I just bought an eeePC to play around with; some interest already in the office from staff, although I should have bought it in Pink so my assistant can steal it off of me

First impressions, a little fatter than I expected, and not as subnotebook as I'd like, but its light, and its got some oomph.

I'm looking at it as a spare laptop for vacation and or dev station.
Mine came with Xandros (in Chinese), but its a 2 second fix to change to English.

CTRL ALT T for terminal, /opt/xandros/bin/locale_dialog and choose 英文.

I'm still running Xandros, but will either run Puppy or EeeDora, if I can get the old DeadRat distaste out of my mouth. I usually prefer Debian...

Windows XP and OS X can be installed also, and apparently Vista, although that would be a little um, pointless. AmigaOS, and others are also doable - the little machine has taken a lot of converts to smaller OS's already.

Keyboard is a little chicletly, but its usable.

I loaned mine to someone visiting my office to use, he got Firefox and MSN (Pidgin), and Skype up and running without any assistance, so the Xandros setup is pretty ok for a Linux newbie. Skype and Pidgin didn't use the WebCam though for initial first use. (I didn't check myself, it might need extra setup for that)

For a handbag machine, its perfect. For a guy, its a little diminutive, but hey, its cheap, and did I mention its cheap.

Ok, for another 1000 (i paid 3000 for the 4G (not the 4G Surf)) I can buy a real laptop, but it doesn't fit in my bag without my feeling it.

The screen is small, but its usable, and the seems fast enough. Mine has already had some ram installed (I have a box of a zillion 512MB DDR2 in the office from many many MacBook upgrades), but even without, it was fine.

For what it is, its great.

Wifi (54M), USB2, SDHC SD Slot (can use 6Meg speed cards), and a 4G SSD drive.

4G is enough for what it is. Most of the other distributions sit at 300-500M, and you can stick files on a USB HDD if you want.


More links :

EeeDora: http://eeedora.rmbsanalytics.com/
Wiki: http://wiki.eeeuser.com/

Where can I get one of these?

My friend has one - he says there are shortages now and hard to find. Also, my experience has been that computer stuff tends to be slightly cheaper in the States, where I will be visiting next month. Are there any issues I should consider if I buy one in the States to bring back here? Compatibility issues with the wireless network card for example? Power cord? Software?

I'm trying to wean myself off Microsoft products and this looks like a great way to go. Of course its no substitute for the desktop machine, but for web surfing, email, chat, and the occasional document I might write while sitting in a cafe somewhere, this looks perfect.

The price in the states was approximately 20$ less.
Not really worth getting it there for no warranty here.
$399 in States (2872RMB). RMB3000 = not much more.

There are cheaper models, I got the one with the webcam. Without webcam (the 4G Surf, its about 200-300RMB cheaper). There is also a 2G version, but no stock. There is an 8G model, but no stock.

If you want one, I can order one for you, pickup from my office, can get same day as ordered.

One note - the keyboard is a little small. I played around with it at Bamboo last night. Its definitely usable, but it takes a little getting used to. Kind of like the keyboards from mid nineties laptops, some small things in different places.

No compatibilties for Wireless, its a standard. Power cord is apple style - regional adaptor clips off, and a standard usa/china two prong underneath flips up.

PSU is more like a phone adaptor, albeit 1 1/2 times larger. Its still quite small though.

Lawrence.

I bought one a couple of weeks ago, and I love it. I don't find the keyboard too bad, and in fact now when I type on the big keyboard I'm always hitting the wrong keys! (Well, not that bad, but it's amazing how you adapt.

I formatted my drive and installed Arch Linux on it, as even under the advanced user settings I was stuck with KDE and prefer GNOME for my desktop. Still have some issues to work out, but most of the important stuff is working.

Just a note: The web cam is not going to work with pidgin, which is another reason I installed a different OS, so I could get AMSN, since no one I video call uses skype, and pidgin doesn't support web cams, and from what I've read, they're not planning on supporting it anytime soon, because it's a pain to code.

I plan on upgrading to 2GB RAM, and if I get the balls, maybe soldering in a 32GB HD when I get back to Canada.


A good forum for information is http://forum.eeeuser.com/ . Can answer pretty much any questions that come up, and I found it was great to check before I decided which alternate Linux install to go with.

Lawrence,

Is that price (3000RMB) an advertised price at an Asus vendor or a price you'd have to bargain a bit at a stall to get?

Dunno. I ordered mine from Taobao, painless, and delivered 2 hours later.
Note 3000 for the 4G version was without fapiao, it was slightly more for "with fapiao".

The base price from Asus vendors is 3000 RMB, but I saw it for 2800 RMB from PDA Dream when I replaced my lost cellphone. I recommend buying a 4GB SD card to put in the expansion slot as Xandros takes up over 2 1/2 GB.

It's definitely captured people's imaginations. I got one for my wife to coax her out of being a technophobe. The principal at our school bought one and he loves it. We reckon it will be great for junior kids to carry around with them.

I might wait until the 8 or 10 inch screen models come out and hack it to be tethered to a cellphone for browsing RSS feeds on the subway. I might try to get WMwifiRouter that shares a GPRS signal using the cellphone's wifi. I haven't figured out how to secure that one yet. The alternative would be to buy a bluetooth dongle and dial into the Internet that way. Or, you could use Google Reader with Google Gears for offline browsing. The possibilities are amazing.

We bought a slightly oversized laptop soft vinyl envelope cover to keep it scratch free. Has anyone seen any decent covers for UMPCs. We paid 70 RMB for ours on the 3rd floor of HK Plaza.

It comes with a neoprome bag (or at least the 4G does)

Again, make sure on the models before you buy.
The 4G Surf is Cheaper, but no webcam, and less battery. - 2600-2700+-
I have the 4G, it has webcam + larger battery. 3000
8G no stock, but 3600-4000ish.

Official Prices:

http://www.asus.com.cn/products.aspx?l1 ... re=txt/246

(I paid 2999 for mine, but I think of that as 3000, although my staff disagree, but I'm the boss, so I'm right, bwhahahaha ahem.)

Thanks for the info. I'm seriously considering the 4G. Any idea when the larger screen models will come out?

I am interested in purchasing one of these...Lawrence, are you still offering for sale? What is the best way to get in touch?

Office details on my website (in the links)