Asus Eee PC 701 review

Average user rating

8.6

excellent

Average user rating from 5 users

See all user reviews

Agree? Disagree? Write your own review of the Asus Eee PC 701

Rate this product

Asus Eee PC 701 user reviews

December 1, 2007

Posted by: Gageteer

"Tickles me pink"

What I like:

Lightweight, long AC cable, good battery life, good keyboard, cheap.

What I don't like:

Supplied operating system, puny storage capacity.

Review:

This machine is hot property at the moment and that's down to one factor above all else - price. It's what caught my eye and doubtless what has caught everyone else's eyes as well. What is more, for the price, Asus has put together a nice package. It does feel quite well-made and comes with a little protective case and a generous AC lead; the sorts of extras you expect get when you pay for an expensive laptop - and sometimes don't get!

Anyway, as an owner of a normal-sized laptop and a tiny Sony UMPC, I feel in a reasonably good position to judge the EeePC, and, to be honest, it really does address a lot of the problems I've encountered when using both UMPC's (ultra-mobile pc's) and normal laptops. The EeePC is shockingly small without drastically compromising typing functionality, as is the case with the Sony UX1 - which while far more handsome and much more powerful than an EeePC, is not particularly suitable for mass text input. The EeePC also outfoxes normal laptops by being this small; that is provided you do not need powerful processing and graphical power.

The EeePC is ideal for web browsing, emails, writing large tracts of text on-the-fly and things like that. It is not particularly 'sexy' in any colour, despite Asus' best efforts. There's nothing wrong in the look, exactly, it’s not hideous, just not remotely flash either. This particularly evident in the white model, which is the one I have. It looks like an apple Mac stripped of style and bereft of coolness, with the keyboard looking somewhat retro to me - in a bad way.

Beauty is not skin deep, though, and the EeePC does what I want; that is helping me work, in comfort, typing on my lap or on a coffee table. It doesn’t get so heavy and hot as to numb my knees and then set fire to them without my knowing, even less does it hog the tabletop and rob my friends of a space to put their croissant.

However, all this said praise and functionality was dependent, at least for me, on installing a decent operating system, since the one that is supplied is difficult for more advanced users to enjoy. It’s too restricting, particularly if you have several machines and are used to chopping and changing files between them – suddenly you’re faced with the EeePC and it’s not-quite-linux, not-quite-windows, not quite anything system. Yuck. Even the hidden desktop mode is awful. Admittedly the Eeepc is aimed at kids, they say, but kids are smart enough to not dismantle windows and apple piece by piece and, indeed, children these days are raised on PC’s outshine many adults in the use of them.

So, in short, if you just want to surf and work, this is ideal… and refreshingly cheap without being ‘cheap’.