ASUS Eee PC 900 (Celeron M ULV Processor 900MHz, 1GB RAM)

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The selection of input-output ports on the Eee PC 900 is identical to that of the 701. The left side consists of an Ethernet port, a single USB port, mic and headphone jacks. The right is home to a D-Sub VGA video output, two additional USB ports and an SD card reader. The latter can accommodate third-party SDHC cards for up to 32GB of additional storage. Larger cards are expected to emerge in due course.

Features

The aforementioned 8.9-inch display isn't simply for making the laptop look nicer. It's also of a very good standard. It runs at a native resolution of 1,024 x 600 pixels, which is significantly higher than the 800 x 480-pixel screen on the old 7-inch model. The quality of the display is also commendable, especially given the price of the laptop. The vertical viewing angle is a little limited, so you'll need to adjust the horizontal tilt to get the picture just right. Still, the horizontal viewing angle is wide enough to allow two users to watch a DivX movie side-by-side in relative comfort.

The Eee PC 900's Webcam is now of the 1.3-megapixel variety, a step up from 0.3 megapixel on the 701.

Anyone expecting the new Intel Atom CPUs in the Eee PC 900 will be sorely disappointed. This iteration uses the same Intel Celeron 900MHz CPU as the old 701, but it now has the backing of 1GB of DDR 400 RAM--twice as much as you got in its predecessor. The geek inside us yearns for an Atom--or similar--CPU, but we'll have to wait until at least June before ASUS updates the Eee again. In the meantime, we'll thank our lucky stars ASUS didn't opt for a VIA C7-M CPU as seen in the Packard Bell EasyNote XS.

The amount of storage you get in your Eee PC 900 depends on whether you opt for the version containing Linux or Windows XP as an operating system. The Linux model comes with a fairly capacious 20GB of storage, while the Windows XP model has just 12GB. The reason for this discrepancy isn't as sinister as some fanboys may imagine.

ASUS wants to keep the price of both models identical. Had the Windows model shipped with a 20GB drive, the price of that model would have jumped significantly due to the cost associated with the Windows user license. ASUS has been able to supply more storage in the Linux edition as a result of Linux costing approximately zero dollars.