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Photo by Lois Pryce, schoolkids in Algeria

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Photo of Lois Pryce, UK
and schoolkids in Algeria



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  #1  
Old 23 Jul 2007
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Laptop virtually perfect for the road

Just came across this

ASUS Eee PC - official site
Asus Eee PC: £199 Linux laptop - Crave at CNET.co.uk - more details
ASUS Eee PC - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - even more details

It's virtually ideal for travelling - solid state hard drive - so no moving parts to get trashed - and it's dirt cheap £199.

It has wi-fi, 4,8 or 16gb solid state hard drive, 4 usb ports, ships with a nice little linux variant (very easy to use) that boots in 15 seconds and comes pre-loaded with open office, skype and firefox.

It's exactly what I've been looking for - they come out next month... time to put some cash aside I think!

m
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Last edited by mattcbf600; 23 Jul 2007 at 15:49. Reason: added wikipedia link
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  #2  
Old 24 Jul 2007
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The first site .. looks to be all flash photos and stuff .. the wilpeadia is more useful .. looks like it will run windows XP .. so could be used for Garmin GPS Mapsource stuff .. nice find.

Note some criticism on the wilpeadia site ..

"Video resolution of the Eee PC-701's 7 inch screen is only 800x480 pixels, the same as Nokia's N800 4.1 inch screen. This will prevent usage with some software and will likely make navigating many web sites much more difficult."
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  #3  
Old 24 Jul 2007
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Difficult but not impossible. Have you ever tried browsing on a 320x240 PDA?
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  #4  
Old 24 Jul 2007
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Yes it's certainly not a fully featured laptop with stunning resolution - but that's what makes is perfect for travelling I think...

It would be good to have a larger screen resolution and it looks as if the 10'' version will - but what people have been saying is that on a 7'' screen anything larger than 800x600 is almost impossible to read - which makes a certain amount of sense I suppose.
Big ticks for me have to be..

* Solid state hard drive - it aint gonna break
* Small form factor - I can tuck it away anywhere
* So cheap if it dies, it's not the end of the world
* Built in wi-fi
* USB ports so I can connect my phone, camera etc

I guess it's that in-between step from a PDA (less than 800!) and a laptop - I'm sure I'm not going to be surfing the apple trailers site whilst I'm out on the road - but I'll certainly be ploughing through my various RSS feeds, maybe booking ferries etc, and updating my blog and sending emails.

I don't have a Garmin so I don't have to worry about MapSource I guess - I'd also be very hesitant about running XP on it - it's got very good specs for an OS that takes up less than 500mb of disk space - but it's going to struggle with one that takes up 4gb!
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Last edited by mattcbf600; 24 Jul 2007 at 11:03. Reason: Formating was all to pot
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  #5  
Old 26 Jul 2007
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Me likey a lot.

Shame the 10" isnt out until 2008.
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  #6  
Old 26 Jul 2007
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Yes I know what you mean - I've got a pre-order in on the 7'' - I'll report back when I've had a play.

m
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  #7  
Old 30 Jul 2007
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If this thing can handle my mapsource for Garmin, I'm definately buying.
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  #8  
Old 30 Jul 2007
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Well it's linux based so unless you remove that and install Windows XP then I'm afraid it wont :-(
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  #9  
Old 30 Jul 2007
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Little laptop

Hi Guy, I needed a small sized PC for work. I travel all over the UK/Europe. Kent to the Shetland Isles, Spain etc. Yes on the bike.
So I got a Flybook. It certainly is the business, every connection you could need, including SIM card slot, 9" 1224x780 touch screen, 80Gb HD. It even has a kevlar carry case.
Bit pricey though.
Flybook
I'm planning South America for next year.
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Old 30 Jul 2007
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Quote:
Originally Posted by The_gypsy View Post
Hi Guy, I needed a small sized PC for work. I travel all over the UK/Europe. Kent to the Shetland Isles, Spain etc. Yes on the bike.
So I got a Flybook. It certainly is the business, every connection you could need, including SIM card slot, 9" 1224x780 touch screen, 80Gb HD. It even has a kevlar carry case.
Bit pricey though.
Flybook
I'm planning South America for next year.
Wow... beautiful machine, the new one with built in everything is a dream! But at 1.5k... wow that's a hunk of money!

m
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  #11  
Old 30 Jul 2007
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mattcbf600 View Post
Wow... beautiful machine, the new one with built in everything is a dream! But at 1.5k... wow that's a hunk of money!

m
Jeeesus.

Bit much to spend on a laptop that rattles around in a backbox. This isnt a GS forum you know
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  #12  
Old 31 Jul 2007
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mattcbf600 View Post
Wow... beautiful machine, the new one with built in everything is a dream! But at 1.5k... wow that's a hunk of money!

m

here here!!!
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  #13  
Old 30 Jul 2007
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mattcbf600 View Post
Well it's linux based so unless you remove that and install Windows XP then I'm afraid it wont :-(
Ugh, ofcourse .

Oh well.
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  #14  
Old 16 Oct 2007
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mattcbf600 View Post
Well it's linux based so unless you remove that and install Windows XP then I'm afraid it wont :-(
Hm.. The cost of adding Windoze will probably double the cost of the machine!

There must be some existing software out there for Linux that supports export to GPX file format, which most Garmins seem to support.
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  #15  
Old 21 Oct 2007
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Latest news on the configurations

Asus launches tiny PC | Reg Hardware
Asus UK, for instance, will be offering only the 4G, for £219 including VAT. It will also offer a version of the 4G with an internal 3G HSDPA card - however, the add-ins price has yet to be set.
The interesting news is that Asus have said that you can run Windows on the tiny machine, in fact they've put together all the drivers you need
While the Eee PCs are designed to run Linux, they will operate with Windows XP too, and Asus has already posted a stack of drivers necessary for folk who do want to use the Microsoft OS.

But frankly if the only UK version is the 4gb you're going to struggle to install a usable version of that favourite Microsoft OS.

I'd much prefer to pay a little more and get the 8gb version, but that would involve purchasing from abroad. It's also not clear at this stage if the UK 4gb version is the baby with or without the built in webcam, and what the memory option is - the standard ships with 512mb but the 8gb comes with 1gb DDR memory - a substantial increase.

I guess we'll know more when they hit the shops.

m

EDIT - Okay here are the UK spec machines you can buy right now

Asus Laptop - S6F-3029P, Leather Notebook -

They still appear to be on pre-order but they are UK spec - 4gb, with webcam and a choice between 512mb or 1gb RAM.
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