Windows XP-powered Eee PC laptop: $400, April 9th

Sounds like we've finally got a price and a date for the XP powered Eee PC: $400, and April 9th. The hardware's identical to current-gen Eee PCs, though, so if you're happy with your little white lappy and are itching for XP you might try to pick up a license on eBay. Still, if all goes well for ASUS, they'll be selling 4x what they did the first time around, innit?

P.S. -If you are, for whatever reason, itching to read more about current hardware running the 7 year old OS, Laptop's got a hands-on. Nothing that wasn't already out there though.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 4:36PM]

Lol. I know. It just looks that way 'cause the screen's so small.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 2:26PM]

XP powered? I was hoping for a solar or fuel cell powered one ...

[Hannes The Hun Posted Mar 30th 2008 3:17PM]

i dunno... this smells like MS was completely panicking that customers would get used to like the preinstalled xandros linux and talked Asus in bundling XP with it. granted, it makes no sense to me: I've been using my imported 8G for quite awhile now, and while windows fundamentals (official stripped-down XP SP2) worked really well on that little sucker, i finally went back to xandros, it's just a better and tighter fit, especially the awesome easy desktop. for power user stuff I still can boot the full desktop.
don't get me wrong, I'm a big XP fan, but it makes absolutely no sense to me buying it with XP Home pre-installed, especially when it really is just plain old XP Home and not something specially customized as for example this really fantastic Windows Fundamentals.

[ahdok Posted Mar 30th 2008 3:21PM]

Smells to me more like Asus know they'll sell more lappies if they offer a range of Operating Systems to buyers.

A lot of people just won't buy something if it's not windows.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 3:00PM]

ThinkPad 15.4'' widescreen R Series notebooks
From: $710.00*
Sale price: $452.61*

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 3:05PM]

Please support the Linux version. The screen is too small do do anything that would require windows to be installed. I bought the EeePc just to support Linux.

[sinjinn Posted Mar 31st 2008 4:36AM]

and save whales

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 3:35PM]

It would be nice to not see such a propagation of otherwise similar models, which will only drive costs up. I would prefer to see the image for the "F9" restore moved from the limited space internal drive to a cheap USB key. The USB key could have both the Windows and the Linux restore image on it. If the user wanted Windows they would just enter their Product Key, which would be sold separately, allowing for just one line of hardware and more usable space on the internal drive of the Eee. I'm assuming the Windows version will also have some kind of F9 restore function built in, does anybody know if that is the case?

[Erik Posted Mar 30th 2008 3:37PM]

No kidding, I remember when my parents picked up their XP machine in early '03.

It was *so* much better than our ME machine (yes, we unfortunately suffered through that abomination).

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 3:49PM]

excellent, soon we will just get a free one with an internet subscription.

Geocaching With Team Hick@Heart

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 4:36PM]

Finally! I was thinking of getting one of these for my younger brother. All he really uses a computer for is email and some web browsing. This should do the job, no?

[sinjinn Posted Mar 31st 2008 4:38AM]

no

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 31st 2008 10:08AM]

No? Why not?

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 4:46PM]

I have an nlighted version of xp running on my 4g surf and it is significantly faster of a bootup than that video by about 8 seconds.

And xp works great. I need to open my docx and pptx from school, so linux did not work for me.

[ethana2 Posted Mar 30th 2008 5:17PM]

Lucky you, ISO is about to make things even worse.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 5:23PM]

ISO? Not familiar with that TLA. Do you mean international standards organization?

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 7:55PM]

Dave.....Windows XP enhanced? Try Windows XP Buthered, Neutered and Annoying.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 30th 2008 8:49PM]

lol we've had this in new zealand since last week. i unboxed it at work on thursday

[aeth Posted Apr 4th 2008 2:08AM]

Damn. Having in Australia early too would be nice

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 31st 2008 2:05AM]

Microsoft has announced that it will not allow OEM licenses to be loaded on PC's after June. I wonder how long this XP version is going to be available. Actually I'm wondering if Microsoft is going to make a last minute change and let XP live on a bit longer. With this new mini-laptop market just starting to take off it seems really stupid on Microsoft's part to halt sales of XP. I can't even imagine someone trying to run Vista on one of these. It would take 10 years just to boot up. If they gave XP a facelift, and a new name like "Micro Vista" it would sell like mad on these things. I think their marketing team is asleep at the wheel.

[bullwinkle12 Posted Apr 1st 2008 12:48AM]

I'm new to Linux, and I have a question. I'm going to be first in line for one of these bad boys when it comes out (Linux version of course). I was just wondering whether Wine works w/ Asus's version of Linux, or if we need Ubuntu to use it? (not that it will have any effect on my decision to buy it.)