@ golferal

But why do they always express screen size in inches?

I love to tell chicks my Wang is 154 mm, that just amazes American chicks...doesn't quite shock any chick that lives outside of the US though. They always say that they have better dumb terminals in Asia, and the ones from Africa are just huge.

buzaw0nk

@golferal: I'm with you. Metrics are for sissies.

weatherman

Optical drive?

TriZz

@golferal:

Oh poor you! That's what you get for being in one of the THREE countries that have yet to adopt the metric system, the others being Burma, Liberia.

Blame the society!

Shodan

It seems like more and more of the OEMs (HTC, Asus, MSI, etc) are starting to step up to the plate to flex their muscles a little more. And why not? They're the makers of a lot of the stuff we see from other major brands. They know this stuff as well as anyone and ought to get a little credit for it.

Ron-Mexico

cant you just rip out the ssd and put in a normal laptop hdd 2.5" that way your could get a much beter laptop for a cheap price (sorry ssd lovers they just cost to dam much)

surkhail

I know it's an 'Murican thing, but I really hate it when specs are in the metric system. I hate having to convert everything. Kilograms and millimeters mean nothing to me.

golferal

I could not be more sick of seeing Atom processors inside otherwise fantastic looking notebooks.

If a company called Raon (?) can fit an ULV Turion X2 inside of a notebook not much larger than a cell phone, why can Asus not add a processor worthwhile?

I know, I know: it's part of the Eee line, it's an "extension" of your other notebook, it's to keep it cheap, it's nice and cool, it's "good enough" for soccer moms, but damn. The performance equivalent of a 1.2ghz Pentium M in 2008 is just not good enough.

regnez

For that price, I'll buy.

OMG! Ponies!

wonder how hard it would be to load os x on it

rlreif

@mailbox01: I see people carrying/using iPhones and regular MacBooks everywhere I go, but I've yet to see a single Air. I've taken many trips recently too, both within the USA and international, and still no Air sightings at airports or the like. I don't even hear the name mentioned anymore, so I'm wondering the same thing. Internal Apple sales figures might be one thing, but it would seem that open public adoption speaks a lot for a majority of portable devices these days.

madcitybrit

Now my Virus Catching machine is extra light !

lucky_you

@onewiththewurlitzer: If it were sitting on the surface, it would be 1990s ad. But because it's floating, it would be 2000ish.

ripfire

Why do they say 0.3MPixel camera? It sways people to think it sucks. They should just say VGA Resolution.

ripfire

that ad is quite early 1990s

onewiththewurlitzer

Well hello to you to quality speakers.

"hi quality speakers"?

nightsky

@Mark Wilson: agreed - just looking at the apple sales numbers.... people are paying the premium for the nice hardware, even with market uncertainty.

freelunch

I might consider this one.
Well done Asus.
If you follow good battery care techniques, a non replaceable battery is not a problem.

trek1394

"The only catch is obviously that XP is not included in the better configurations."

Isn't that just generally true of all computers?

nutbastard

@mailbox01: I haven't seen recent figures, but the Air had decent success (on the Apple laptop scale) after launch for some time.

Mark Wilson

@dingus: Haven't you ever read Doonesbury? That's Dan Quayle talking..

Jrsy is the dude, playing the dude, disguised as another dude

Is the Air even selling alot. Just like the Apple TV. big hype, but poor sales.

mailbox01

Who's being quoted? Is it the feather talking?

dingus

finger lickin' good.

romado12187

@golferal: golferal has no friends. your profile says it all ;D. but seriously, why are we americans so damn lazy? that's why the rest of the world hates us - we complain about some pretty trivial sh... Metric is used by physicists and engineers - why should the world have to base their system on imperial units of measure based on counterintuitive number systems. base 10 is super easy to follow

xecutiv

an ATOM? the MBA is a core 2 dup isnt it? I mean, maybe a dual atom, but sheeeeesh. Looks nice :)

Stacky Botrus

@lucky_you: If you used Linux, it would be a virus-writing machine. Meanwhile, stock up on some immunoboosters.

kanon

God damn apple, are they beginning (or already have begun) a trend of laptops the value style over function?

Jitty

@regnez:
I second that!.
Why not pack an ULV Turion X2 and be ready for Windows Vista and Windows 7 when it's out?

This Atoms thinggies, although nice, lack a little horsepower for my taste.... and no serious OS upgrade for the future calls for a NO NO.

aec007

@golferal:
Yeah, maybe only one of three - but who makes the money? The US's GDP *buries* everyone else. I like this map in which -states- were renamed to represent the -countries- whose GDP they represent.
GDP map
Or the fact that the US creates 20% of the *entire* GDP of the WORLD, and double the next nearest country (China) - or more than the next three countries combined (China, Japan, India)
GDP by country
I'll stick with inches, miles, and pounds I think, thanks

Cyrano76

@MobileMilitia: oh woops, i meant to add that it looks hot. i use a tiny laptop at work that's on its last legs, and this could be a sweet replacement (if it can hold more than a gig of ram).

MobileMilitia

a vga camera is a real let down...moreso than the 2mp on the iphone. seriously, how much could it cost a company to put a decent camera in their product?

and is 1gb of memory the max is supports? what year is it?

MobileMilitia

@Jitty: They invented the trend.

And before any MacFanBoys flame me I have a Mac so I'm allowed to make Mac jokes..

Jrsy is the dude, playing the dude, disguised as another dude

Can XP be installed on the 64gb versions?

GutterIsATool

If Asus stuck an SSD in there for performance, they would do better to use a more advanced CPU. If it's to save battery-life however, I can see it possibly being worth while although it really cuts into the s101's feature list. 32gb is simply not enough.

In comparison, my iphone has 16gb SSD, a better camera and a shittier screen. Even the MacBA isn't such a bad deal considering it has a fairly robust set of hardware (and is upgradeable).

For my money sony has the best ultra-thin out there. Followed closely by voodooPC

CribbageLeft

@regnez: Hey, you get what you pay for.

ripfire

new headline "Asus makes a laptop thats just as useless as the MacBook Air"

livinzlife

when? want!

gizdude

@Cyrano76: Take THAT xecutiv!

golferal

@xecutiv:

If you look at who buys the most stuff in the world (us), it would make sense to give us information we can easily use. And I'm totally cool if scientific types want to use the metric system as long as I can find out how many INCHES thick and wide my shiny new toy is.

golferal

Wow! Increase the resolution to 1280x800 and double the ram and this is pretty much my dream laptop.

AxCrusnik

@surkhail: it's the SSD that makes it thin

shalegac

@Cyrano76: Enjoy your inferior weights and measurements system, then.

Metkis

@surkhail:
SSD's boot faster.

zmjjmz

how funny that if Asus makes non-replaceable battery its fine no one cares, but if Apple makes it..Ohhh god...All to hate Apple. Just funny.

vgart

Erotic is using a featha, kinky is using tha whole chicken!

Kaiser-Machead's LEGO WALL-E

@rlreif:how bout it.
my very first thought as well...
well... that and I just watch ROCKER! and nothings better than wishing you could just do it right the first time...

kiffallen

If these proposed prices are anything like the eeepc expect a $200 price increase.

Chewbenator

@madog: .... and not to say any of that because I love Apple, which I do [well, more of a love/hate relationship], but rather because I think these types of ultra-thin notebooks are absolutely worthless and will continue to be for a while. I don't see the allure of saying,

"Hey, we made an extremely tiny notebook with 4 year old technology inside of it! Sure you can buy one that's twice as good for cheaper, but it weighs 2 pounds more!"

madog

@Cyrano76: yes 20% and getting less and less... but that detail you omit.

sos10

I know you always pay a little bit extra for the Apple version of something regardless of the extra software and hardware it may come with over others, but comparing this notebook to the Air isn't really fair. Bigger screen, more HD space, no ethernet, and a faster processor. A better headline would be, "A smaller, cheaper, slower MacBook Air that you can afford because it's...... smaller, cheaper, and slower and not made by Apple."

By the way, why the hell do PC manufacturers insist on labeling their processor by the name? Like just using "Intel Atom", or my brother's HP tower with its, "Intel 3000", or whatever the hell it said on the sticker before I ripped it off. What kind of advertising is that? Are people so easily swayed by "3000" and "hyper-ultra multi-threading" buzzwords these days?

madog

see, this is reasonable machine to make ultra-thin. ultra-thin AND small (length and widthwise) enough that you can put it in a handbag or a random spare pocket in your backpack. and relatively cheap, to boot.

the air, on the other hand, is just thin. it's still as big as a regular laptop, which means i'll still be carrying it in a regular laptop bag/case... space savings? practically nil.

willyolio

@MobileMilitia:

in my opinion, it would be better without any camera, and the 1gb of ram is pretty descent for that kind of laptop :p

deactivated

I Dont think air is selling very well.

Just as an example, in Copenhagen...one of the stores near where I live, they have a demo model that looks brand new (a macbook air) at a reduced price...

weeks have passed and no one has bought it yet....and this is in a semi-big city with over 1.2 million citizens

I would say thats a big hint...

JoOngle

@Jrsy is the dude, playing the dude, disguised as another du...: Allow me as a Mac Cultist to be the first to throw out the obligatory *cringe*:

MAKPHANBOI

Seriously, is OS X the only OS with system-wide spell check?

Ginsu

@nutbastard: Amen.

Ginsu

@mailbox01: Call me a troll, but for fuck's sake man, a fifth grader ought to have better grammar than you.

Ginsu

@TriZz: No?

hanswurst0815

@Cyrano76: Although not a country but a union of states, the European Union's GDP is bigger than the US GDP.
Japan is second, third Germany and fourth China. Fifth the UK ...India and Brasil are further down the list.
This according the IMF, World Bank and CIA, but not Cyrano76

sos10

@rlreif: You wont know until someone gets their hands on one. Who knows if they switched internal devices from their other Eee's.

But if its easy from the get go, chances are this will sell better than the MBA (for obvious reasons as well as good reasons).

diabolusunknownTheSecond

A 10" screen? Seriously? How does that compete with the Air? It's a good thing I don't wear bifocals or use reading glasses like a huge chunk of buyers, or this would be worthless. Oh, wait. I do wear them...

imajoebob

Damn that thing is hot. Makes my (admittedly cheaper) MSI wind look like a brick. And the Wind's battery is replaceable, but it only gets an hour and 45 minutes. Which REALLY sucks...

jackbrown

@sos10: Sources???
The figures I stated are the most recent available (2007). It's not according to me, it's according to the International Monetary Fund. And yes, the EU is on there, but they don't have a rank because they are a conglomerate. We could aggregate China, Japan, India, and Germany, and call it, say - "Chi-apa-ndi-many - and then it could have a bigger GDP than the US as well.
But again, forget all that - if you have better information than I do, please share.
And as for your "yes 20% and getting less and less... but that detail you omit" - I agree that is probably likely, but you should have at least a couple of independent sources to back up your feelings before you state them as fact.

Cyrano76

I haven't even seen one MAC AIR in the wild and I live in Hollywood and work in the film industry where crap-n-toshes are everywhere.

Carbon

from the specs it is not much different than the eee 1000H which has already gotten OS X loaded onto it nicely (dunno if they worked out audio drivers yet)

I am going to follow this guide with an eee 1000HD I got off of ebay for $280 after live cashback

[www.maceee.com]

discounteggroll

Not bad. Definitely more useful than the Air, but I think they could have done a little better by adding at least 1 firewire port and including a slim external optical drive as an option.

KLanD

@almostdvs: 700 is still a little much for a netbook though.

almostdvs

funny thing is it'll probably run os x no problem. i give it three weeks after release before someone puts it on there.

almostdvs

@mailbox01: According to the New Zealand Apple store, The Macbook Air is the best selling Mac in Nz. But thats here, So yeah.

Soyerzz

@KLanD: Firewire? Seriously?

Pope John Peeps II