At last, someone has done something special with solid state discs, and people are already raving about it, although it will not become available until next year.
A £150 laptop from Asus called Eee, weighing under a kilogram, little bigger than a paper back book, with a seven inch screen and WiFi looks like the sort of product which NAND flash was invented for.
Up to now, the laptop guys have reacted to the advent of dense SSDs by producing computers which simply replace HDDs with SSDs. Sometimes they just offer the SSD as an (overpriced) option.
Here, though, is a product designed around the SSD from the start, and it looks to be a little treasure.
I haven’t seen one, but I’ve read the reports of people who have, and no one has a bad word for it.
Linux-based with Open Office, a 30 second boot, a five second shut-down time, and software described as ‘idiot-proof’, the Eee is the answer to everyone who needs to keep in touch while travelling, and hates lugging around a six pound Dell.
The $300 Eee has 256MB of RAM and 2GB of SSD. The $400 version has 512MB of RAM and 4GB of SSD.
The manufacturer of the Eee is Asus rather than Acer. Otherwise, I appreciate the comments.
As you noted, the Eee is instant-on (compared to a hard drive with XP or Vista). TVs went instant-on about 40 years ago. This is the first personal computer designed from the start to be all-electronic -- no motor.
This is the first production machine that qualifies as S-C-E, small-cheap-easy, and it is truly revolutionary.
How low can pocket computers go? $100? $50?
Thanks for that.
For me, it's not how cheap they go but how small.
My wish is for a computer that fits into your inside jacket pocket, runs of AA batteries, with a monochrome display, and all the modern connectivity.