Asus Eee PC 901 - First Impressions
I’ve been thinking out loud about what to do about a new computer for some time - last September I was looking at a Mac Mini, and in Spring I started to look at the Eee PC. Almost a year on and this Dell Inspiron notebook is still fantastic. Whilst it has an external mouse, keyboard, webcam and two hard drives connected all the time, it’s still amazingly quick, stable and reliable for a two year old notebook, which is powered up for at least 14 hours a day, every day. The only thing that’s given way is the battery.
And that’s started to be an issue - it’s always tethered to a power point. The last few times I’ve travelled by train I’ve also found the sockets to be broken or simply not working - which makes three hours each way a lot less productive. I’m also fed up with piles of paper and folders around the desk - especially when everything is so easy to find and manage with GMail and the Google Apps suite.
There’s quite a few versions of the Eee PC - indeed, soon there could be 23. It’s worth looking around, but needless to say (I suppose) the more recent ones include the 901 and 1000H. Prices also vary, depending on the screen size and colour you’re after. In the end I went with eBuyer who I’ve always found to be fairly quick and safe. You’ll often find the option of less storage (12GB) and Windows XP, or more storage (20GB) and Linux.
Powering up walks you through a Windows XP installation, and it’s fairly straight forward from there. I then downloaded Firefox and some essentials from PortableApps.com including Notepad++, FileZilla, Audacity, Sudoku and Gimp. StarOffice comes pre-installed, and seems to do the job. (Although I’m using Google Apps a whole lot more now).
Overall I’m really pleased with the Eee PC. Plus points include the battery life which is phenomenal, screen resolution, portability and the video playback performance, even on an external monitor, is a pleasant surprise. The keyboard was very easy to get used to, however, I do miss not being able to scroll on the right edge of a trackpad. Wifi sensitivity and Bluetooth are also impressive. The built in webcam and microphone work nicely.
Cons include a noticeable lag at times and the speakers sometimes disappoint, but that’s about it. The only improvement I’d really like to see is a built in 3G modem.
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