I’ve wanted an ASUS EEE PC ever since I learned such a thing existed. ASUS has been making dimunitive PCs before the word “netbook” was even common parlance (in fact, I don’t think ASUS even describes them as netbooks today) and I’ve coveted on ever since I decided that blogging from my iPod Touch on the bus wasn’t particularly viable. While financing an EEE PC was no problem (they’re just a few hundred bucks each), coming up with a legitimate reason to buy one was kind of difficult, seeing as my three year old Macbook was steadfastly refusing to call it quits.
Luckily, a Delta baggage handler destroyed my Macbook screen (strange thing to preface with “luckily”), effectively converting it from a laptop to a desktop (thanks, external display!). So, after over a year of will power, I finally had a genuine need for a netbook – and I’m pretty glad I waited.
ASUS EEE PCs first hit the market running a lightweight version of Linux. I’m no stranger to Linux, but I will admit that I’d rather not spend hours staring at a command line just to get my mouse to work. Now, ASUS has a line of EEE PCs that run Windows XP, which is fine with me.
Even though I was an ASUS fanboy before I even owned a EEE PC, I did do a fair amount of comparison shopping. I read scores of reviews and very nearly bought a Toshiba NB205. I also considered an Acer Aspire One. Because typing is essentially 99% of what I do for a living, my main criteria was a keyboard that wouldn’t make my copy end up looking like a drunken text message. Lifehacker listed the Samsung NC10, Dell Mini 10, Asus EEE PC 1000HE, the MSI Wind and the Acer Aspire One among the “five best netbooks” with the EEE PC leading by a lot. So it seemed like a safe bet to me.
I popped on down to Best Buy and gave all the keyboards a whirl. The NB205 performed terribly (or, at least, I performed terribly on the NB205). There was something strange about it – whenever I typed, it was as if my fingers weren’t on the home row. I’m a fairly swift touch typist and being forced to hunt and peck would severely cramp my style. Typing on ASUS EEE PC 1005HAB (the model they have at Best Buy that only comes in a deep, dark blue) was a breeze, so I bought it.
Out of the box, the machine is quite decent. No tweaking or fiddling required to get the wireless up and running and the boot time is highly tolerable. Performance isn’t really an issue when dealing with Netbooks – if I want speed, I’ll hop on my desktop. So, I’m going to mostly focus on design issues.
I’ll admit that I’m not a huge fan of the trackpad. Instead of being a smooth runway for slick fingers, it’s a zone of bumpy weirdness. It boasts “multi-touch” features such as zoom in and zoom out and has “touch zones” in the corners that work much like OS X’s expose. But really, compared to the Macbooks trackpad, it’s nothing to write home about. For instance, you can’t scroll with two fingers. Instead, you have to swipe on the far right side, which is only somewhat bothersome. I do kind of hate the button – it’s hard to push and it takes a little bit of thumb yoga to reach it.
The case, on the other hand, is extremely glossy. It’s almost mirror-like. Which is swell and all, but it’s kind of a fingerprint magnet. You’ll want to invest in some kind of microfiber cloth if you don’t want the outside of your computer to look like a crime scene.
Again, I want to note that the keyboard on the ASUS EEE PC 1005HAB is very nice. It barely feels like I’m typing on a wee little machine and I’ve even spent entire days working on it simply because I wanted to get away from the office.
The screen is 10 inches which is on par with most Netbooks. Reading a Firefox window while typing on a Word document is kind of an endeavor – but I’m spoiled with my 22 inch display on my main computer. There is an option to zoom in and out and resize text, but I find it unnecessary and, frankly, it gives me a little bit of motion sickness to watch it in action. The other function keys – such as volume and brightness – are handy, but you do have to hold Fn to activate them, which, again, isn’t quite as easy as having dedicated media keys.
As I understand it, this EEE PC isn’t the lightest or slimmest in its class, but it’s certainly not a burden. The removable battery makes bulge out on the back, but it’s worth it. All in all, I’m highly satisfied. If a Delta thrower were to bust this up, I’d buy another.
I paid $299.
SPECS:
1GB RAM DDR2
Intel Atom 270 Processor
160 GB Hard Drive
WiFi 802.11 B/G/N
1.3 Megapixel camera
