One of the things that is stopping me from buying a eeepc form laptop is the bezel. Most of them use such a small screen with huge bezel. Makes it a distraction for me. Also with the lack of a drive, it will deter me from buying one any time soon.

God all the plastic around the screen..

and Matt BTW... that's "as Intel wants call them". Took me 3 reads to get that.

@One2ManyCords: there are few things less annoying than super fat bezels.

why do you need a tiny screen, I would happily pay that extra 50 if ther wasnt a bezel

Unless they can jam in at least 1280x768 or even 1024x768 I just can't justify using any of these.
It's just aggravating trying to do anything with a screen that small.
I'll just stick with my aging Think Pad T41 for now.

I can see where that bezel real estate could be annoying over time.

Aside from that it doesn't look all that bad.

Well it is the poor mans choice but I ordered the HP Mini! Just lucky I guess to have a job.

I'm sticking with my EEE since i'm not wiling to spent allmost the same amout of money for not so better allmost-notebook.

Actually, @One2ManyCords: wont means "apt" or "inclined". So he used it right. - "as intel is apt to"
and your fix was still wrong - it should be "as intel wants _TO_ call them."

[www.merriam-webster.com]
Check this for the definition of "wont"

I have an Eee and this thing is only attractive because of the HDD. I do not agree that this "netbook" is more attractive than the Eee (in fact I find it ugly).

The one thing that the Eee has that very few devices like it have is amazing community support.
the wide variety of tutorials and forums available made me try some things I would normally be uncomfortable with and helped me go from someone who didn't know what the Terminal was to being fairly knowledgeable about Linux.

Every time i see something 1-up the Eee's specs i just remember that theres no mini-note wiki or CTLuser.com

I'm sticking with my EEE since I am not willing to spend allmost same amount of money, for not so much better allmost-notebook. (Maybe if it had optical drive)

I think this is in the price range of my first computer, a Commodore VIC-20. 5K of RAM, tape drive, and an old 17" B&W TV I used with it.

So, by 1992 standards, this sucker is amazing.

everything else aside(it can all be hacked in the eee)

that battery life is what i'm most interested in. If it really does 4.5 hours. thats not bad

Another freakin' display dwarfed by a gigantic bezel...FAIL.

@One2ManyCords: You forgot to add the word "to". "As Intel want to call them".

@ripfire4: "wants"

Talk about a long chain of fails. Geez.

@One2ManyCords: His statement was correct, it's just somewhat obscure english. "is wont to call" is correct in this case.

As for the laptop itself, it looks like someone designed a laptop from a drawing of an eee 701. The Asus has cleaner lines, and looks more professional, in my opinion. I'll wait until CTL brings out a competitor to the eeepc 900 series.

it looks like one of those franklin dictionaries

@hatboysam: @rrwakc: Ditto. I'm loving mine. And the community involvement/enthusiasm and support -- especially at EeeUser.com, but other places -- really sets the Eee off vs competitors. Thanks in no small part to the early anticipation and hype that existed for a 1/2 year before they even started shipping. They were after all the first, and had the opportunity to really take advantage of early mindshare.

Another thing is that we won't really know the comparative performance of these minis until someone does a comprehensive review/benchmark. Difference in CPU Mega/GigaHz isn't a direct reflection of performance -- especially total system performance -- particularly when the CPUs have different architectures (Via/Intel/Cirrus, AMD?/whoever). Real-world battery life is also an important concideration; and it's not until we see how they compare, that we will know who has the advantage there.

I wouldn't expect the Eee to win any reviews versus ones like the HP, but nonetheless, I'm happy with mine.

@ClintonOddfellow: You beat me to it. Yes, wont is actually a word and its use here is warranted.

@LJN: @ClintonOddfellow: I stand corrected...

The Eee doesn't support external display, true? I can get over a 7" as long as I can go external when needed.

@One2ManyCords: Actually he was legit to say wont, it means something along the lines of "is inclined to".

This is the first of this type that I've seen I think I could live with. An available upgrade to a lid filling screen will probably come soon.

7"?! epic fail.

@demonz: Yes, the Eee supports external display.

@One2ManyCords: Again, what is the attraction to showing off your "erudition" by by nit-picking a post? It is, however, sweet, that you made an ass of yourself in the process. Of course, that would have been the case even if you hadn't been so hideously wrong (as is your wont).

@Totalfixation: @One2ManyCords: @strider_mt2k: @AJ_Syrinx: If you want a mini laptop with a thinner bezel, it needs to be built with lower tolerances, and out of more expensive materials that have better strength/weight ratios, like magnesium and polycarbonate. If you want a thinner bezel, you're going to have to pay for it.

Would you pay more for a smaller bezel? Really? Well, CTL/Asus/everyone else doesn't believe you, and they went with the fat bezel instead.

All these ultraportables, but other than hacking(atm, car computers, etc) on the go, I still don't get the usefulness of such things.

You still need to carry it outside your pants(the ultraportable that is), probably in a european man purse or just a regular laptop-sized backpack. And when or where you take it out and use it(the ultraportable that is), it still can be replaced by a normal laptop.

It still looks kinda thick. I think the specs forgot to mention that the 2.6 pounds was per corner.

HP Mini is a lot better

@ludwigk:
I'm not in the market, therefore I have a limitless budget! ;)

Point taken!

I modem? Really? No... Really?

Nice camera backup for travel. Leave thine FruitBook Pro at home. Sweet.

@ludwigk:

If you want a mini laptop with a thinner bezel, it needs to be built with lower tolerances, and out of more expensive materials that have better strength/weight ratios, like magnesium and polycarbonate. If you want a thinner bezel, you're going to have to pay for it.

True that you're probably going to pay for it, but not necessarily all that much more. Look at the Eee PC 900, which is considerably better than the Eee PC 8G, and is supposed to debut at about $500-550, with considerably more space (12GB or 20GB), a larger 8.9" screen with higher resolution (and thinner bezel...), better webcam, etc; and this only a few months after the 8GB was released. I think every one of these UMPC manufacturers could've used an 8.9" screen without adding much cost, if any, to their product, and probably sold a lot more in the process.

That being said...

56K Modem

Take that Eee PC!

Via C7-M 1000MhZ Processor

No thanks...

Nope, doesn't have better specs until it ditches the Via processor.

Heck, the Mini-Note has a much better Via processor than this one and it's STILL outperformed by the Eee!

I don't mind the small screen like what appears to be many bezel-haters. But I'd like to see that space filled with something like some tiny devices that can be charged through it like a bare-bones cell phone, 1g mp3 player or at least some tiny picture frames for passport photos of your family. Something! Modular is where it's at and that's just wasted real estate.

Amazon has them for preorder as of today. Just sayin' is all....