As I have discussed in the previous few posts, my family now is the proud owner of an Asus Eee 4G PC. This is used primarily by my youngest son, but has proved to be quite popular with all the family. However as we said in my last post the Eee 4G PC comes with only 4GB of solid state storage, and since the majority of that is used by the operating system there is not much room for other content. In the previous post I looked at adding extra storage via a SDHC memory card but in this post I thought I would look at external hard drives.

Eee External hard drive

As the external hard drive is designed to be used with an Eee PC, I really wanted one that would fit well with the “small is good” theme that the Eee stands for. So any external hard drive had to be as small as possible, but still provide a good amount of storage, look good and work easily with the Linux operating system installed on the Eee.

After searching around I manage to find something that seems to fit the bill. Take a look at the
Passport Essential from Western Digital which is neat looking, small enough to fit into a shirt pocket, and has plenty of storage space. As it is a USB drive it will be supported by Linux and should therefore work fine with the Eee.

Check Linux compatibility

This last point is an important point that one needs to be careful off when buying equipment for a Linux PC. Thanks to the Linux community most devices will be supported by Linux, even if the vendor does not provide drivers. However this takes time and so when buying for Linux and especially for new devices it pays to do some research on the Internet first. In this case although the manufacturer does not state that it supports Linux, a quick search of the Internet shows that a number of people haved confirmed the Passport Essential working with the Eee.

Do have an Eee PC? Do you use an external hard drive?

I was taking a short cut through an electrical goods shop at a shopping mall last weekend and was intrigued to see a very large group of people crowded around something in the area where the shop sells its laptops. When I went over to have a look at what all the fuss was about, I found one of the sales assistants demonstrating the Asus Eee 4G PC. The Eee had finally arrived in the Emirates and was causing quite a stir.

Asus Eee 4G

I returned later on the way home to have a play and to show it to my wife. I have to admit to being a little underwhelmed at first. I think the small size of the screen was the main cause of this, however the Eee obviously worked fine and after playing with it for a while it was obvious that screen size was not really an issue. The demonstration model was logged on to the store WiFi and using Firefox I was able to view and use websites effectively. OpenOffice is preinstalled and opened quickly and easily and worked well and did not appear to tax the processor at all. The keyboard while on the small side for adult hands was perfectly usable and for kids would be fine.

Reactions to the Eee 4G

My wife was completely smitten and was immediately talking about buying one for our seven year old as his first computer, and if he didn’t want for some reason it, she would love to have it! This sort of reaction is probably one of the main reasons why the Eee has become so popular and remember this is before the exceptional price is discussed. It is a very powerful combination and the price was a tipping point for my wife and we bought one on the spot.

Eee 4G user experience

After a few days of having it at home, the experience with the Eee has been really good. I configured the system, the WiFi for the home network and installed our printer in minutes. My son is overjoyed with it and my wife uses it for email and surfing once he has gone to bed. I don’t think either of them has noticed it is not using Windows, the only comment I have had about the interface is how nice and easy to use it is. So my conclusion is that the Asus Eee 4G lives up to its reputation as a fun, easy to use and cheap ultra sub notebook.

Do you have an Eee? What do you think of it?

I have talked a number of times in the past about the highly successful and revolutionary Asus Eee ultra sub notebook. This has a very small form factor (7”), a functional keyboard despite its small size, a reasonably good screen, and runs a customized version of Linux rather than windows and all for a nice small price to match its size. If you’re were looking to find faults or at least things to improve you would probably come up with some of the following;

Increase the size of the screen - the screen really wasn’t that great to use, hampered as it was with an 800 pixel resolution.

Increased Memory - Even on a machine this size 512 Mb of RAM is really not enough these days, more memory would allow you to better use the multiple process ability of Linux.

Increased Storage - The 4 GB of storage was not really enough, especially if you wanted to store a fair amount of digital content, and lets face it, these days who doesn’t.

Well obvious Asus have listened to some of these wishes and have just released the Asus Eee PC 900 which does provide good improvements in all these areas.

Screen - The screen resolution has been improved to a very nice 1,024 x 600, which also means you’ve got a modern type wide screen aspect ratio. The news screen also takes up more of the lid improving the Eee’s overall looks.

Memory - Memory has been increased to 1 GB

Storage - The storage has also had a significant increase with the Linux version having a respectable 20GB of storage. There will also be a Windows XP version with 12GB of storage. Asus decreasing the storage to pay for the XP operating system!

There are a number of other small changes also, such the on-board cam which has been improved to a 1.3 Megapixel unit, while the touchpad features multi-touch capability ala the MacBook Air. All in all the new Asus Eee 900 has improved the capability of the Eee brand, all for a small increase in price. I for one think that price is worth paying! How about you?