eee – Open Thinkering

I’ve sold my Asus Eee 4G. What now?

Posted on May 28, 2008 by Doug Belshaw

I’m a bit of a sucker for gadgets. I keep telling myself that I should hold out for the second generation of things, but I just get carried away again and again. That’s not to say that I don’t buy quality stuff; quite the opposite in fact. Yesterday I sold my Asus Eee 4G to @moodlehotpotato (Mary Cooch) after a brief Twitter chat, Skype chat and Paypal payment. It wasn’t because it didn’t serve a need – it was because there was so much potential there I wanted something that could fulfil that need to the max! 😀

There’s many sites and blogs that have waxed lyrical about the Asus Eee 4G. From a teacher’s point of view, this is what I liked about mine:

The size and weight mean I can carry it one-handed from one classroom to another. As I teach History in my classroom and ICT in various other classrooms, this is great.
Internet connectivity is great: wi-fi is painless to set up
I could take it to meetings instead of a pen and paper.
My use of it makes staff and students alike want one. It makes the school purchasing a set more likely.
It runs a version of Linux customised for that particular device. Anyone who’s used OSX on an Apple computer knows the difference this makes… 🙂

So if it’s so great, why have I sold it? Well, three reasons:

The screen, whilst useable, is a bit small. Newer models have 8.9″ screens instead of 7″ which enables them to utilise a 1024 pixel-width resolution. This makes all the difference when web browsing. Who designs sites for 800×600 in this day and age? (my web stats show that less than 2% of visitors to this site, for example)
It hasn’t got Bluetooth built in – I purchased a micro-USB dongle, but it was a hassle to setup. I want things to be straightforward. Newer models have Bluetooth built-in.
Battery life, whilst acceptable at a shade under 2 hours in normal use, could be better. Newer models, based on Intel’s Atom processor, promise to drastically improve on that.

So what am I going to buy? Well, a post about 4P Computing over at OLPC News (Price, Performance, Portability and Price) showed that only three met the criteria for a true Netbook:

4PC Name	Power	Perform	Portability	Price
Asus Eee PC	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Classmate/2Go PC	No	Yes	No	Yes
Elonex One	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Everex Cloudbook	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
HP Mini-Note PC	No	Yes	No	No
Norhtec Gecko	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
OLPC XO-1	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes

Of those, the Elonex One only actually has a 300mhz (must have been a mistake), the OLPC XO-1 is garish and not easy to come by in the UK, and the Norhtec Gecko only has a 7″ screen. It was obvious that I was going to have to cast my net wider, which is where the Low-Cost Laptop Cheat Sheet over at Laptop Magazine proved helpful. I’ve taken off the column about US availability as well as removed any that aren’t available in the UK (at least not according to Google Product Search). Finally, I took off any that had 7″ screens, changed the price to GBP, added the Asus Eee 900 and HP Mini-Note, and reproduced what’s left of the table below:

Laptop Name	Price	Operating System	Processor	Storage	Display Size	Webcam
Asus EeePC 900	£329.99	Linux/Windows XP	900 MHz Intel Celeron-M ULV 353	12GB SSD (WinXP) 20GB SSD (Linux)	8.9″	1.3 megapixels
HP 2133 Mini-Note	£349.99	Linux/Windows Vista	Via C7-M 1.2Ghz	120GB HDD	8.9″	0.3 megapixels
Asus EeePC 901	£499.99 (pre-order price, likely to be c.£400)	Linux/Windows XP	Intel Atom	8GB SSD (WinXP) 12GB or 20GB SSD (Linux)	8.9″	1.3 megapixels
MSI Wind	£334.95	Linux/Windows XP	Intel 945GMS Atom	80GB HDD	10″	1.3 megapixels

I paid £219 for my Asus Eee 701, so as you can see my next purchase is going to cost me at least 50% more. But which one shall I choose? Here’s the main positive/negative points about each one as far as I can see:

Asus EeePC 900

Advantages: Available now, multi-touch trackpad, lightweight, same size as 701.
Disadvantages: No Bluetooth, 901 coming out shortly.
Reviews:

HP 2133 Mini-Note

Advantages: Sleek metal body, WXGA screen, huge hard disk, optional Bluetooth, available now.
Disadvantages: Some users complain of fan noise, processor quite slow.

Reviews:

Asus EeePC 901

Advantages: Bluetooth, Intel Atom processor (improved battery life).
Disadvantages: Potentially expensive, not available now (early June).
Pre-release specs: I4U (unconfirmed)

MSI Wind

Advantages: Bluetooth, 4-in-1 card reader, 10″ screen, Intel Atom processor (improved battery life).
Disadvantages: Not available now (early June), likely to be significantly bigger than Asus Eee.

Pre-release specs: PC Advisor

The Verdict

It looks like if I’m going to buy now, it’s the HP 2133 Mini-Note or the Asus EeePC 900. If I can wait until mid-June, I’ve got the option of Netbooks with the new Intel Atom processors – namely the MSI Wind and Asus EeePC 901.

I’ll probably wait. But if I don’t, then here’s the HP and Eee 900 head-to-head:

Feature	HP 2133 Mini-Note	Asus EeePC 900
Dimensions (WxDxH)	25.5 x 16.5 x 3.3cm	22.5 x 17 x 3.4cm
Weight	2.63lbs (1.27kg)	2.2lbs (1kg)
Screen size	8.9″ WXGA	8.9″
Processor	Via C7-M 1.2Ghz	Intel Celeron M ULV 900Mhz
Memory	1GB	1GB
Operating System	Linux or Windows Vista	Linux or Windows XP
Battery Life	c.2 hours	c.3.5 hours
Storage	120GB HDD	12GB or 20GB
Bluetooth	Yes	No
WLAN	802.11a/b/g	802.11b/g
Keyboard size	92%	80%
Multitouch trackpad	No (scroll zone)	Yes
Webcam	0.3 megapixel	1.3 megapixel
ExpressCard/54 slot	Yes	No
SD card reader	Yes	No
Case	Anodised aluminium	Plastic

I reserve the right to make a carefully-considered, well-researched impulse purchase… 😉

New Asus eee user? Read this!

Posted on March 27, 2008 by Doug Belshaw

This is my first blog post using the powerful combination of my new (replacement) Asus eee and the Scribefire plugin for Firefox. 🙂

The purpose of this post is to demonstrate how I have setup my eee for better productivity (i.e. made it more powerful whilst retaining ease-of-use). I think you’ll agree that my setup at least looks good:

There’s two programs/scripts I used to get to the above. I was made aware of these by the excellent Eeeuser.com wiki, which should definitely be your first port of call! In particular, the following are very useful:

pimpmyeee (a script that turns on and turns off features – includes themes, icons, ‘Advanced Mode’, etc.)
TweakEEE (a program that is installed to the Settings tab and allows you to modify the Easy Mode user interface)

By using these two programs/scripts I now have the advantage of being able to use the fantastic Easy Mode whilst having the power and flexibility of accessing the Start Menu. This means I can install and access programs such as Frostwire and the GIMP quickly and easily using Synaptic Package Manager:

How have YOU modified your eee? Are you pleased with the results?:p

Technorati Tags: Asus, eee, theme, Scribefire, Firefox, howto, modifications, Linux

Eee-aye, eee-aye, eee-aye… oh.

Posted on March 24, 2008 by Doug Belshaw

Last Sunday I managed to track down an Asus eee. There’s been a lot of hype about these little laptops with their 7″ screens. I was all prepared to starting writing a review of how useful mine’s been when… it’s stopped working.

Well, that’s not strictly true. It still works. It’s just that the left mouse button, which is on a kind of rocker switch beneath the trackpad, has stopped working. If I plug in a USB mouse it works fine – but that’s not the point, is it?

So it will be going back tomorrow. It would seem I’m not the only one with this problem. Something to do with leaving it running and overheating. Me? Using a laptop too much? Shurely not… 😉

Update: After 45 minutes in Toys ‘R’ Us (yes, that’s where I bought it from – nowhere else had any in stock!) I got a replacement. The only one they had left was the display model. I took it as it’s in good condition and actually the 701 model. This means that it’s easier to overclock and upgrade! Oh, and I also managed to wangle a £10 gift voucher. 😀