Announced at CES, the new Eee PC Flare series looks set to make Netbooks cool again (and faster too). Our MSU Campus Rep Aiman Farooq got a chance to get some hands-on time with the 1025C – see what he thought in the video above.
The 10.1-inch Eee PC 1025C will be one of the first Netbooks to feature Intel’s new and improved Cedar Trail platform, in this case an Intel Atom dual-core N2800 1.86GHz processor.
The 10.1" Eee PC 1025 Flare features the latest Cedar Trail dual-core 1.86Hz processor
With 2GB of memory added to the mix this is sure to be a healthy performance boost to a category that can already easily handle the average student’s daily work load.
There’s more to the Flare than just a performance upgrade though. Similar to the recently released ASUS Zenbook the Flare series will all feature ASUS’ instant-on technology. With instant-on the Eee PC 1025C will resume from sleep in just 3 seconds and can stay alive in standby for over 3 weeks. That means you can get to work as soon as you crack open your Netbook.
Speaking of standby time, thanks to its hyper-efficient Cedar Trail CPU the Eee PC 1025C will pull out an impressive 12-hours of battery life. With that much leeway you’ll be able to go at least a couple days without needing to plug in for a recharge.
The 10.1" Eee PC 1025C in Red alongside the larger 11.6" Eee PC 1225B
But performance aside, a big part of the story here is the Eee PC 1025C’s redesign. Moving away from the “Seashell” design that has guided ASUS Netbooks since 2009, the 1025C (and the larger 11.6″ 1225) are the first to feature ASUS’ new “Flare” design philosophy.
With a premium look reminiscent of higher-end (and far more expensive) laptops, the Flare features a seamless keyboard, metallic finishing, and fingerprint-less matte bezel. The 1025C is portable as well at just 2.76lbs and 1.35-inches thin.
Future-proof technology like USB 3.0 ports and HDMI-out ports included
There’s more too – the Eee PC 1025C gets the future-proof treatment courtesy of HDMI-out technology to connect easily to your HDTV or larger display, and USB 3.0 data transfer technology that’s 10x faster than USB 2.0.
Stay-tuned for pricing and availability – we think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.
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Intel and MS are focusing on getting ready for Windows 8. So we won’t be getting Windows 7 64bit, DirectX 10.1 supporting GMA drivers, etc for quite awhile.
Systems with Windows 7 Starter Edition are still required to be equipped with only 1GB of RAM and it’ll be awhile before they can get linux drivers to support the new GMA’s.
The NM10 Express Chipset is still pretty much the same and that means USB 3.0 support has to be provided by a add-on controller, which we are only likely to see in the more premium models like the N2800 Eee PC 1025CE.
The 1025C model will be the more basic model, lacking the webcam zoom/cover switch and will come with the N2600.
While 32nm SoC Clover Trail should be released just before Windows 8 comes out and Cedar Trail may get slightly faster clocked versions released later as well.
So in all likelihood Asus will be releasing updated Windows 8 models when the time comes and the models we see now are just to keep going for now.
While price estimates are a bit higher than when these models were first announced, probably being influenced by factors like the hard drive shortage problem that some companies like Seagate are indicating will effect prices all the way till next year. Also the shortage may be another reasons why model releases have been delayed.
So the 1025CE should be around $319, the 1025CE should be around $279, and the X101CH should go for around $269. Basically about $30 higher than prices suggested early last year.
Another reason for delay is the new GMA’s are based on Imaginations PowerVR SGX545 GPU, similar to the SGX535 that the GMA 500/600 was based on, which has a pretty bad history for proper driver support. While the Cedar Trail GMA drivers had a critical test failure with Windows 7 and they decided to delay release to give time to improve those drivers but it looks like they are waiting till the last minute to release these products and they may not come with final GMA drivers.
Presently tested Cedar Trail systems only support DirectX 9.0c because of the driver issue and that remain the case at release. While Adobe has also not added the new GMA’s to the supported GPU’s for Flash hardware acceleration, but the dual core CPU performance of the new Cedar Trail ATOMs should be good enough for most 720P and some 1080P videos and the new GMA’s do support hardware acceleration of most regular video formats for full HD video support and can even play Blu Rays.
While not all of Intel’s newest features like WiDi may not work right away but should be enabled with later driver updates. Though Cedar Trail is only suppose to support up to 600p streaming.
Looks like the resolution is only 1024×600 on these. I hope there’s a workaround like the Display1_DownScalingSupported tweak otherwise the Metro desktop on Windows 8 won’t work. Not good for a 2012 Netbook.
Windows 8 still works with lower resolutions, there is just a minimum to fully enable all the features of Metro. Windows 8 is basically intended to adjust how it works depending on the system it is installed on and how it will likely be used.
Also, don’t draw too many conclusions from the developers release as that is not what final Windows 8 will be like.
MS still has hundreds of changes to make and they’re not even up to the beta/release candidate phase yet.
While, as I suggested in my other post, I think they’ll be released Windows 8 specific models when the time comes. Mind features like UEFI and secure boot will have to be supported as well.
Also Intel will be pushing 22nm Silvermont to replace 32nm Cedar Trail in 2013. So there will be a fair amount of change from now till then.
mas, daya tahan btaarei asus k42j ..itu normalnya berapa lama yah..dengan pemakaian menggunakan mouse, hardsic external dan modem kira2 berapa lama yah laptop saya sekrang ini cuma kuat kira2 90 menit.. itu di hitung masih normal atau tidak yah .kalo tidak normal biasanya bisa di claim garanasi gak yah
I’ve seen prices posted, and even a Feb release posted. Is there a set release date for these netbooks?
Pre-Orders are starting to be offered but no release date has been mentioned yet.
Asus tends to keep details confidential until they actually release the product. So we’ll just have to be patient until they do, but it’ll likely be either near the end of February or early March.
Possible deal breaker alert, looks like the 1025CE and 1225C use soldered RAM. So you’ll be stuck with whatever amount of RAM the system comes with for those two models.
Mind any system coming with Windows 7 Starter Edition can only be sold with 1GB of RAM! And they’ll not likely to be sold with more than 2GB even with Home Premium.
So this seems an extremely bad decision on Asus part. The N2800 can support up to 4GB but they decided to cripple it.
Very neat and tidy! I’m ipsresmed. My office looks like OfficeMax exploded. Last year. Then a marauding band of monkeys had a heyday.