Laptop users in North America are quite lucky. ASUS has confirmed that major retailers across the country are now accepting preorders for its forthcoming second generation ASUS EEE, the PC 900. The product will officially be sold on May 12 and users can have a choice of getting a Linux or Windows XP “variants”. The new price point for these babies are at $549, although those who will get Windows will have to contend with a smaller hard drive because of the higher cost of getting a Windows user license.

For those who haven’t yet read any of the references to the EEE PC 900 in this blog, the new unit will have a largers 8.9 inch screen and 1 gigabyte of memory.

I’m currently on the lookout for a good laptop for my wife. I’m planning to buy her a new one as a Mother’s Day gift even if I might get it at the end of the month.

Right now, I’m torn between the ultraportability of an ASUS EEE or the decent computing power of an ACER laptop. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve fallen in love with the EEE’s small form factor. I know my wife will love the fact that she can bring it with her in her various meetings and during her brainstorming sessions with her staff. But I am also considering getting her an ACER with a decent graphics chip. I am proud to say that my wife is also a gamer and she has been complaining that she hasn’t had the time to play her favorite RPGs and simulations. A budget gaming PC will be something she will definitely appreciate.

There are just so many choices right now. I think I’ll need a couple more weeks before I arrive at a decision.

One of the things that I usually do with my profession is to constantly meet new people who I collaborate with on various projects. Yesterday, I met one of my new teammates and I was pleasantly surprised to find out that he is also an avid ASUS EEE user. In fact, “avid” is too light a word to describe him. A fanatic/enthusiast would be a better description, especially when I saw his EEE.

He proudly whipped out his lappie and showed me his EEE running a version of Apple OSX! My jaw dropped when I saw it. It was probably the most bad-ass mod I have seen in ages. He then proceeded to regale me with his story. He said that most of the components of the EEE is compatible with OSX except for a couple of components. I forgot one of the components but he said that the Wi-Fi module is incompatible. He said he removed these incompatible modules and replaced them with compatible ones.

From the way his OSX is behaving, the transition was quite seamless. There was nary a jitter on the OS except for a very perceptible lag in the video for video conferencing (which is more a limitation of the EEE’s processing power). This successful project proves that the ASUS EEE has the capability to become THE enthusiast’s preferred laptop.

ASUS is on a roll in terms of coming out with buzz-worthy products over the last few months. It’s newest coup is the first laptop that carries a terabyte of storage. before you start wondering though, it’s not really one harddrive but two 500GB harddrives. The nifty thing here is how they have managed to fit two HDs in such a svelte machine.

The specs are no slouch either, the ASUS M70 has a 17-inch WUXGA display, Altec Lansing speakers and it is powered by an Intel Core 2 Duo T7500 ~T7700/T8100/T8300/T9300 processor, ATI Mobile Radeon HD3650 with 1G VRAM, DDRII 667 as well as Blu-ray capabilities.

There’s no word yet on the price or even the battery life of this baby. Hopefully, the price will be something that would also be worthy of a blog entry.

I’ve been bringing along my ASUS EEE in all of my meetings. It’s been a constant companion to the point that I never leave home without it. Even when I go out for errands, I never forget to bring it with me in the hope that during a lull in my day I can catch up on some work or just surf at leisure.

One limitation of the EEE is the battery power. I can only squeeze up to two and half hours of power on the stock battery. This is not enough especially for a power user like me. It’s a good thing that ASUS has started selling spare batteries at relatively affordable prices. I love the fact that the company has released heavy duty batteries that give up to four and half hours of power. That’s enough juice for me to last the whole day.

I’ve already placed my online order for a battery, between this new one and my stock battery, I’m pretty much set.