Medion's Atom-powered Akoya Mini laptop now on sale

Here's a peculiar one. Medion's Akoya Mini -- you know, just one of the legions of low-cost laptops you've barely heard of -- is finally on sale after being showcased at Computex. But it's not the mere fact of being on sale that's intriguing; for whatever reason, Medion has decided to offer the unit up in Austria's Hofer, which is the foreign equivalent of America's Aldi. So you know, while you're browsing around picking up a few bits of produce and a 20-pack of Fun Dip, why not snag a 10-inch netbook for €399 ($628) to round things out?

[Thanks, hondosan]

[Hellios @ Jun 27th 2008 8:00PM]

Apparently this is the MSI Wind, but with Draft-N. Also all Medion laptops are rebranded MSI laptops.

[KyleK @ Jun 27th 2008 8:05PM]

Aldi is German, not American :p

[DiRT @ Jun 29th 2008 2:15PM]

Or not. Seeing as how I have 2 Aldi's in town, and I'm living in the US, you are incredibly wrong.

Now, there may be Aldi's in both places, but don't deny me my case of Ramen for $1.

[KyleK @ Jun 29th 2008 5:35PM]

I meant to say that ALDI is a German company (it originated here). It is very large and present in a lot of countries.
The post reads like it's an American company.

[decapitor @ Jun 27th 2008 8:12PM]

FUN DIIIIIIIPPPPP!!!!!!...

and then somebody told me about diabetes...

[Ryan @ Jun 27th 2008 8:41PM]

diabetes is worth getting if you got it from a fun dip... best candy ever.

[Deputy Doffoos @ Jun 27th 2008 8:13PM]

eehrrmmmm , they have ALWAYS sold that Medion crap in ALDI

[Matt @ Jun 27th 2008 8:21PM]

We made the mistake of buying a Tevion TV from Aldi. Of course most of the inputs are now broken, and it never did work with any remote besides the included one.

[Steven @ Jun 28th 2008 3:17AM]

There have always been Medion lovers and haters, and there will always be. And this has mainly to do with Aldi. People often talk about Aldi products, since Aldi is an important Medion distribution channel.
Aldi is Europe's leading discount chain, and is esp. popular with the financially less fortunate because of its low prices.
The others love to talk detrimentally about Aldi, typically when they return home with a full cart's worth of Aldi stuff.

I've owned a Medion PC -- purchased at Aldi -- for 6 years now. One minor problem was solved quickly and under warranty. Oh yes, warranty is 3 years. Standard.

(the thing I don't understand with Aldi is some of the products they sometimes have on offer. Like golf balls?)

[nikster @ Jun 29th 2008 10:06PM]

As for the financially less fortunate - not really true, I loved to shop there too when I lived in Germany because nothing beats that feeling of having bought an incredible bargain. The thing is that many Aldi products are actually really good products.

I can answer the "for whatever reason" question too: Aldi came up with the idea of a "Volks-PC" many years ago, and they have some sort of promotion every year. And they always commission Medion to build the machines. So Medion selling at Aldi/Hofer (same thing) is business as usual, they do it every year. I can remember times when the Volks-PC was such a great deal that people would queue up for it in the morning before it went on sale and fight over who got to buy one. These days it's more like they are selling the usual bargain Clevo like everyone else.

[cesium @ Jun 27th 2008 8:15PM]

wtf is aldi??

[Some Kid @ Jun 27th 2008 8:31PM]

this it way to much for a Atom based computer-ill take the E(yes E, not EEE for once) or E Slim over this any day
and they come in cool colors

[Scialex @ Jun 27th 2008 8:41PM]

this is cool

[KilgoreTrout @ Jun 27th 2008 9:04PM]

Medion mulimedia desktops are very good machines always incorporating the latest technology for a price that even excluding the software I have never managed to mach with off the shelf equivalent components.
Their problem seems to be after sale assistance, but they offer 3 years factory guarantee.
Last month Aldi was selling a quad core with 4 GB ddr2 nvidia 9800 GT, wireless everything, vista premium, N gigabit wifi for less than 900 bucks.
Oh and the design is nice too.

[Ethyriel @ Jun 27th 2008 10:11PM]

I have a new German client who's Medion desktop I recently repaired. That was available in Aldi, too, though she got hers in Germany before she moved here.

Anyway, it was pretty good quality. It was in for a power supply which failed and took out the video card with it, but the supply was actually a pretty good quality Fortron. The case was solid and easy to work in, and had a fairly nice MSI motherboard. It was a little low on memory, but considering it's age (3.4Ghz P4), 512MB wasn't as bad as a lot of Dells which sold with integrated graphics sharing the 256MB of system memory. It had discrete graphics, too.

Sure, I could build a lot better, but for the price it was a damned nice machine.

[El Taco @ Jun 27th 2008 10:47PM]

Akoya? Interesting name for a laptop

[Ingersoll @ Jun 27th 2008 11:57PM]

Well, that explains where all the MSI Winds that were supposed to ship to US customers today actually went.

[MrCayne @ Jun 28th 2008 2:32AM]

It's also going on sale in Germany on the same day:

http://www.aldi-sued.de/de/html/offers/2827_7018.htm

If it went for 300 €, it would really be a great offer...

[Rick @ Jun 28th 2008 9:29AM]

Aldi in Bavaria and other southern German states will be selling them for 399E starting July 3rd.

[Furymaster @ Jun 28th 2008 3:16AM]

It's on Sale in Germany (Aldi North in white and black, Aldi South in silver and black colour) and in Austria (also silver and black). The price is very good, considering that it comes with Windows XP Home and Corel Office X3. Compared to the Asus EEE-Line it has a big Harddisk (80 GB) which is one one hand good - and on the other hand it's moving parts... heck, I'm trying to get one on thursday morning. Guess which colour?

[Leerlaufprozess @ Jun 28th 2008 4:58AM]

The price sucks considering it (or the msi wind version) originally was planned to have BT and a six cell batterie for 360 €. I'm definitely not paying 400 € for a nebook that runs out of battery after 2 hours.

BTW: It's normal for Aldi to sell medion PCs and laptops.

[luke @ Jun 28th 2008 9:08AM]

> Guess which colour?

I'll definitely decide when I get there. Not a clue yet. Anyone got good pictures of all three colours (nice to live in the Aldi North/South "borderland". all the options right there)?

[borg @ Jun 28th 2008 5:37AM]

Funny how they advertise GRAFIK POWER when it's only Intel GMA... I suppose by GRAFIK POWER they mean IT HAS GRAPHICS

[luke @ Jun 28th 2008 9:04AM]

Heck, I'm getting one too. Kinda hate the medion brand, but what the hell. Waited long enough. :)

[SPOKE @ Jun 28th 2008 9:47AM]

hardly worth the price.

All these low cost laptops started with the OLPC, and then monstered into this regularly priced, lowered powered piles of ass-packages.

[sameersg @ Jun 28th 2008 10:21AM]

maybe i will buy one next week it seem to be good

[Vorin @ Jun 28th 2008 1:00PM]

you misspelled Höfer...

[Dillon @ Jun 28th 2008 5:33PM]

A laptop that runs on atoms? Yes! Looks like they've finally mastered
nuclear powered laptops! 24 year battery life ftw!

[rctycoon @ Jun 28th 2008 5:57PM]

xbox 360

[Ingersoll @ Jun 28th 2008 9:31PM]

Well, this explains why none of the MSI Winds were available to ship in the US market today.

[Señor R @ Jun 29th 2008 6:34AM]

"which is the foreign equivalent of America's Aldi"
Nice, really :) Aldi is as German as Sauerkraut or Weißbier (good to have a German keyboard), so it's far more correct to call America's Aldi a foreign equivalent of German Aldi Süd (oder Austrian Hofer). It's not that important at all, but I want to see how Americans react if a German calls the US Starbucks a equivalent of German Starbucks :-))

[phairphair @ Jun 29th 2008 10:45AM]

I'm not sure I see the point of the article. Aldi has carried Medion for at least 10 years. Hofer is Aldi, it simply has a different name in Austria.

[Cheatah @ Jun 30th 2008 3:17AM]

As this is an American site, it's completely understandable that they compare the Austrian Hofer to something everyone in America seems to know: Aldi. Whether it's a German or American company does not matter in this context.

Germans should be proud that it was explained like this, as it means that every American knows Aldi.

(BTW, here in Belgium, Aldi has been selling Medion for ages... and not only computers, but GPS, DVD-recorders, TVs, etc.)