[10/27/07 2:07am edit: had to switch the galleries to flickr as the self-hosted one uses up way too many resources]
[10/26/07 3:44pm edit: more pictures can be found here]
Click here to view the first impressions gallery (more pictures coming tomorrow)…
Let me begin by summarizing the Eee PC in four words: It’s worth the wait.
Four months ago, ASUS announced the Eee PC- a tiny, affordable, full-featured laptop. It was music to our ears- the ultimate portable gadget. Most of us have spent those last four months “guestimating” on when they would be released- and tormenting ourselves with excitement over speculation. To be fair, four months is actually pretty fast in getting a product to the market- much faster than many recent tech items. The Eee PC 4G was recently released in Taiwan on October 16th, and will be launching in the United States in the coming days.
Thanks to the folks at ASUS, an Eee PC arrived at my doorstep this morning. It was love at first sight.
The first shock came while opening the mailing package. Inside was the Eee PC product box. It was small- about the same size as a motherboard box. For some reason, I expected it to be much bigger.
Soon, I had the ASUS Eee PC 701 4G in my hand. It’s tiny. Good tiny. Tiny as in: take two DVD cases and put them on top of each other and the result is just slightly smaller than the Eee PC. From front to back, the Eee PC is about the size of a Nestle Crunch candy bar and from left to right it’s about 1 1/3 Nestle Crunch candy bars. I put the Eee PC in my shoulder bag today and barely noticed it in there, unlike how i always can notice when i carry my current 12″ notebook.
Also in the box were guidebooks, an AC adapter, and a case. I haven’t had a chance to read the guidebooks yet, so I’ll get back to you on that later. A quick glance did show that they include instructions for installing Windows XP, instructions for doing a system restore, and a CD with the manual and Windows XP drivers on it. The AC adapter is great- small enough that you can take it with you without taking up much space. But even better: the plug prongs are both small (instead of the one small one large variety) so you can plug it in an electrical outlet upside down if needed. The case is a form fitting neoprene sleeve- something that I would have actually paid extra money for as an accessory. It’s nice quality.
The best way to describe the Eee PC would be: proportional. The keyboard, screen, and touchpad all seem to be the proper size. Nothing is too big or too small. I’m not saying that a larger screen size on it wouldn’t be a welcome addition for some- but the screen is great how it is. The keyboard is not that much of a switch from typing on my Dell 710m laptop, just a little smaller. The touch pad is nice as well. I’m not too fond of the tightness of the physical mouse button(s)- i know that sounds ridiculous- but the button is a little tough to push down and it makes a loud clicking noise. I’m sure that over time it will soften up- and besides- I tend to do the tap-on-the-touchpad for a click anyway. By the way- the physical button is both a left and a right mouse button depending on which side you press it at.
Turning on and off the Eee PC is shockingly fast. It turns on in about 20-22 seconds and off in about 9 seconds.
The screen is absolutely gorgeous. It can go from very dim to very bright with many settings in between. I’m interested to see how the different brightness levels affect battery life. Whites are especially vivid and crisp. The screen is definitely high quality and makes the Eee PC a pleasure to use. The resolution is good as well. There’s enough screen real estate for almost all websites to work perfectly. PDF files look great on the Eee PC as well, so long as you view one page at a time. If you try to view pages side by side, it is still readable, but the text is a bit too small for me.
Of course, to the left and right of the screen are the rather large speakers. Unfortunately, if you turn the Eee PC against light properly, you can see that there are only speaker openings at the top- the bottom is just decor. Still, the sound quality is good- they are your typical laptop speakers.
The Eee PC comes loaded with software- Firefox, OpenOffice, Pidgin, etc. The Linux interface is really nice- very polished. There are plenty of different settings to play with as well, and four different “themes” for the Eee PC interface. I was surprised not to see a “terminal” application- in fact, I still can’t even find the Linux terminal. It must be around there somewhere…
The wireless networking card is great. It found many more networks than my other wireless devices can find, and the range appears to be superb. The network manager too is solid and works well, remembering the networks that you connect to often.
I’ve shown the Eee PC to several of my friends in person and all of the responses are always positive, even from people who are not extremely interested in technology. People are impressed with the size and functionality, and sold once they hear the price range. Many people guess that it is much more expensive.
There are, however, several quirks. The battery indicator only shows the percentage left- but does not estimate the time left. I suppose after I use it for a while, I’ll have my own idea of how much time is left, so it’s not too big of an issue. The clock in my system tray is in 24h mode rather than 12h am/pm. Not sure if I just missed a setting, maybe? Also, there is no ~` key in the top left of the keyboard. [Edit: The ~` key is oddly placed to the right of the esc key.] Granted, in all the years of computing I’ve probably used that key only once or twice. What makes it odd on the Eee PC, however, is that the “1″ key is where the ~` key normally is, so i’ve been hitting “2″ instead of “1″ accidentally. [edit: Also, F1 is not directly next to Esc.] No big deal- just a little something to get used to.
Ultimately, the Eee PC meets all of my personal expectations and actually exceeds many as well. I’m really pleased with the size of the Eee PC along with the high quality screen. The software interface is also easy to operate. I’m excited to explore further the features of this device in an upcoming full review, where I will focus on battery life, benchmarks, wireless ranges, and many other things.
