-passing at http://boycottnovell.com/2007/11/26/xandros-tax/? S'pose we may never know*!
(*not a challenge to prove this either way: I'd check myself if I was all that bothered)
Don't you realise what this machine is made for - yes it costs a whopping £219 rather than £100/£150, but what on earth would you buy instead?!
You're not gonna get a decent ultraportable for anywhere near that, although granted you could buy an under-specced 15.4-inch 3kg machine made by a retail store for twice the price..
The eeeeee is ideal for the commuter, it's light, it's particularly robust and the lack of Windows really isn't a problem for most users. True, at some point Vista will probably get stuck on it, as with a larger screen, more memory, faster processor, and you're back to paying a hell of a lot more money again.
Look at anything in its league - some of the UMPCs cost up to 2k, 11-inch machines like Sony's TZ cost well over a grand. You might be too tight to fork out £219 for an ultraportable laptop, but the sales success suggest most other people - me included - disagree.
odd, every day thiis week there have been wii available in croydon, usuall at the electronics shop next to east croydon station and at a nmber of high street retail chains..... what i couldnt tell or be bothered was wehter they were cynicall bundled with other "value added" products?
i was almost tempted to pick some up for a quick profit on ebay!
but, i thought no, at least those poor miserable souls who inhabit Croydon and have saved sufficient benefits cash should at least have something to lookk forward to this christmas (and i'd wager the 'cash convertor' store will be full of them by end of januarary)
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