Which Eee PC did you get?
It seems as though there are two models of the ASUS Eee PC 4G: the “7A” and the “7B.” Both are the same price ($399) and identical to the untrained eye. There is one difference: the 7B is missing the second mini-PCIe (PCI Express Mini Card) expansion connector.
Yes, that’s the slot that this forbes article talks about for expanding the storage of the Eee PC:
But Asustek clearly wants to connect with the first billion, too. For instance, the 2- to 8-gigabyte memory cards can be upgraded to 32 gigabytes
Apparently, they’re not so much interested in the first billion anymore.
How can you tell which one you have? The serial number starts with either “7A” or “7B.” This can be found on a sticker on the back of the Eee PC. Of course, to see for yourself if your Eee PC actually has the second Mini-PCIe slot, you have to destroy the little yellow tab covering the screws of the hatch on the bottom of the Eee PC. By doing this, you are voiding your Eee PC’s warranty. If your SSD dies within the next year, you not only don’t have a warranty to get it fixed, but also can’t pop in a new SSD storage module into the secondary Mini-PCIe slot- since there isn’t a connector for it.
Early reports indicated that the loss of the connector had to do with black colored units or units shipped to the United Kingdom. I can confirm now that my US Pearl White Eee PC 4G bought via Newegg does not have the second Mini-PCIe connector. It is a 7B unit.
I’m now left with no warranty and no second Mini-PCIe connector- on a device that cost exactly double the original announcement from way back in June.
The weirdest part is that it seems to just be missing the connector itself, which is just a piece of metal. Cost savings? $1.
Regardless, I’d like to hear what ASUS has to say about this. I’m not very happy at all.
[edit @ 1:10am]:
Apparently, according to this thread (thanks muha), there are some users with serial numbers that start with 7B that actually DO have mini-pcie connectors. What in the world is going on?
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Further on item #2 — I would argue that neither $350 nor $400 qualifies as “around 199.”
okay so here goes (is still mad that his last post was lost in “submit” black hole)
It doesn’t matter that it wasn’t promised. IT was included on sold units. That means that there is an implied promise that if you buy this you’ll get that, that’s a big deal if you ask me.
Also, *anything* in a computer that allows you to add more functionality to the unit is something worth keeping. If I can open up a door and add something to the computer and get a new feature through that slot, I’m that much more willing to buy it. I don’t care if you are some dummy off the street that can’t find the power button or an experianced user…there are still a lot of people that would like the ability to upgrade with a mini pci-e slot if they so chose to, even if they never do.
This thing about the warranty sticker sounds to be pointless griping….from the description I heard of the sticker, it’s one of those common warranty stickers that one could probably find pretty easily…I’m sure (from what i’ve heard on here) that you could use a smaller screwdriver to get the door off too. Either way it’s not a huge issue, just paste on another warranty sticker before you have to send it back…on this subject, whoever said “not opening that up until the year is up” This thing actually has a 2 year parts and labor warranty according to Newegg’s specs list. You might be waiting a little longer
To anyone still complaining about Asus screwing them on the price originally, get a life, it was 3 month old speculation and talk, things change as the project evolves, it’s just how it works.
We’ve got a black 4G surf coming in the mail tomorrow at work, I’ll base my *actual* opinion of this rig on that, because sadly enough, with everything that’s sorrounding this thing, good and bad, it’s still worth it
for $400 you can have a portable computer that will survive 2 years through warranty and won’t be a burden to haul.
I guess I’m glad I didn’t pay attention to the Eee until after it was released, lol. I don’t care about all this, I’m just really excited. I can’t wait until mine gets here on Mon/Tues!
The lack of the mini-PCIe doesn’t trouble me as much as having to void the warranty to expand the ram. I had never seen mention of the mini-PCIe in the official specs so I wasn’t actually expecting it initially.
If you notice in the Forbes article – Shen demonstrating opening up the back to upgrade memory had not been mentioned in the marketing materials. Part of the problem may be that the people at the top are not aware of how the machine is being crippled.
My white eeepc arrived on Friday. The serial # starts with 7B. However, I’m not ready to break the warranty seal so I don’t know whether mini-pcie is there.
When I remember that I paid about a thousand dollars for a Libretto 95 (with Windows 95) some years ago, I think $399 still represents a tremendous value considering the functionality that you DO get.
Why should a RAM upgrade be allowed to void the warranty?
Is the RAM not user serviceable like all other laptops?
I have to agree with what other users have already said… If it was never written down, you don’t really have the right to get pissed because of it… No official advertisement for the EEE mentions this connector, nor does it appear on the manual… So, if they included it in some of them, good for them, but it’s not as we have any right to be pissed at Asus. Yes, we may say “tough luck, mine doesn’t have it”, but nothing else… And regarding price…My two cents are this: Asus did make an annoucement at the beginning saying it would be around $200, but indipendently of that, all discussions over the price were posted at non-official Asus sites (like this one), and were basically rumors… besides that, if you don’t really feel like paying $400, no one is forcing you to buy one. The fact that they are selling like hot cakes means simply that Asus was correct (market wise) in selling them at $400, as enough people would buy them anyway, as it is still a great deal…of course, it would have been better at $200, but I don’t regret for a second having spent $400 for mine…
7B with the connector – bought 11/19 from NewEgg
I have had my E over two weeks now, and am very pleased with it. I upped the memory to 1 gig, installed a nLite formed XP and in many ways outperforms my dual core Toeshiba. All this wringing of hands over this slot is pointless. As others of said by the time that type of memory drops enough in price where it would be a real option for the E, it will be more cost effective just to upgrade to the latest E like machine.
Mine works as advertised and then some…..
Bremen, good to hear a realistic (straight-to-the-point) voice. Can you please clarify what a “nLite formed XP” is and if you can have this alongside Linux? Thanks!
hmmm, makes me wonder if Asus was trying to hide something by putting the warranty void sticker on the panel in the first place?
You can check these to see if you have the pcie port by taking out the screw on the side with no warranty tape. then pop up the panel along that side being careful not to break it then look under it to see. I don’t like the idea of getting less for the same money when it would cost asus at most a $1 to put the upgrade option on all of these eee pcs. The soured me for sure. When all you guys with no pcie port need a hard drive replacment, good luck on your sd card option its really slow to run an os from sd or usb. It will be a slow brick.
I have a white 79B00, haven’t bothered to check for the connector. I have an 8GB SDHC card living permanently in the slot. Why would I care about a connector that allows me to (potentially) expand my Eee’s SSD at a cost that significantly exceeds that of the notebook itself? Especially considering the fact that I was able to double its built in SSD with the SDHC card for $55. In terms if SSD this is a ludicrous argument. Now if that connector offered some other appealing function then maybe I could see the point.
Sorry I meant 79OAA.
@Seraphim
Check the WIKI on this site and you will see instructions on installing XP. Including in those is the link to nLite and the instructions on it. After the install I searched on the site and found how to remove the page file from XP. Bottom line is after installing XP I had nearly 3gig free on the installed “hard drive”. There is a lot of really good information on this site, just spend some time searching around….
For those who think ssd pcie cards will be expensive forever probably thought a 500gb hard drive would never exist for ~$100, just go down to compusa and check for yourself. SSD hard drives will be cheap and soon, all hard drives will be ssd soon. SSD is 20 times faser than sd or usb,ssd is not the same as sd or usb at all. SD is very slow in case you have not ried that before no matter how fast the card says it runs, the interface is slow. The superfast pcie will come in handy in a year, trust me for a few lucky ones
48-49: What part of *THE $199 Eee PC WAS A 2G DON’T YOU GET?*
Like I posted, get a clue. The 4G was never announced at $199 by ASUS – and it’s the 4G that is being sold at $399, not the 2G. Your complaints have no merit. Just because a company makes a product introduction announcement that they want to sell their shiny new product at $X at some point in the future doesn’t mean they have any requirement to do so at the actual product sales launch anyway. The 2G still isn’t on sale so any complaints about the $199 Eee PC are invalid. ASUS has since also said that the $199 is for bulk 2G orders only.
All preorder retailers were *not* showing the same details, thus much of the speculation/controversy before the actual launch. If you bothered to payed attention to the preorder sales sites most disclaimed price and spec changes anyway, so the point is invalid because *THEY KNEW IT MIGHT CHANGE*. A few offered refunds if the specs or price varied, but I’m not aware of anyone being refunded on a claim.
You still have no beef against ASUS for bait and switch or price gouging or whatever because you used a preorder company. If you see a Best Buy ad for an Eee PC 4G for $399 and walk in to find them on sale for $450 you’re still only going to be able to file a bait and switch against Best Buy, not ASUS. For the third time, get a clue. Retailers are not ASUS and if they publish bad specs it is on them, not ASUS.
This blog is less about bait and switch and not really about price. The fact is ASUS did change the spec of the ASUS eeepc, they originally had a pcie hard drive upgrade port, now they do not for the same price, less specs for the same price is what people don’t like. If they put a slower processor in an smaller screen, whould you still not understand what people are complaining about? People don’t like to loose options for the same money.
stephan: My issue isn’t about the missing mini PCIe port – when I get an Eee I’d rather get one that has it. I get that people don’t like spec changes, but I’m trying to get people to realized that much of it was MEDIA SPECULATION that gave them the false expectations that they have/had. Have the specs changed from the initial October release, other than the mini PCIe slot (which was never ADVERTISED anyway!) or has the MSRP changed? It’s not that I don’t get it about people complaining, but they are mostly complaining about crap that is easily refuted once you look past the frenzied hype of the past several months. Expecting the 4G to sell at $199 is a false belief because there never was a 4 GB model for $199 announced by ASUS. If you think it was, show me the press release. I’ve already linked to the original $199 release where it mentions 2 GB. Link a release where the mini PCIe is promised and maybe there will be valid complaints about the missing slot.
Until then it’s all whining because noone wanted to look for the *truth* beyond the media hype (not ASUS hype).
The best hack of an Eee PC to date award goes to….. tnkgrl – where bluetooth was added (of course need to do some soldering). Modding the Asus 701 (Eee) – Bluetooth « tnkgrl Mobile your creative mind and love to hack eee pc, then you can try this hack which was demonstrated by tnkgrl
Of course, without the Mini PCIe, then some products like this in the following link, will not work in the newer Eee PC (without the Mini PCIe slot ) -Vaulter Disk is a flash-based, standard-sized mini PCIe module.
see:
http: //asuseeehacks.blogspot.com/2007/11/sandisks-vaulter-disk.html
Has anyone tried this flash extending Mini PCIe “Valuter Disk” yet?
http://asuseeehacks.blogspot.com/2007/11/sandisks-vaulter-disk.html
So, since not everyone with a 7B is missing the slot… it’s not really “True”, is it?
stephan: No one doubts that the SSD price will drop eventually. However, the problem is the sales volume. Gartner projects global consumption of SSDs in consumer and business notebooks to leap from about 4 million units in 2007 to 32 million units in 2010. So there is not much chance that SSD will replace hard drive in the near future. Even at 32 million units, the volume is still too low comparing to hard drive to take advantage of the economic of sale and drive down the price dramatically. By 2010, you would probably want to have a more advance version of eee anyway. So the mini-PCIe slot is a non-issue.
What you guys are not realizing is that pcie is not just for SSD…. pcie is an interface, and a fast one at that. There also will be adaptors shortly that will allow pcie ports to support small form factor hard drives ie pcie to ata interfaces (aka a 30-100 gigabyte 1.8 inch hard drive+) or pcie to high capacity fast cf cards etc. To say the pcie is non-issue is naive. Would you like a eepc with a full speed ata 30 gig hard drive picked up off ebay for 70 bucks?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160185169674
This is possible with pcie. All of these adaptors available for mini-pci(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_PCI) now and will be soon for pcie, mini-pci’s replacement, do some research.
Asus also did originally announce that these would be 199-299, well they are 399-499 exactly 100 dollars more than they said. I do think that the eepc is a good value at 399-499 though and don’t complain about price, but the price did go up.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2142026,00.asp
ASUS did not promise a pcie port, but the absence of one make it not a usable computer to me 4 gigs is just not alot and no upgrade options is cheap, sd and usb are slow, look it up. So I love the eepc but with no upgrade option it is worthless to me. I am getting one with the pcie slot off ebay, I had a pcie eeepc on nov 1st before but sold it to my brother since he liked it thinking the slot would be in the next one I got but it was not, hence I returned it, I don’t want alot less for my money like some people just to make asus $1 more on my purchse, I do think ASUS is an awesome company, my geforce 2 was from them
And I have been a fan ever since 
If enough people complain, asus will put the port back. I think some people work for asus here as much as they want them to make money off us… at the expense of our upgrade future, so it is ok if they remove the upgrade port for ram too? They can solder it on if they want to and save even more at our expense. They never said we should be able to upgrade ram right?
Groklaw Reader: The slot is there, the bracket to slide the card into and make use of the pins is missing…you should still be able to solder to the right pins if you do the bluetooh mod…
btw: Warranty shouldn’t be such an issue with you nutters…peel it off, put it back later…messed it up? buy one, if they are the generic warranty stickers that have been described by eee users it should be easy to find one with some effort online.
we just got the black 4g surf delivered at work, waiting to finally check this thing out.
… so the 8G is out?!
woohoo!
7B here. Purchased from Directron last week. No connector.
I’m sold on the EEE…we unpackaged it and powered it up and it was love at first sight, all the deleted hardware just kind of melted away…the keyboard is pretty easy to get the hang of, even for touch typing with larger fingers…it’s quick enough and my boss that knows nothing about linux is able to use it and is even working through some howtos (with help) to get a start menu and other things added to it.
I don’t understand what the big deal is here.
Maybe if you’re one of the 8 or so people who are actually going to use the MiniPCI-e slot then I can see your point, but it’s really nothing to cry about.
(Incidentally, I have a 7A with the slot but I don’t expect I’ll ever need it.)
Gathering info as I read this post made me formulate a theoretical situation.
NOTE: The below ideas are from OTHER USERS. I simply made a CONNECTION BETWEEN THEM to formulate a logical situation.
So here goes…
Originally, Asus had in mind that EPC users would keep upgrading, just like Apple and iPod users.
However, the clear difference would be that users WILL find transferring between old and new EPC a pain in the ass.
Asus’ solution, and a clever one at that, is to release “backuppers”, which go in the 2nd mini pcie slot.
How it works is the backupper will be of the same size as the “old EPC”’s SSD storage (for the sake of users needing to keep upgrading the backupper along with new EPCs as storage grows), and you plug it into the 2nd mini pcie slot.
When it’s plugged in and detected as empty, and you bootup, your OS will not load. Instead, the backupper will trigger an automated full system backup onto the backupper. Once everything is backed up, the old EPC will format itself.
Once that’s done, slap the backupper into the new EPC. When the backupper is detected as non-empty, the EPC will format itself and copy everything from backupper to EPC’s SSD, then format backupper. Done, now users have a 2-step solution to transferring between EPC and Asus is happy.
But Microsoft isn’t.
MS doesn’t like the idea that new EPCs need not buy new Windows copies. And what if hackers find a way to make the backupper not format itself after copying, or the old PC does not format after backingup? Then multiple EPCs can load Windows into their SSD EFFORTLESSLY! No, MS does not like the idea at all.
Hence, MS offered to pay Asus to throw the backupper plan down the drain. Microsoft probably paid Asus A LOT for Asus to do so (I mean, come on, Asus is throwing away a potential get-rich-quick scheme similar to iPods), or MS is paying Asus in continuous payments, not single payment.
Random notes:
- The mini pcie is hidden behind “void if broken” seal, meaning once users transfer to new EPCs, old EPCs are no longer under warranty. Though, users will not complain as much because they have a new EPC to use anyways. Perfect balance between keeping costs to a minimum and keeping users from bitching about things, if you catch my drift.
- The mini pcie is not mentioned in specs because Asus only intends on it being used by the backupper. It is kept a secret because user-end expendability cripples the iPod-scheme and goes against Asus’ reason for putting in the 2nd mini pcie slot. Hence the “void if broken” seal — if you add a 16gb SSD there, and it breaks, then it’s not their fault. They didn’t want you to do that anyways, just get their next generation EPC!
I seriously doubt this is a conspiracy by MS to keep people from pirating Windows.
There are already far too many easier ways to pirate the OS.
Hahutzy, I award you the Medal of Internet Conspiracy for your brave efforts. Now go forth on the newsgroups and spread your message!
I think some need to understand why others are upset about this, I think the non-belivers will relent when there are pcie to ata 1.8 inch hard drive adaptors, that already exist for mini-pci and will exist soon for pcie. Which means for the non-technical that you could slap a 70 dollar 30 gig hard drive into an eee pc and run it at full speed, but only if you have a pcie slot
Asus also did originally announce that these would be 199-299, well they are 399-499 exactly 100 dollars more than they said. I do think that the eepc is a good value at 399-499 though and don’t complain about price, but the price did go up.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2142026,00.asp
Also if enough people complain, and if enough people understand the relevance, ASUS will put the $1 port back.
http://vip.asus.com/forum/topic.aspx?board_id=20&SLanguage=en-us
But where in your link does it state that the $199 or $299 model is the 4G that is for sale at $349-399, or the 8G at $499? That’s the big issue that people are mistaken and are complaining about. The 4G is not what was promised at $199 — a 2G was inferred at “around $199,” and even so that promise of a $199 2G is not bound by anything anyway. It’s not an apples to apples comparison to complain about a system with better specs selling for more. Until the basic bottom end 2G is on sale and we have a hard MSRP for it the $199 argument has no merit. Period.
Your comment of the mini PCIe card adapter to a 1.8 inch drive might not fit. A quick Google search brought up a mini PCIe card at 2.2×0.8×0.2″.
http://www.softwareforless.com/findspecs.asp?partid=61820C
True, but why even say it will be 199 if you know prices will vary, maybee to get people hiped up about it? The eee pc surf was supposed to be 199, its 299. The 4g was supposed to be 299 it is 399. 100 dollars more, but still a good deal for a umpc like computer.
Here are some idea of what they can do with mini-pcie… these are mini-pci cards but they will do the same with mini-pcie since mini-pcie is a replacement for mini-pci.
http://www.globalamericaninc.com/index.php?cPath=55_57
Look at the Mini-PCI Type-IIIB Card with 124-pin interface
It can be and will be done with mini-pcie too.
The size of the pcie card is irrelivant, it just needs a connetor for a mini hard drive interface or compact flash card and it will run at full speed, not slow sd or usb2
The size is very important if you want to fit into an Eee PC…
I was refering to smaller hard drives like a 1″ microdrive
http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=349854&sid=22c88023167c2c8397bd4c7ff3fbc7e7
@Stephen
“Here are some idea of what they can do with mini-pcie… these are mini-pci cards but they will do the same with mini-pcie since mini-pcie is a replacement for mini-pci.”
Where did you get this information from? You’re clearly wrong.
The PCIe Mini Card is a replacement for the Mini PCI card found on many Mini-ITX mainboards. It is half the size of a Mini PCI card, measuring 30 mm x 51 mm. It has a 52-pin edge connector as opposed to the 100-pin stacking connector of Mini PCI Type I & II cards and the 124-pin edge connector of Mini PCI Type III. The new card is modeled after the Mini PCI Type III, but is sans side retaining clips.
Wow you all are getting a bit uptight about what? A laptop. It’s not the end of the world. Buy it or not.
It reminds me of the hoo-ha when Apple dropped the (unadvertised) Mezzanine slot from the original iMac…
Where can you buy a mini pci-e connector to solder on?
I DON”T GET IT! Why would anyone want a dumbed down laptop, which was most likely conceived as a device for people way on the other side of the digital divide, eons away from where most of the people posting on this site live — for those who do not know the digital divide relates to people who have no PC, nor access to PCs, through a lack of the resources/opportunity etc to own one…hence the low price concept — you then buy the pathetic “Yet oooohhhh so stylish” EEEPC then want to beef them up and pull them apart and carry on like it’s your birthright to do so and moan about the process. I SAY, GET OVER IT! Rather than buy the next widget most of you clearly do not need, consider the Negroponte concept and support the OLPC project and leave ASUS to wither and wane as they clearly deserve to, for their deceptive and manipulative goings on in respect of this product.
idgi, you really don’t get it.. The Eee machine is not dumbed down, it is an innovation. It is a first of its kind device and we are all excited to be part of it. And judging by your comment you don’t own one, because if you did you would have a different perspective. It’s not only stylish and small, its also the start of something really big… change.
The machine was built on innovation, being the first mass produced and cheap solid state flash memory laptop out there. If we bought it, it is obvious we bought into that concept, so the fact that many users want to upgrade, hack, or overclock their units should come as no surprise.
For a laptop, the Eee PC is extremely small and lightweight with still a useable screen and keyboard and it is shockproof (no harddisk). It has anything I need ‘on the road’, I can write letters, use e-mail, surf the web, work in spreadsheets, create or view presentations, store and view photos I take. In short, it is the ideal machine to take with me always and anywhere, complementing my desktop machine at home.
The Eee PC is cheap, anything remotely comparable is at least twice the price of this little gem.
The Eee PC is a beauty, a little machine you want to be seen with.
I feel no desire to tinker with it and I am sure that will be true for most users. The ‘geek’ factor is overrepresented in these internet forums and blogs.
I will order one as soon as the 8G will be available in the Netherlands.
Chris,
You are quoting this article which is about mini-itx boards: http://www.logicsupply.com/blog/2007/10/16/what-is-the-pcie-mini-card-why-now/
But that does not mean mini pcie is not a replacement for mini pci slot on laptops as well. Your quote actually proves my point that mini pcie is a replacement for mini pci. It is the same thing as pci slots on motherboards being replaced with pci express slots now. They are actualy thr same thing as the desktop motherboard slots just in a smaller form factor.
Cyb3rGlitch
Get it here:
http://www.twinner.com.tw/SearchProduct/ProductContext.php?Product_SN=59824
Ronald, as someone who has travelled often in the Netherlands, I have always admired the abililty of the Dutch to express so succinctly, in English, the bleedin obvious. I hope that Asus reads these blogs from the real users, who don’t want to pimp their kit, just use it for what it is intended to be used for. Hurrah for Ronald!
The 8G is out in asia
Eee PCs with the pcie slot are going for 500-550 on ebay now. Since they are upgradable 
Im waiting for the 32G eeepc now, haha.
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