ASUS Paves the Way

Computex was all a-flutter with stories about tiny notebooks dubbed mini-notes. You may have seen the most popular one before: the ASUS Eee PC. In this article we look at new mini-notes as well as interesting standard notebooks from ASUS and others.
While we have already taken a look at the world of miniature notebooks from the ASUS Eee PC to the Eee Box and MSI Wind, there are many not-so-mobile machines that deserve our attention.  Unsurprisingly ASUS had a quite a few products on display – the company is simply not sitting still at the status quo and wants capitalize on the attention their Eee line is getting.

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First up is the ASUS R50, a UMPC that features Intel’s Atom 2520 processor at 1.33 GHz along with a 32GB 1.8″ SSD drive and 1GB of DDR2 memory.  The unit has some great features including 802.11 b/g, Bluetooth 2.0 and 3.5G cellular networking not to mention integrated GPS and a dual-facing webcam.  The screen is a 1024×600 resolution at 5.6″.  And you get all of this for a 1.2 lbs weight.

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Next up is the ASUS F80S that is an inexpensive 14″ notebook that features a water spill proof keyboard and something ASUS is calling a “palm rest providing (sic) the best touching feeling.”  Uhh…sure.  Other than that feature you can find the standard hardware in here: Core 2 Duo processors (with Pentium M or Celeron M optional), Windows Vista, GMA X3000 graphics (AMD Radeon HD3470 optional) and DDR2 memory.

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You may have heard of the Toughbook – this is ASUS’ answer to it.  The B51E is a ruggedized notebook for harsh environments; thing construction, rain forests and just plain clumsy people.  The insides are pretty stale – Core 2 T8000 series CPUs, GM965 chipset, standard hard drive and you’ll be tugging around about 7 lbs of extra weight with it.

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Yes, that is indeed real bamboo on the ASUS U6V – “performance with environment in mind”.  The notebook features a 3.5G wireless connection, the ASUS facial-scan login system and the NVIDIA GeForce 9400M discrete graphics.

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The luxurious Lamborghini line of notebooks saw and updated from ASUS as well with the new ASUS VX3.  This machine is aimed more at mobility with a 12.1″ screen yet still packs the Core 2 Duo T9300 processor, GeForce 9300M discrete graphics card and up to 4GB of DDR2 memory.

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Of course you can’t get a name-brand machine like a Lambo without some matching accessories.

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Moving into ASUS’ line of gaming notebooks, we found the ASUS G70S labeled as a “double barreled rig” for some apparent reasons.  Featuring a 17″ widescreen display, support for dual-core Intel CPUs, dual GPUs and dual HDDs, this is not your daddy’s notebook; unless your daddy is rich. 

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Of course ASUS had the various Eee PCs on display as well.  From the top: a pretty in pink Eee PC 901 and following it are a couple more shots of the new Eee PC 1000.

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Finally, we wrap up ASUS’ new notebooks with a glance at the G50V – the next step in gaming notebook.  Inside this system you’ll find a pair of GeForce 9700M GT GPUs, Intel’s top Core 2 mobility processors, two hard drives for up to 640GB of storage and a combo Blu-ray drive.

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