Americans: prepare for more debt!
Unlike the unfortunate case of the Ultrabook, Asus can successfully say that the price of the ultraslim and ultracheap Asus X101 netbook will not deviate much from the US$199 they projected. How did they do this? Well, simple, use the cheapest hardware, of course. According to the official Asus X101 website, it will come with this spec,
| Operating System | MeeGo |
| Display | 10.1″ LED Backlight WSVGA (1024×600) Screen |
| CPU | Intel® Atom™ N435 Processor |
| Memory | DDR3, 1 x SO-DIMM, 1GB ( Maximum 2GB ) |
| Storage | 2.5″ SATA 8GB SSD HDD 2 GB DropBox cloud storage |
| Wireless Data Network | WLAN 802.11 b/g/[email protected] Bluetooth V3.0*1 |
| Camera | 0.3 M Pixel Camera |
| Audio | Stereo Speakers |
| Interface | 2 x USB 2.0 1 x Audio Jack (Headphone/Mic-In) 1 x Card Reader : SD/ SDHC/ MMC |
| Battery | 4hrs (3cells, 28W/h) battery life |
| Dimensions | 262 x 180 x 17.6 mm (WxDxH) |
| Weight | 0.92 Kgs (w/ 3cell battery) |
| Color | Texture : Red, White, Brown |
The X101 is ready for preorder in various websites, however, as it is right now only PCSuperStore can promise a $199 price. The price ranges from $199 to $209, as of now. For Europeans and Asians, unfortunately, Asus is totally skipping Europe and there is no word on the X101 hitting Asia.
The ultracheap, ultraportable and ultraslim netbook will break barriers in these three areas, but it does come with significant compromises. The 8GB SSD, for example, would really make this a poor purchase if you intend to install Windows 7 on it, as it will likely gobble up quite a significant bit of your memory especially if you climb above Windows 7 Starter. Then again, after installing a Windows OS, you won’t be able to do much else unless you put a high capacity SD card in. And then there’s the power – it comes with the lowest powered Atom processor, the N435, which runs at 1.33Ghz. That would pose even more performance-related problems if you intend to play games on it or watch HD videos on it.
However, this is just conjecture, though I suspect it won’t be too far from the truth. Without a sizeable hard disk, it’s hard to think of this as a practical piece of kit. You might, however, be more interested in the souped up version based on the same chasis – the X101h, which will sport a 250gb hard drive and Windows preloaded. Time will tell how useful the X101 if used outside its MeeGo confines.
]]>On a Non-GAAP basis, revenue was $13.1 billion, operating income was $4.2 billion, net income was $3.2 billion, and EPS was 59 cents. On a GAAP basis, the company [...]]]>
Fusion is the least of the Atom's woes
SANTA CLARA, Calif., July 20, 2011 – Intel Corporation today reported its fifth consecutive quarter of record revenue, with double-digit revenue growth across all business segments.
On a Non-GAAP basis, revenue was $13.1 billion, operating income was $4.2 billion, net income was $3.2 billion, and EPS was 59 cents. On a GAAP basis, the company reported second-quarter revenue of $13.0 billion, operating income of $3.9 billion, net income of $3.0 billion, and EPS of 54 cents.
The company generated approximately $4.0 billion in cash from operations, paid cash dividends of $961 million, and used $2.0 billion to repurchase 93 million shares of common stock.
“We achieved a significant new milestone in the second quarter, surpassing $13.0 billion in revenue for the first time,” said Paul Otellini, Intel president and CEO. “Strong corporate demand for our most advanced technology, the surge of mobile devices and Internet traffic fueling data center growth, and the rapid rise of computing in emerging markets drove record results. Intel’s 23 percent revenue growth in the first half and our increasing confidence in the second half of 2011 position us to grow annual revenue in the mid-20 percent range.”
Unfortunately for us fans of netbooks, Intel is reporting a slowdown in Intel Atom’s sales, with revenue at $352 million, falling 15 per cent from last year’s Q2 results. Concurring with this fact is Paul Otellini, Intel’s president and CEO, who laments that the netbook market is weak.
Otellini alleges that netbooks faces serious competition from tablets and full-sized but low-priced laptops, and therefore is gearing the Intel Atom up for the tablet market, with its Oak Trail version.
Liliputing, however, alleges that the reason to this is that the reason to this is can be attributed to the levelling off of consumer demand for netbooks. “They’re not growing at the ridiculously fast rate that they were in 2008 and 2009. And that makes a lot of sense, because the product category isn’t brand new anymore,” says Liliputing.
Whether or not you are of the opinion that netbooks are on the way to its graveyard with Intel focusing on tablets and the new Ultrabook is yet to be seen. Some people do believe that that is so for reasons such as irrelevance, obsolete-from-the-day-you-buy-it, competition from tablets, Intel looking elsewhere, etc, but the truth is that it might just turn out to be a niche sector of the computer market, but to say it will totally go away is a bit implausible.
Info via: Intel Newsroom, ComputerWorld, Liliputing]]>