The Cuso PC S600 is not the UMPC of your dreams... or a UMPC

Enter the Cuso PC S600 "UMPC," your ticket to near-constant ridicule from friends and family. Sure, you'd think with specs like the blazing 266MHz ARM CPU, 1GB or 4GB of flash memory, 802.11b WiFi, miniSD support, playback of MP3, WMA, ASF, WAV, OGG, AAC, APE, AVI, WMV, DIVX, H.264, ASF, and 3GP files (um, with the freeware app TCPMP), and all kinds of Windows CE-powered document handling (TXT, DOC, XLS, PDF, PPT, PPS) you'd be all set, but we don't think it's that simple. There's something about that cheap looking plastic casing, stereo speakers, and totally out of line use of the term UMPC that tell us this probably isn't much more than a glorified PMP. On the bright side, we're thinking this isn't going to break any banks, though we've got no word on price or release date.

[Thanks, KC Kim]

[Homeboy @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:01AM]

Damn, time goes by quickly. That thing packs more heat than what my first computer did. It was a 120Mhz Pentium, 24MB RAM with a 1GB harddrive. Fast forward 10 years and I can have all that plus more power in the pocket of my jacket.

[Oinquer @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:48PM]

..thats an ARM processor anyway...not a x86...dont compare them

[SimonRichards @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:41PM]

Did you feel it whoosh as it went right over your head?

[j_g_puff @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:50PM]

Pentium? You young 'uns don't know you're born!

[Rob Conway @ Mar 2nd 2008 2:55PM]

OMG! anyone amused by Engish needs to look at google's translation of the original page for this!

http://64.233.179.104/translate_c?hl=en&u=http://www.imp3.net/articles/2/2008_02/17502_1.html&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dcusopc%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG

[ijyt @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:03AM]

The design isn't as bad as you make it out to be.

[monkfishbandana @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:10AM]

Depends on the price. I would be far from ashamed to own this; in fact I quite like it.

[mike @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:23PM]

Me too but the screen needs to upped. Most programs for CE are made for HVGA (640x240 in this case).

[Zach @ Mar 2nd 2008 2:15PM]

it isn't made by apple *coughs*

[mac @ Mar 2nd 2008 6:27PM]

It doesn't sound all that bad, but with the low-end ARM processor (I mean within the ARM lineup), it'll probably feel sluggish. I can also guarantee you the UI will be awful.

[stitifier @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:11AM]

My 3 year old HP Hx2755 has a 624MHz ARM processor, a 2 GB SD, and a 16 GB CF. Oh, and it supports .doc, .xls, and .ppt with the various office apps I've (unfortunately) had to pay for. Oh, and it totally plays .avi files with TCPMP. Oh, and it's 3 years old and isn't the size of a Swingline stapler and doesn't look like a boxified Game Gear.

[JohnTitor @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:12PM]

oh yeah? My 3.5 year old Dell X50v has a 624MHz CPU, 4GB SDHC, 16GB CF, 64MB RAM, and 16MB GPU. It supports .doc, .xls, .ptt, and .one. And it totally plays .avi in TCPMP benchmarking 300% speed on a VGA screen ;-)

[Flashpoint @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:13AM]

If this thing has full JAVA, FLASH support and can allow you to bid on EBAY, or use Myspace/Facebook/Flikr I see a future for it. Especially if its around $200

[shiba @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:24AM]

heh, the first family computer was a Dell Dimension XPS166(s maybe?). Before that it was trips to the library/school.

166MHz Intel Pentium Processor (With MMX - ZOMG!!!)
32MB RAM
And when they shipped it to us they did some weird hard drive partitioning that left us with like a 3GB drive and a 2GB drive or something like that.
Video card was a Matrox, I want to say Millenia or something like that, not completley sure though.

At least it had more storage than this :P

[Jeff @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:34AM]

It would have been a Matrox Millenium...I have terrible memories of that video card. It still haunts me to this day...

[Homeboy @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:48AM]

Yeah MMX was pretty hot those days, but I didn't know if it was a big of an advantage because the blood drips in Quake 1 was the size of sugar lumps.

I remember how jealous I got when my friend got a Packard Bell desktop Pentium 2 400Mhz MMX, Elite shit!! He rocked NFS 3 without any problems. It was white with blue details and speakers attached to the size of the monitor. The screen was 17 inches and at school he toldme that the screen was huuuuuuuuuge almost the size of a TV. Myscreen at home was 15 inches but only 14 inches viewable :( What wasso funny about Packard Bell is that in those days they shipped their desktops with like 25 CDs of software. Tons of bloatware, 6-7 months or so after use it took like 5 minutes for his computer to load all the useless icons on this desktop and taskbar.

[Neil @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:33AM]

Its funny how everything that doesn't come from a big name company is made out to be junk on Engadget.

[Raheem @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:37AM]

Yeah seriously. If this was a big name, it'd be the future of the UMPC world!

[ITRanger @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:39AM]

Ok. High plastic, but depending on price, it might not be so bad. The deal breaker seems to be mini-sd rather than SDIO and SDHC for potential attachments.

[Harry Wagstaff @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:29PM]

I dunno, Microsoft is 9 letters long, Apple is 5. Microsoft has a bigger name than Apple but that doesn't seem to protect them from constant bashing or stop the constant love fest for Apple.

[Ricardo @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:37AM]

No thanks, I'll stick with my EeePC with Windows Vista.

[Raheem @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:38AM]

Really? What's the performance like on that bad boy?

[Ricardo @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:33PM]

Pretty good, or else I wouldn't use it.

[dean @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:55AM]

Looks like it runs Windows 98 too, bonus! Yeah, I don't' see the point of it either.

[Mike @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:43AM]

Does anybody know what country this is produced out of?

'cause くそ　(pronounced kuso, cuso, whatever)
definately means 'feces' in japanese.

[ssuk @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:06PM]

yeah, but they wouldn't ever write it "cuso", so it's not Japanese.

[Mike @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:31PM]

yeah, i know, just seemed a bit funny. like the Chevy Nova.

[KC @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:17PM]

I was thought it would be a bad/funny name just saying out the letters in the name. CUSO: Cee U, aSs O.

[bebop @ Mar 3rd 2008 2:09AM]

Yeah, cuso... I noticed that too. Not headed for Japan without a name change. PMPs don't seem to be terribly hot here anyway. If it's not a phone, its not relevent.

[ReggieXuk @ Mar 2nd 2008 11:58AM]

I think engadget need to leave some decision making up to us.

[jdeuel @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:12PM]

nahhh. All these crummy news blogs like to think we depend on their every word, engadget, joystiq, gizmodo, kotaku, techeblog

fortunately engadget is the least bad about it, so it's the only one left in the ol' rss

[nookane @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:14PM]

Anyone who speaks Japanese will get a good laugh out of this name. Good luck, Cuso

[initialxy @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:39PM]

hahaha i know, i speak japanese and i'm laughing right now.

[nookane @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:28PM]

BTW Mike "kuso" is more properly written "糞"

[Mike @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:36PM]

i'm aware there's kanji for くそ, but 糞 doesn't necessarily display the specific pronunciation, or number of syllables.

[sam @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:23PM]

yea and baka (バカ) is written more properly 馬鹿 but only anal-retentive people or douche-bags who think they are masters of the japanese language would bother to point that out.

[Mike @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:32PM]

nice. thank you.

[Tony @ Mar 2nd 2008 2:55PM]

Are there Japanese Grammar Nazis too?

[RS @ Mar 2nd 2008 10:32PM]

There is nothing more proper about writing "kuso" in kanji. It is
most frequently written in katakana: クソ, but that is not any more
"proper" either.

And while the standard romanization would use a "k", brand names and
the like take liberties with romanization all the time, so it would
not be at all strange to see the word rendered with a "c".

In fact, the original name for the product (酷索) would be "kusuo" in pinyin romanization, so there ya go.

So, who wants to purchase a Turd PC?

[Christoph @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:41PM]

Provided it's cheap (

[Christoph @ Mar 2nd 2008 12:48PM]

sounds like it has some nice features, low price... oh wait, but there's the "near-constant ridicule from friends and family" - shit. guess i'll have to buy an ipod afterall.

NOT. Get real!

[jdeuel @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:13PM]

"probably isn't much more than a glorified PMP"

Every UMPC and MID?

[sinjinn @ Mar 2nd 2008 3:54PM]

i use a umpc as my main computer. glorified pmp ? no.

[terenceyyk @ Mar 2nd 2008 1:18PM]

Do you know what kuso in japanese means?
Crap!

[Markus @ Mar 2nd 2008 2:15PM]

According to the link it has a "2 megapixel interpolation camera", so you know at least that component is junk. I doubt they stopped there.

[giuliop @ Mar 2nd 2008 3:15PM]

I just wish Engadget would stop trying to think for us. You know, we do have a brain, and we do know whether this UMPC of our dreams, or not. More objectivity, please.

[tekdroid @ Mar 2nd 2008 8:29PM]

I think the CUSO name and font is trying to be similar to Casio, but I could be wrong. That was my first impression.

For ridicule, I look at the players out there tied to restrictive one-way-transfer apps, ifyaknowwhattamean.

Interesting speccage. Plays APE and Ogg but no FLAC http://flac.sourceforge.net

Shame about that.

[Cory @ Mar 17th 2008 4:30AM]

Umm, ya this is junk. Nokia N810 FTW!

[Phil @ May 11th 2008 8:44PM]

I've actually ordered one of those things. Why? Because I'm no fan of huge laptops or desktop computers with their blazing fast processors that take forever to start up and shut down; require a muscled arm and shoulder to carry around; and have too many heat-inducing moving parts. Give me a tiny computer that fits in a pocket; has tons of features; can turn on or off in an instant; never heat up; and come with programs so perfectly matched that they actually run faster than their 'big boy' counterparts in real world usage. Sites like "engadget" just don't get it. The Cuso is a step in the right direction.