| Brand: | Asus | ||
| Average Rating |
|
The ultra portable Asus Eee PC 1008HA Seashell weighs only 2.4 lbs and measures a mere one inch thin. Within its slick shell it packs the latest ATOM CPU from Intel, the N280, which a offers 667MHz FSB, the fastest in its class. With a 6-hour battery, built-in WiFi 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth, as well as a 1.3MP webcam and Digital Array Mic, the 1008HA allows you to stay connected wherever you go and do so comfortably. Its 92%-scaled ergonomic keyboard and Multi-Touch touchpad make it a breeze to type and navigate through content. But the feature that truly captures most attention is its innovative design. Inspired by one of nature’s most beautiful creations, the seashell, the 1008HA’s slick curves and smooth lines offer contemporary style and effortless sophistication. To protect your investment, ASUS also includes a sleeve case with the 1008HA, perfect for carrying your 1008HA while out and about. more info
Popularity: 1% [?]
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
ASUS Netbook
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I have an ASUS F3F notebook so the conversion to this one was very easy. This was purchased primarily because of the size much easier to go thru inspection at the airports.
I expected to use this primarily for viewing e-mails while in Las Vegas. I was stunned to discover that it can do CAD drawings. I am not a touchpad user so a notebook mouse was installed. With the Samsung DVD disk the 10 inch netbook is wonderful on the road.
Love it till you warranty support
Rating:2 out of 5 stars
My husband bought one for me for my anniversary. I love it. I carried it everywhere and used it everywhere. Then the power supply failed, less than two months after I got it. Called warranty, waited days, called back, waited, faxed documents, got pissed, called again. The part is on backorder till the end of september which is what they told me on August 20. Called at the end of September, part is now backordered another two weeks. I’ve now called six times. Can’t even get their customer support managers to call me back. Meanwhile, it’s a beautiful paperweight.
Wonderful netbook, runs windows 7 awesome and I love it as much as my iphone but the company completely lets it down.
Good, a few gotchas
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
By now you’ve done the research, read the reviews, so I won’t go over that again. This is overall very nice, but a few things to keep in mind:
* Trackpad. It is the same plastic material as the case, but with small bumps to tell you when you are on it and when you are off it. The bumps are low, lower than the braille you see on an ATM. To see what it is like try sliding your finger across a glossy plastic notebook lid and you’ll see it doesn’t slide smoothly and easily. Neither does this trackpad. Consider the cost of an external mouse, as you seriously may want one (I do).
* Glossy screen. This is a matter of opinion, but this screen is very very reflective. If you haven’t seen a glossy screen one spend some time with one before you buy. I think they are rubbish, personally, and will get a screen protector. The 1005 has a matte screen, BTW.
* Keyboard. If you’ve never used a netbook beware that the keyboard is smaller than normal. They give some percentage smaller, but all that you’ll care about is that the keys aren’t where your fingers go when you are used to typing on a normal desktop or notebook.
* Speed. Atom 280 is plenty fast enough for 1 app, maybe two at once. You’ll wait once in a while, but not long, and not as long as you might expect. Installing Windows 7 took less time on here than on my Macbook Pro unibody.
* Hard disk. They advertise a 160 GB drive, but don’t tell you get an 80GB C: and an 80GB D:, and oh, by the way, D: is full and C: only has 70 GB free. Installing Windows from a DVD (you have to attach an external drive and make it bootable in the BIOS) let’s you repartition, which I did to get 144 GB free.
* Mouse button. Rocks from side to side, left side is left click, right side is right click. The whole typing, mousing, clicking experience is different enough from what you are used to that you’ll want to send Asus an email saying “why?”.
* Screen. It is a lot smaller than the bezel. Plenty of room for a larger one. Not sure why they went 10.1″, but it is big enough to see a web page, the fonts are decent sized, and overall it works. You scroll web pages a lot, however.
* Sleeve. This is a case that sort of fits the computer. It is designed for other machines as well, so it is not a snug fit. Really cheap fake velour material, so don’t make the decision on the case because this comes with a case. I’ll probably get a decent one with space for the power adaptor and toss this one and not feel bad about tossing it.
* Black case. You’ll read a lot about fingerprints showing up on the black case. What they mean is you see the oil left on the case by your fingers, as you do when you touch your sunglasses lenses and then hold them at an angle. If that kind of thing bothers you, you’ll hate black and should definitely get some other color.
* Forget upgrades unless you are willing to risk $200. You have to open the case and remove a sticker that lets you know you just voided your warranty to do any upgrades (RAM, HD, WiFi, etc.) Some people have gotten free repair after they killed the thing, which is as easy to do as forgetting to flip the tiny power switch inside off before touching the internals, but many haven’t been so lucky. If you kill it and have to pay, they charge $200. FYI.
* Updates. There is an ASUS update program installed, but it flat out doesn’t work. If you want to update your machine (BIOS, actually), you’ll have to find a blog posting and go through all the steps to do it. Pretty time consuming just to flash the BIOS so the fan and WiFi work properly.
* You can put Windows 7 on here, and it will work fine with a vanilla install, as long as you go through some hoops to upgrade the BIOS first (see above). Otherwise, you get a black screen when you start Windows 7 that can only be cured by updating the BIOS.
* The only Linux build that works is an alpha of Ubuntu. The WIFI driver is the problem with older Ubuntu or other distos.
That’s about it. Quirky, odd little machine, but I like it and would buy it again. It is small, light, solid, and works. Not bad for the price.
ASUS Eee PC 1008HA Seashell 10.1-Inch Pearl White Netbook – 6 Hour Battery Life
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
Great for Travel. No cd rom and kinda slow for editing pictures and video.
The Headache of Your Life!
Rating:1 out of 5 stars
If You are considering to buy Asus, first go to the shrink! This computer boost that it is a wireless “n” computer with Win XP. XP is great, but wireless “n” is not a possibility, you can have “a/g” or “b/g”. Asus has a terrible customer service who will not help you until you mail in or email your purchase documents.
Asus support site is awful as you can get. No descriptions and no installation instructions and most of the time no version numbers so you do not know really if you need to upgrade the software. Asus is Chinese, they just want your money, they are prepared to do nothing and will not address the defects of their products.
Don’t expect to reach an intelligent person at asus, and you are lucky if they can speak english, and do not expect they will stand behind their product!
If you purchased the Asus extended warranty this is an other headache just to register, in the end you will find out that you will probably be unsuccessful after 200 man hours.
Asus in their infinite stupidity partitions the hard drive in half by default, if you tell asus this is unacceptable, they could care less because they already have your money
Do you think you might have to change your battery? perhaps upgrade your hard drive? install more memory?
THIS REQUIRES SURGERY AT A COMPUTER SHOP! NO USER ANYTHING WITH ASUS!!
I could probably write all day about this computer, but it all boils down to this:
The computer does not operate as it marketed to do so
Asus customer service is hopelessly incompetent
Asus technical support is a joke as the computers are made in China, and Asus USA knows nothing about their own computers
No BIOS , or Asus updates, or patches work!
The User can not even change the battery, memory, or hard drive.
You only get 3 hours of battery life unless you turn the screen brightness so lo that you can not see the screen
Every transaction with Asus will be a nightmare! This is a horror story you do not need to experience!
Great Netbook
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
This netbook is great but there are some drawbacks that you might consider before buying it:
- glossy display, hard to read in bright environments
- you need to holf Fn key to press page-up/page-down (together with up/down keys)
- single button tracking pad, kind of annoying if you are used to simultaneous left-and-right clicks (e.g. paste operation in Linux)
Everything else is perfect in my opinion, this is my choice of netbook.
Great keyboard, great track pad great connectivity, great looks…
BTW, it kicks ACER One D250 ass!
lovely
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
i am very happy with my new netbook, i am still did work with i very much, i was busy but i will enjoy it specially in my holidays abroad, becuse is so small and light that you forget if you have it with you, very fast and nice sound, that was the only worried i have before i used at home but is perfect.
Great Little Computer
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
This computer operates just like advertised. Great WIFI. It has extremely good battery life and XP operating system. Only downside is the owner’s manual states that individuals should not try to install additional memory.
great overall netbook
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
very nice looking netbook, thin, light and i like the glossy case. has the faster N280 1.66ghz cpu and performs good. Runs windows 7 great. downsides are that it only has 2 usb ports and to upgrade the memory you have to completely tear this one apart which voids the warranty. i would probably go with the 1005 version though due to the extended battery life and extra usb port.
Hinges are flimsy – need to baby it
Rating:2 out of 5 stars
The electronics on this machine are impressive. Work well that way. But you need to beware of the very flimsy construction of this machine. You will need to baby it as the hinges on this computer are somewhat delicate. Also the screen casing came apart on me as well. This is not a good machine to have if you travel extensively and knock the computer about. It is a rather delicate piece of equipment that cannot take a lickin and keep on tickin. Moreover there is no easy way to upgrade the ram. You will have to send it in if you want to upgrade the ram.
On a positive note, the keyboard and screen are excellent. It is light and very svelte. It is a great looking machine. It responds well. I added Ubuntu to it and it really ran well. The XP version that comes with it is pretty snappy. So no complaints with the basic operation of the unit. I just need a machine that can take a bit of knocking around and this one doesn’t fit the bill. My next netbook will probably be an Acer Aspire 1 which is much hardier in terms of hardware.
powerful sexy netbook
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
Set all the techno- geeks in your ‘hood to salivating when they see you tweeting, blogging and doing what you do, you shy stallion on this little bling- box. Better than a quickie behind your local Starbucks in your 3- series, you trendy exurbanite, and less risky! Fast, black and compact like a Louisiana running back, this netbook will fulfill all your needs as a road worthy partner. Who needs that 7 pound boat anchor? Commuting and air travel are a breeze with this bad boy. Fully functional, envy- enabled. Get one now you know you want it. The perfect complement to your iPhone-pod-blackberry driven lifestyle.
Excellent Netbook
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
This netbook has by far the best industrial design shape and look of any netbook I have seen and touched in person. It just feels super slim in your hands due to svelte tapers and rounded edges from its thickest point. I have found that battery life is very good at a usable screen brightness, and compared to a typical laptop this seems to keep going and going. The up time, of course, does not match the ‘ideal conditions’ quoted battery rating, but that is a universal issue across the board with most battery operated devices. The power cord and brick are also the smallest I have owned for any laptop. The brick is maybe 1″x3″x3/4,” I wish more laptops came with a truly portable power supply such as this.
I loaded the release candidate of windows 7 and immediately upgraded the memory with a 2GB stick and haven’t looked back. The memory upgrade is definitely not for the faint of heart and should not be attempted by anyone that has not had experience with hardware modification. It requires splitting the machines case and removing almost all of the internal components after disconnecting several VERY delicate ribbon cables. However it was worth the trouble to me as Windows 7 works great on this netbook.
Points to think about before purchasing:
1. All of the ports have connected covers to add to the smooth design appearance of the laptop. If you intend to hook an array of devices up to it on a regular basis these covers could get annoying. Personally we don’t use the netbook this way and I like the design look.
2. Difficulty in upgrading the RAM. See above.
3. The track pad and mouse ‘button’ on this model are different. To add to the clean design aesthetic the track pad is simply a rectangular zone of bumps on the case below the keyboard. This actually works well once the lack of an edge has been adjusted too. The tactile feedback of the bumps is something I find to be preferable to a regular track pad. The button design though would be my single biggest complaint. While it is a right click/left click setup, the buttons are on a single rocking bar/button. To perform an actual left click (the most common one) your finger generally has to rest on the left most portion of the rocker to leverage a click. Two regular buttons would be much preferred.
4. The keyboard is high quality, but a noticeable size difference from a regular keyboard. The feedback of the buttons is great, but I would not plan on writing any research papers on it.
I bought this for surfing the web and emailing anywhere, along with being a convenient vacation traveling laptop (watching movie files, offloading and viewing photos from cameras, loading music on ipods, etc.). In such an application the device is absolutely perfect.
I am in love with my baby netbook!
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
I got this computer two months ago and have hardly touched my big laptop since! This is the perfect computer for taking with you–it’s tiny, light, and boots quickly. I actually bought a new purse that allows me to carry this inside; it doesn’t even look like I’m carrying a computer with me! I’ve encountered maybe one or two bugs, but nothing that would not be uncommon to any new computer. I love the easy magnification using the touchpad, and the keyboard arrangement of wireless/touchpad/brightness/etc. is great. The keyboard is easy to type on, feels just like a regular computer. I suppose my main complaint is that the exterior is so shiny it shows every little finger smudge, but that is easily fixed by wiping with the cloth they included. Everyone who sees my computer comments on it; it makes me feel like a superstar. I am definitely in love!
great netbook
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
every thing is great except the audio of the speakers when i use the messenger
Rápido como um PC
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
Apesar da sua leveza, abre fácil o XP, navega rápido com uma tela muito viva, tem rede wi-fi N, e o bluetooth permite ligações pelo Skype com o uso de fones de ouvidos sem fio usados nos celulares. A bateria realmente chega a seis horas. Dá para carregar o dia inteiro e levar a qualquer lugar. Superou as expectativas.