MSI Wind U120 gets ripped apart, examined in detail
By Donald Melanson 
posted Jan 21st 2009 2:59AM
posted Jan 21st 2009 2:59AM
We manged to get up close and personal with MSI's new Wind U120 at CES, but not quite as up close and personal as the folks at the folks at MSIWind.es, who managed to recently get their hands on the netbook and promptly ripped it apart. As you may be able to glimpse in the picture above, this one is actually the U120H with built-in 3G, but the differences between the two apparently stop there, with each boasting otherwise identical specs and innards. There's not too many other surprises either, as you might expect, but modders will no doubt at least be pleased to see that the system seems to be about as accessible as its predecessor. Hit up the link below for a closer look.
[Thanks, Johan]
[Thanks, Johan]
I wish the dual core atom netbook im building at the moment looked as neat as that inside...
(Extreme poetic license has been taken on the word netbook... But it does have 12hr battery life..)
i just peeled back my new unibody macbook for a ram upgrade, and i'm shocked to see the system board in the MSI Wind is so much larger than that of the macbook.
So you think this, is much smaller than the one in the wind: http://static1.ifixit.com/igi/qFsHP2uMXoMCagVy.large
From the photos, and my u100, the Winds insides look smaller, and you have to realise, that the HDD and everything are all stacked on top of the motherboard in the wind.
Damo
@Damo: agreed. The area under the hard drives is clear. So all that real estate is shifted elsewhere making the board larger.
It makes more sense if you consider the price difference; Apple had more £ to spend on shrinking the motherboard.
@dan
Precisely, things could a whole lot easier and cheaper when stacked up. And guess what, it's better for portability too! I don't carry Air around much, not because it's not really my laptop, but because it's too damn 2D-space-hogging for an ultraportable.
So is the ram non-upgradable on this one?
what would make you say that? there's a ram slot right in the middle of the motherboard, same as the old ones.
I don't know what you're looking at but there is no ram slot on that board.
U210??
WTF..it means farty in Tagalog..
Look again....U120
And, I too am curious about the memory. It does not look like there is a slot for memory on there, unless it is hidden underneath all those wires and stickers in the center of the mainboard
Off the record, if you can wait a month or so, there will be a version
of the u120 will be upgradable to 2 gigs around the corner (not the u120h) Since MSI
rushed the new u120s out so fast, they messed up in my opinion on the
ram upgrades. They know and will correct this.