What is so great about the EEE ?

Well, how to answer this one... ;)

First, the EEE is an ultra light computer (900g) using an SSD (Solid State Drive) to store the OS and the user's data. The SSD is a very good choice as normal HD often suffer from rough transportation / manipulations on the move, resulting in damaging and loosing all data. The EEE comes in 3 versions, 2Gb, 4Gb and 8Gb.

The EEE is wireless (802.11 b/g) and some versions also have a webcam 1.3M pixels. All drivers are already set-up when booting for the first time, meaning that the user will not have to dig for hour before making anything work, which is pretty cool as it enlarges the audiance of user (from novice to expert)


The screen is small, 7 inches, and uses a resolution of 800x480 widescreen. The color and contrast are pretty good considering the size. At first, anyone, and me included, was thinking that the screen was too small. Let's be honest here, yes it's small, but very much usable ! On each side, you will see the speakers, which have a decent quality.

The keyboard is very small too, so big fingers "be aware". Again, at first, it takes a little bit of time to get used to the small size, but it's only a matter of hours.

There are 3 USB 2 ports, a VGA out, and a SDHD card reader to extend the store of the computer. The battery last 3h30 when using Wifi (at least in my case).

The OS used by default is Xandros with a very simple interface, giving the possibility to children to use it. For advance users (even the one without Linux knowledge), it's possible to enable the advance mode (see [URL="http://wiki.eeeuser.com"]wiki.eeeuser.com[/URL]). The OS looks like a normal Window interface, and is very easy to use and to customise.

The main idea behind the EEE is to have a very portable computer, not the kind replacing your every day computer, but the one you can bring with you all the time.

For example, I am a web developer and when I travel in holidays, I can get my 15.4'' laptop with me cause it weight 4Kg and I would be to annoyed it anything happens to it (if it get stolen, broken, damaged, flooded, ... eaten ?). This EEE is THE perfect computer is this case, cause it will allow me to check my emails, and in cause of emergency fix the problems (it's really easy to install an FTP client for instance).

Also, still using the holidays example, it'll be possible for me to empty my digital camera on my EEE / SD card and share directly the pictures with my friends / family or send them to my blog.

Finaly, this is for me a great platform to learn Linux and practice commands in an dev environment. So far, I managed to learn how to install and update softwares, install Apache, MySQL and PHP to have everything ready on the move.

Again, the EEE will not replace your everyday computer, but it will be it's best companion.