My carefully laid plans to upgrade upgrade my netbook in June were foiled last week when my Eee 1000HA essentially bit the dust. Since I couldn’t wait for the Acer Aspire 532G and the Asus Eee Seashell 1005PR to ship, I fell back on three other options. The Acer Aspire AS1410 came highly recommended by many, but I worried about the Celeron processor, and I wasn’t wild about the 11.6″ screen size. Buddy Brad Linder also recommended the Asus UL20A, but again that meant a screen-size increase, this time to 12.1″. Against my better judgment, I went with option three: the Asus Eee Seashell 1005PE.
I say against my better judgment because my Eee 1000HA model proved terribly unreliable over time. However, ultimately the 1005PE won me over on specs and price. It’s great on battery life, and has an Atom N450 processor, a 10″ screen, and room for 2GB RAM. With an upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium, it meets nearly all of the requirements I laid out for an upgrade months ago. It doesn’t have a high-res display, but I’m willing to sacrifice that for the eleven-hour battery life. And at $350 (plus $80’ish for the Home Premium upgrade), the price can’t be beat.
Since I’m headed off to L.A. this week for The Cable Show, the new netbook is going to get an immediate workout. Luckily the layout is familiar, and I have to admit I’m digging the new burnt-red color. Here’s hoping it’s up to the task of trade-show blogging.