Netbook Review UK

As we heard earlier, Asus will launch the brand new Eee PC X101 10 inch netbook this summer for just under $200 (USD).  That’s the lowest priced netbook Asus has ever offered, and will make the X101 the cheapest Atom powered netbook ever launched.

For the budget price, you get a netbook with the new 1.33 GHz Intel Atom N435 single core processor. It’s a 5W chip that uses less power, and generates less heat than other Intel Atom offerings.  Of course, it also offers a little less performance than the Atom N455 chips more commonly used.  Keeping the power consumption down further, and the cost, is the 8GB SSD hard drive, and the decision to drop Windows 7 for the free Meego Linux offering.  It also has an almost-but-not-quite full sized keyboard, a small touchpad with a single button beneath it, and a 10.1 inc, 1024 x 600 pixel glossy display.

Brad at Liliputing got a chance to check out a pre-release model and remarked on the thin and lightness of htene new model.  Part of the reason why this netbook can be so thin, light (and cheap) is that Asus will not be offering a 6 cell option in the US.  Instead the X101 gets by with a smaller 3 cell power pack.

Check out the hands-on video after the break.

The US version of the Eee PC X101 will also run MeeGo, an open source Linux-based operating system optimized for netbooks and other mobile devices. The netbook will be available in some regions with Windows 7 as well, but by going with MeeGo in the US, the company can avoid Windows licensing fees and keep the price low.

Unfortunately the demo unit I saw didn’t have MeeGo so I can’t say anything about how the netbook performs with the Linux distribution.

The netbook also has an 8GB solid state disk instead of a hard drive. That should help improve battery life, since a solid state disk uses less power than a hard disk. But 8GB isn’t a lot of space to work with.