Next week at CeBit, there’s some speculation that either Windows or WiMAX could be announced in connection to the Eee PC.

PC Pro is reporting that Microsoft will be participating in ASUS’ press conference during the event. Windows XP may be appearing on the US based Eee PC 8G. Perhaps this explains the recent slight price hike on 8G Eee PC preorders on Amazon.

T-Mobile will also be in attendance at the press conference. We can only hope this means that integrated WiMAX (along with a wide service coverage!) will be coming to the Eee PC shortly.

If you’ve been waiting for the Eee PC 8G to become available, It looks like it’s just about here. Over at Amazon, they have a new page up for what appears to be a Black ASUS Eee PC 8G. It’s listed as a 4G, but the description says that it has 8GB of storage and 1GB of RAM. It is listed for $542.99 and ships within 3-6 weeks- this could be the timeframe we’re looking at.

[Thanks for the tip, Dave!]

Update: Amazon has confirmed that it is the 8G Model in the Product Title

ASUS hoped to ship 1 million Eee PC’s this quarter- and they were on track to do so- but now comes word that the Eee PC 8G version will be delayed further until the second quarter as a result of hardware issues connected to the flash memory.

The good news is that the total orders of Eee PC’s did surpass 1 million total for the quarter- ASUS just won’t be able to ship the full 1 million because of the 8G delay. Of course, the 8G does not represent a large portion of the orders and shipments- so the numbers are still quite high.

Still, if you’re holding out for more memory, you’re either going to have to wait a bit longer or stick with a SDHC card instead.

If you’ve been looking for an ASUS Eee PC 8G, you may have to wait just a little longer.

According to this Digitimes article, ASUS is blaming a flash and battery shortage for the recent lack of 8G shipments to retailers:

Asustek company president Jerry Shen admitted SLC NAND flash is running tight, although he noted that the shortage of batteries is more of a concern for the company. [link]

The good news is that ASUS expects to resume shipments of the 8G units in 1-2 weeks.

This could be part of the reason why extra Eee PC batteries are not yet available for purchase from ASUS- and with the batteries (and other accessories) rumored to be arriving in late February- maybe the problems are indeed just about solved.

Reading further into the Digitimes story on Asus adding touchpanel screens into the Eee, PocketLint suggests that the panels will be the four-wire type adding just US$15 to the BOM.

“The 9-inch touch panel-equipped Eee PCs will adopt “four-wire resistive touch screen technology” adding just $15 to the manufacturing cost of the new tablet-esque gadget.”

While less precise than the five-wire garden-variety panel, the touchscreen interface is a much anticipated addition that would further add to the image of the Eee as a competitor to the recently introduced MacBook Air in the ultra-portable laptop category.

For those who regularly read the eeeuser forum, you probably know by now that the Eee PC 8G, 4G Surf, and 2G Surf are now all available for purchase in the United States.

There are reports that the 8G Eee PC has no onboard SSD storage, but instead uses a 8G SSD card in the mini-pcie slot. For more information, check out this forum thread. The 8G’ s price is $499.

The 4G surf model goes for $349- it has a smaller battery then the regular 4G, and does not have a webcam.

Finally, the 2G surf model costs $299, and according to this thread actaully features 512mb of ram instead of the anticipated 256mb of ram. Good news!

Many websites (engadget, gizmodo) have been reporting over the last several days that there will be an upcoming ASUS Eee PC 8G model with a 10″ screen. The rumors seemed to start with a news post found here on a German website. I contacted ASUS to find out if the rumors were valid and this was the response:

 We will have 8G with the same form factor and 7” screen size as the Eee PC 4G now.

There are no plans for 10” at the moment.

Eee PC 8G expected MSRP is $499.99 USD.

On the official ASUS Eee PC website, ASUS updated the product information table to include launch dates:

• Eee PC 8G: End of November
• Eee PC 4G: 10/16/07 Global Launch
• Eee PC 4G Surf: Middle of November
• Eee PC 2G Surf : End of November

As expected, the Eee PC 4G will be the first model to be released in the United States on November 1st.

According to this article from DigiTimes, ASUS will indeed announce the final Eee PC prices on October 16th. It does officially confirm that the $199 price point can only be reached by contract orders, as expected. An initial batch of 10,000 units will hit Taiwan markets after the announcement. By the end of this month, Eee PC’s will be available in the BestBuy / Newegg channels (as suggested in the last news update.)

Furthermore, x94scorp on our forums noticed a new update on the official ASUS website where the RAM specifications of the devices have all been raised. The 8G model has 1GB of RAM, the 4G and 4G Surf models have 512MB, and the 2G Surf has 256MB. Have the specifications been raised? Interesting!