The Asus e900 Crushes The HTC Advantage

I didn't expect the weather to turn as bad as it did. I didn't get much accomplished while walking the earth earlier today. Nor was it the pleasure I'd expected it to be when the sun was still out and shining.

But I did stop in J&R!

And they had the new Asus e900 -- running Windows XP.

It. Is. Gorgeous!

The white plastic has a sleek pearlescent finish that gives it some class.

And that screen! It's da bomb! Bright and sharp and evenly lit with vibrant colors.

Lengthwise, the e900 is the same size as the old EeePC. From front to back, it's just about 1/4" longer. Weight is a wee bit heavier (even without the battery), but not the brick the hp Mini Note is.

The keyboard is deceptive. It looks the same as the original EeePC, but I swear there is something drastically different about it.

I did notice the difference between the white and black keyboards that Laptop magazine posted about. But I didn't post about that myself because I didn't believe my own observations. I did notice the black plastic had a better feel and the keys didn't tend to make me dizzy as they did on the white one -- because the keys have a tendency to get all skewed, out of line.

The e900's keyboard is a different beast. It has a better feel, it's more solid, and I didn't see the keys getting out of alignment. Plus, and this is weird, I didn't have but about 2% of typos in the test sentence I just banged out on it in WordPad! Typically with the original EeePC, I'd have about 30% or more typos!

The larger trackpad is a significant improvement and was very responsive to my touch (I think some people have said they've experienced otherwise -- I say get an RMA number!). The feel of the single-bar mouse button is better too and I had no problems clicking properly.

This baby is fast. It screams! It screams like my frikkin 1.8GHz desktop Celeron doesn't scream. I launched that pig of program, Adobe Reader -- and boom! Up virtually instantly! Everything had a crisp snap to it. It was XP as I've never before experienced it (which says a lot for the crappy hardware I've had!).

If all you've seen is the original EeePC with it's 7" screen, you need to see the e900 with its 8.9" higher-resolution screen.

Unlike the original EeePC, the e900 does not scream Toy! It looks like a computer that can kick the ass of other subnotebooks that cost three to four times its price!

I've been thinking of the HTC Advantage. But no more. For less than the price of that pocketable device, I can have something that's still lightweight with a hugely better screen and real desktop operating system and applications.

Matthew Miller, if you go see the new Asus e900 with XP, I think you might think differently about that Celio Redfly! J&R wants $550 for the e900. That's just $50 more than the Redfly. For a hell of a lot more capability!

Now, if it turns out the MSI Wind somehow doesn't work out for me, there's the Asus e900. I'd definitely buy that and be content.


Put it away, Kendrick! The Asus e900 is its antidote!