Asus & Gigabyte Touchscreen Netbooks Compared
Posted on April 10, 2009
Netbooks are increasingly becoming popular owing to their size, convenience in carrying around and the various features they offer. The mobile computer market is overflowing with netbooks, from different vendors, every model trying to better the other in terms of technology and design. To stay in pace with the market trends and also to attract consumers, the netbook-making companies have to constantly innovate and improve what they have to offer. Asus recently adopted touchscreen technology in their mobile PCs, like the Dual Panel Touchscreen Notebook, Asus EEE PC T101H Netbook, Asus EEE PC T91 Netbook and Asus N20 Netbook. Samsung also recently announced their Samsung Q1EX-71G ultra-mobile PC with a touchscreen. Gigabyte’s new Gigabyte M1028 Touch Notebook belongs to this category as well. Among these the Asus EEE PC T101H Netbook and the Gigabyte M1028 Touch Netbook are 10 inchers and really make for interesting comparison.
Display screen – The Asus EEE PC T101H has a 10.2” screen with a 1024×600 pixel resolution. This is a convertible mobile PC, in which the screen can swivel around and bend over, to look like a tablet PC. One can then directly operate it with finger touches. The Gigabyte M1028 Touch Netbook is also a convertible netbook with a 10.1” touch screen, offering the same resolution.
Processor – Either of the devices employ the Intel Atom processor which has a clock speed of 1.66GHz. Hence they equal each other when it comes to processing too.
Operating system and Graphics – The Windows XP Home Edition runs as OS on both the convertible netbooks. Intel graphics processors have been incorporated in both the laptops.
RAM and Hard Drive storage – Both the laptops come with a 1GB RAM and a hard drive storage space of 160GB. The user memory can be upgraded with the memory slots available in either of the mobile computers. There is news that the hard drive of the Gigabyte M1028 Touch Notebook can be upgraded to a maximum of 250GB too.
Networking Options – The networking options are quite similar too with either mini laptops supporting both wired (Ethernet) and wireless networking (WiFi). High speed 3G technology and Bluetooth connectivity are also offered by both portable laptops. One difference between the netbooks is that the Gigabyte netbook, in addition to the above, supports 3.5G and WiMAX technologies as well.
Connections and ports – The ports and interfaces that both the touchscreen netbooks offer are the same too. An ExpressCard Slot, 3 USB ports, a VGA connection, a 4-in-1 card reader, headphone and microphone jacks.
Camera – Gigabyte M1028 netbook houses a 1.3 Megapixel camera. The Asus EEE PC T101H netbook is expected to have a camera integrated into it as well. However, the exact resolution of the camera is not known.
Battery Life – Asus promise a battery life of 5 hours for their touchscreen netbook, while Gigabyte have mentioned a life of about 4 hours for their touch notebook.
The Asus EEE PC T101H Touchscreen Convertible Netbook and the Gigabyte M1028 Touch-sensitive Convertible Netbook have almost similar features, technologies and weight. The M1028 netbook offers some additional features like WiMAX, 3.5G technology and a 1.3MP camera. The EEE PC T101H netbook is musch more sleeker compared to the Gigabyte netbook. Cost wise, the exact pricing of the Gigabyte model is not available currently. The Asus model however, carries a very heavy price tag – above £ 900.