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Eee PC: anyone have one?

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Posts

  • tsmvengytsmvengy Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Anyone know where I could demo any of these? My Best Buy has nothing, same with Staples. I'm just looking to try out one of the 8.9" netbooks to see if I think "WAY to small."

    Also, I'm leaning toward the Aspire One, mostly because of the price. Judging by the online videos it doesn't look to hard to upgrade the RAM in it. Talk me into it, out of it, into something else, or into waiting. What's the consensus?

    tsmvengy on
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  • PeregrineFalconPeregrineFalcon Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    archonwarp wrote: »
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    wunderbar wrote: »
    Recoil42 wrote: »
    http://www.engadget.com/2008/09/11/samsung-shows-off-netbook-ahead-of-october-launch/

    Samsung has entered the fray.


    edit: The keyboard looks excellent. Full-sized right shift key. I can't even begin to express how important that is to me.

    Fuck the right shift key. all the cool people live on the left side.
    I swing both ways.

    Like a bisexual

    Thank you archonwarp, that was the joke.

    PeregrineFalcon on
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    Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
  • PeregrineFalconPeregrineFalcon Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Anyone know where I could demo any of these? My Best Buy has nothing, same with Staples. I'm just looking to try out one of the 8.9" netbooks to see if I think "WAY to small."

    Also, I'm leaning toward the Aspire One, mostly because of the price. Judging by the online videos it doesn't look to hard to upgrade the RAM in it. Talk me into it, out of it, into something else, or into waiting. What's the consensus?

    Take a piece of letter paper and fold it in half top-to-bottom. That's a 10" diagonal screen in about the right aspect. So it's a little smaller than that.

    PeregrineFalcon on
    Looking for a DX:HR OnLive code for my kid brother.
    Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
  • ImprovoloneImprovolone Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I bought my 901 without using a 9inch. I found a 700 or so at a Costco, and determined that was too small, so I just went for it.
    It took me about a day and a half of use to get used to.
    (Just sayin, cause you might just have to bite the bullet on this one)

    Improvolone on
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  • archonwarparchonwarp Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I personally suggest that you wait. The netbook market is pretty new still, and we're only going to see huge improvements. For one thing, the atom chip may be paired with a chipset that isn't horrible at power and heat management. Also, the new AMD Puma chipset, which combines three parts of the motherboard into one super-efficient piece may offer a superior choice. Obviously it's never the right time to buy technology, but I say that nothing but good could come from waiting. If you do need a laptop, I'd suggest the 1000h. I currently have a 12.1" notebook and love it, and I think an inch and a half down would be a phenomenal improvement. Additionally, the 1000h is by far the best priced netbook for its features currently available (unless you want the 8.9" screen).

    archonwarp on
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  • Recoil42Recoil42 Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I would just say way until Christmas. (Black Tuesday even, if you're in the US, or Boxing day if you're in Canada.)

    Why? Because there's still a bunch of models to come out yet. Samsung, Lenovo.. And the Dell E and Via OpenBook haven't taken hold yet. Once christmas shopping rolls around, there's bound to be a huge amount of competition and cost cutting -- because at this price, these things are a perfect Christmas item.

    Recoil42 on
  • tsmvengytsmvengy Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    archonwarp wrote: »
    I personally suggest that you wait. The netbook market is pretty new still, and we're only going to see huge improvements. For one thing, the atom chip may be paired with a chipset that isn't horrible at power and heat management. Also, the new AMD Puma chipset, which combines three parts of the motherboard into one super-efficient piece may offer a superior choice. Obviously it's never the right time to buy technology, but I say that nothing but good could come from waiting. If you do need a laptop, I'd suggest the 1000h. I currently have a 12.1" notebook and love it, and I think an inch and a half down would be a phenomenal improvement. Additionally, the 1000h is by far the best priced netbook for its features currently available (unless you want the 8.9" screen).

    Cool. I thought there might be some new tech coming out, so I'll probably wait. I have a desktop and really just want this because it's a cool toy that's cheap and something you can drag around very easily.

    Also, looking at the videos for the aspire one I don't get why they didn't put a little door in the back to put more RAM in! When you take it apart it looks like the RAM slot is right next to the back of the case!

    tsmvengy on
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  • chasmchasm Ill-tempered Texan Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    That ASUS N10 looks shit-hot.

    chasm on
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    XBL : lJesse Custerl | MWO: Jesse Custer | Best vid ever. | 2nd best vid ever.
  • APZonerunnerAPZonerunner Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    God damn the laptop market for moving so fast. Do I wait for the N10 or pick up the EEE 1000H... Hm.

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  • chasmchasm Ill-tempered Texan Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I'm waiting for the N10. I need a new laptop and I'd rather have something like it that's about as close to a "real" laptop as possible. Not to mention the price is really nice for its feature list.

    Also, does anyone have an alternate link for ordering one? Or know of 1TopPC's customer service or overall reputation?

    chasm on
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  • Big DookieBig Dookie Smells great! Houston, TXRegistered User regular
    edited September 2008
    J&R has it listed as a pre-order for $799. Which is actually cheaper than the expected price for that model, so maybe they won't be quite as expensive as previously thought. I hate to say it, but I'm still thinking of holding out for this one. The 1000H is such an obvious choice at the newly lowered price, but still... the N10 looks really nice. I think I'll wait until it's actually available to buy and then make a decision between the two.

    Big Dookie on
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  • archonwarparchonwarp Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    J&R has it listed as a pre-order for $799. Which is actually cheaper than the expected price for that model, so maybe they won't be quite as expensive as previously thought. I hate to say it, but I'm still thinking of holding out for this one. The 1000H is such an obvious choice at the newly lowered price, but still... the N10 looks really nice. I think I'll wait until it's actually available to buy and then make a decision between the two.

    The reason i don't want the 1000H is because the reviews I've read have said that it's almost the same size as a 12.1" widescreen laptop. Because they have the extra large bezel, you're getting screwed out of screen size based upon laptop volume, or vice versa if you want to look at it that way.

    archonwarp on
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  • EgoEgo Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    A friend of mine is planning on picking up an acer aspire one in the next little while (3 cell battery though,) today we ran around town playing with the few different netbooks available here at retail, the MSI Wind, Acer Aspire One, and HP mini-note (1.6ghz C7-M.) The mini-note had the best keyboard by far, and the worst price. The Wind's keyboard wasn't bad. Aspire's here all have bilingual keyboards, which annoyed me, but which my aforementioned friend appreciated. He's sold on the price/size and ability to run all the software he runs already. For computer-gaming he's just going to be coming over to my place and using my secondary anyway.

    I'll probably hold off a while and decide down the road between an Aspire or the hp mini-note if an updated version rolls around (with better battery life and a lower price.) The Aspire seems like the best deal to me in terms of features for price, since I don't have a desire for 3d on a notebook (I don't use 3d on any of my laptops as is.)

    Ego on
    Erik
  • theclamtheclam Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I'm looking into getting a small, cheap laptop. What are the best choices? Is the Eee the way to go?

    theclam on
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  • LaCabraLaCabra MelbourneRegistered User regular
    edited September 2008
    pretty much

    LaCabra on
  • Recoil42Recoil42 Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    actually the aspire one seems to be what everyone is going for now.

    Recoil42 on
  • PikaPuffPikaPuff Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I like my aspire one but it failed playing my 720p anime.

    PikaPuff on
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  • DaedalusDaedalus Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    archonwarp wrote: »
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    J&R has it listed as a pre-order for $799. Which is actually cheaper than the expected price for that model, so maybe they won't be quite as expensive as previously thought. I hate to say it, but I'm still thinking of holding out for this one. The 1000H is such an obvious choice at the newly lowered price, but still... the N10 looks really nice. I think I'll wait until it's actually available to buy and then make a decision between the two.

    The reason i don't want the 1000H is because the reviews I've read have said that it's almost the same size as a 12.1" widescreen laptop. Because they have the extra large bezel, you're getting screwed out of screen size based upon laptop volume, or vice versa if you want to look at it that way.

    The 901 is basically the same thing as the 1000, but smaller.

    I'm really liking mine, anyway.

    Daedalus on
  • Big DookieBig Dookie Smells great! Houston, TXRegistered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I love the 901, except for the crappy SSD drives. If I could get a 901 with everything the same except for a 1.8" HDD instead of the SSD, I'd be all over that. As it is though, the secondary SSDs used for storage in these laptops are awful in terms of capacity and speed, so until the technology has advanced a little and become less expensive, I'm sticking with HDD netbooks.

    Now if only we could get more information about when the N10 will be released...

    Big Dookie on
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  • DaedalusDaedalus Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    I love the 901, except for the crappy SSD drives. If I could get a 901 with everything the same except for a 1.8" HDD instead of the SSD, I'd be all over that. As it is though, the secondary SSDs used for storage in these laptops are awful in terms of capacity and speed, so until the technology has advanced a little and become less expensive, I'm sticking with HDD netbooks.

    Now if only we could get more information about when the N10 will be released...

    The 901 has space for a 1.8" HDD. Plenty of people have added one. I think a hard drive version was planned but canceled. But there's space in there that's the perfect size for a 1.8" hard drive.

    The problem is that some of them don't have the port for the connector, so you've got a random chance of having some delicate soldering to do because Asus felt the need to save five cents.

    That said, I'm pretty happy with my SDD. The only place where it's lagging behind is in latency for random, short writes, like for a browser cache, so I just turned off the Firefox cache.

    (also, being immune to head crashes is great for peace of mind).

    Daedalus on
  • ImprovoloneImprovolone Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Older 90`s have the ZIF connector for that, newer ones don't.

    Improvolone on
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  • DaedalusDaedalus Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Older 90`s have the ZIF connector for that, newer ones don't.

    Yup. If you don't have it, and you're really good at soldering, you can put on a ZIF connector, since the motherboard is still wired for it, it's just the connector that's missing.

    edit: Really, I don't know why they didn't make an official 901H, it seems like it would have been a big hit.

    Daedalus on
  • archonwarparchonwarp Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Why is puma not being released yet. I am holding on with my 1.5 hour 6-six-battery for now. Seriously, never buy a pentium dual core. Do not let you friends buy one. Ever.

    archonwarp on
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  • PeregrineFalconPeregrineFalcon Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    archonwarp wrote: »
    Why is puma not being released yet. I am holding on with my 1.5 hour 6-six-battery for now. Seriously, never buy a pentium dual core. Do not let you friends buy one. Ever.

    o_O Puma is out. Has been for awhile.

    Do you mean Shrike? Or just a Puma-based netbook?

    PeregrineFalcon on
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  • archonwarparchonwarp Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    archonwarp wrote: »
    Why is puma not being released yet. I am holding on with my 1.5 hour 6-six-battery for now. Seriously, never buy a pentium dual core. Do not let you friends buy one. Ever.

    o_O Puma is out. Has been for awhile.

    Do you mean Shrike? Or just a Puma-based netbook?

    D'oh! Shrike is what I meant. I can't wait to see how low-energy that's going to be. 4 watts peak for the atom processor is nice, but when the motherboard you're using is taking a ton more than that it kind of negates the awesome.

    archonwarp on
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  • poshnialloposhniallo Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    I just started playing FF7 on my 900. I've played the first quarter of that game in a couple of languages, bought it at least three times and never managed to finish it (for no good reason).

    I literally teared up a tiny bit at the opening music. FINALLY! TAUTOLOGICALLY FINAL FANTASY! YAY!

    poshniallo on
    I figure I could take a bear.
  • FrazFraz Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Is the 901 slower than the 900?

    Right now I'm looking at the Mini 9 or the 901. The Dell looks like its put together better than the Eees, but I want that insane battery life.

    Fraz on
  • EgoEgo Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Yes it is, Fraz.

    Ego on
    Erik
  • FrazFraz Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Ego wrote: »
    Yes it is, Fraz.

    That seems pretty backwards

    Fraz on
  • EgoEgo Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Sorry, I just verified, and I'm wrong, while the mobile cel is faster than the atom at the same clock speed, the atom in the 901 is clocked much higher than the cel in the 900.

    My apologies.

    Ego on
    Erik
  • Big DookieBig Dookie Smells great! Houston, TXRegistered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Yes, the 901 is definitely faster. The 901 uses a 1.6 ghz processor that can underclock for power efficiency, or can overclock to 1.8 ghz for high performance. The 901 overall is really a better machine.

    Big Dookie on
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  • UncleSporkyUncleSporky Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Is anybody worried about that maximum number of SSD writes looming in the background? How long do we have?

    I've just got the basic original 4G EEE and I've used it for so much. I play Morrowind on it regularly.

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  • ImprovoloneImprovolone Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Besure to backup your drives every now aand then. By the time these things fail, it will either be time for a new netbook (to hell with laptops :scoff: ) or flash will be so cheap it will be an easy fix.

    Improvolone on
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  • PeregrineFalconPeregrineFalcon Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Is anybody worried about that maximum number of SSD writes looming in the background?
    No.
    How long do we have?
    Twenty years or so.

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  • Recoil42Recoil42 Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    Yes, the 901 is definitely faster. The 901 uses a 1.6 ghz processor that can underclock for power efficiency, or can overclock to 1.8 ghz for high performance. The 901 overall is really a better machine.

    The Atom is an in-order processor though -- among other shortcomings. You can't just look into gHz for this one, you'd pretty much have to do practical real-world speed tests.

    Recoil42 on
  • PeregrineFalconPeregrineFalcon Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    So the Atom 330 (dual-core) desktop boards are out now, and I just thought I'd address something in large, bold type before anyone gets a case of Stupid here and asks it:

    YOU CANNOT SWAP THE CHIP FROM THE DESKTOP BOARDS INTO YOUR NETBOOK. STOP ASKING.

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  • DaedalusDaedalus Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Recoil42 wrote: »
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    Yes, the 901 is definitely faster. The 901 uses a 1.6 ghz processor that can underclock for power efficiency, or can overclock to 1.8 ghz for high performance. The 901 overall is really a better machine.

    The Atom is an in-order processor though -- among other shortcomings. You can't just look into gHz for this one, you'd pretty much have to do practical real-world speed tests.

    Practical real-world speed tests have shown that the 1.6 GHz Atom gets about the same performance (perhaps slightly more in some applications) as the 900MHz Celeron that was in the old Eee 900.

    I'll try and find the link later.

    Daedalus on
  • PeregrineFalconPeregrineFalcon Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Daedalus wrote: »
    Recoil42 wrote: »
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    Yes, the 901 is definitely faster. The 901 uses a 1.6 ghz processor that can underclock for power efficiency, or can overclock to 1.8 ghz for high performance. The 901 overall is really a better machine.

    The Atom is an in-order processor though -- among other shortcomings. You can't just look into gHz for this one, you'd pretty much have to do practical real-world speed tests.

    Practical real-world speed tests have shown that the 1.6 GHz Atom gets about the same performance (perhaps slightly more in some applications) as the 900MHz Celeron that was in the old Eee 900.

    I'll try and find the link later.

    Generally if the app benefits from multithreading, the Atom wins - but only by a small margin.

    PeregrineFalcon on
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  • Big DookieBig Dookie Smells great! Houston, TXRegistered User regular
    edited September 2008
    So there is some slightly new-ish info on the Asus N10. Laptop Magazine got a hands on with it, and it looks better than ever. There will be two versions, and the "good" version will have a 320gb hard drive with the nVidia card, and will retail for $699 - significantly cheaper than the $849 price that had been quoted before. For me, $699 sounds pretty good for that machine.

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  • archonwarparchonwarp Registered User regular
    edited September 2008
    Big Dookie wrote: »
    So there is some slightly new-ish info on the Asus N10. Laptop Magazine got a hands on with it, and it looks better than ever. There will be two versions, and the "good" version will have a 320gb hard drive with the nVidia card, and will retail for $699 - significantly cheaper than the $849 price that had been quoted before. For me, $699 sounds pretty good for that machine.


    Looks pretty good, until I see
    6 to 12 hours of battery life with 6-cell battery

    Holy crap! How is this possible?

    Also, there are legitimate sites taking pre-orders now. Portable One has three models available, and I've heard fairly good things about the company from the notebookreview forums.

    The $100 price difference covers a much larger hard drive and a downgrade to XP Pro. If their battery life claims actually hold true, I will not hesitate to buy this. A netbook that can handle multimedia and play TF2 is massive win.

    archonwarp on
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This discussion has been closed.