Having already made its mark on the burgeoning Netbook market via the diminutive Eee PC line, the arrival of the new ASUS S101 would suggest Taiwanese computer manufacturer ASUSTeK is looking to fry considerably bigger industry fish.
ASUS eyes MacBook Air\'s popularity with its sexier, lighter, and cheaper S101 Netbook. Image: ASUSTeK.
While still defined as a Netbook, which means it’s a small form factor piece of hardware ideal for Web surfing and online communication, ASUSTeK describes its S101 as sitting proudly at the “pinnacle of netbook computing.”
That claimed pinnacle manifests itself through a sleek and stylish Netbook entrant that comes with a total weight of less than a kilo, a maximum thickness of 25mm, and a price tag of around $699 USD (or £449 GBP) -- which is some $300 to $400 USD more than a standard Eee PC computer.
Helping to justify that elevated price tag, the S101 comes complete with an Intel Atom processor, integrated Intel 945 Express (GMA 950) graphics, a 10.2-inch display screen (with resolution up to 1024 x 768), the Windows XP Home operating system, 1GB of RAM, and 16GBs of solid state drive (SSD) storage.
Sweetening the XP deal yet further, ASUS is also giving initial S101 buyers an extra 16GBs of storage on a memory card along with 30GBs of free online storage.
Two Linux-based S101s are expected to arrive in the coming weeks, which will reportedly offer onboard SSD storage in capacities of either 32GBs or 64GBs.
Various online tech reports outline that the S101 could well pose something of a threat to Apple’s MacBook Air notebook, with UK broadsheet The Guardian noting that while “the MacBook Air makes pointless sacrifices that reduce its practicality,” the new ASUS S101 “does the business.”
Other appealing features supporting those claims include a 0.3 mega-pixel Web camera, a multitouch trackpad, three USB ports, a 4-in-1 card reader, a real RJ-45 Ethernet socket, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity, and also a rechargeable and replaceable lithium-polymer battery that ASUS says should provide up to five hours of operation between charges.
Set for release in November, and arriving in colour choices of brown, champagne and graphite, the new ASUS S101 will likely help solidify ASUSTeK’s strong positioning in the Netbook arena while perhaps even tempting those pondering a MacBook Air purchase.
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