Asus Eee PC Gives Nightmares To Sony
If you didn't buy an Asus Eee PC, you probably know someone that owns one, and if that's not true either, I am sure you heard of the thing, at least that! When I saw it for the first time, I was quite surprised, and didn't expect to see it sell so well. I usually don't believe what the local press says, not "official" reports from local retailers either, but I have friends working in the field, and I know for sure that the Asus Eee PC had really strong sales. I see no problem with that, but Sony seems to have nightmares about the Eee PC leeping it up...
According to Mike Abary, “If Asus [Eee PC] starts to do well, we are all in trouble. That’s just a race to the bottom.”. Mr. Abary is Sony's information technology products division senior vice president, so he must know what he says.
In fact, there's no surprise with the Asus Eee PC, since the device delivers its users only what they need, leaving the extra features nobody is using aside. While Sony goes for high priced laptops and desktop computers, Asus just reminded everyone about what they really need.
“Traditional PCs are too powerful, no matter in the home or office; we are seeing quad-core rising with octo-core coming in the near future, and the more cores in a CPU, the more memory the system needs. Is all this really necessary? With the Eee PC we decided to go back to basics, to bring the focus to just functions and reasonable price levels.", said Jonney Shih, Asustek's CEO, and that's completely true. Unfortunately, this truth hurts Sony, and may hurt some other big boys in the future...
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Comments
I own 4G eeePc and the thing is darn near perfect. A little higher screen resolution would be nice. This machine turns the laptop world upside down. Truly a take anywhere laptop.
The Eee PC will never be competition for sony. People who buy Sony laptops buy them because they have the best screens (Xbrite is the brightest and most lucid laptop screen technology), and because they pack a lot of features into a slim package. People are willing to pay a decent amount for a Sony computer. Someone shopping for a Sony, costing over 1000, is not going to consider the hilariously basic Eee PC. The’s laptops from Asus are going to compete with the lower-end Dell and Compaq laptops. Dell is also putting out lower-end linux computers too.
I bet it competes more with PDA’s and lower end laptops than with high end laptops. I haven’t bought a PDA/palmtop because they aren’t powerful enough to do what I want. At the same time, I haven’t bought a laptop/notebook because I can’t justify spending that much for a machine that is more powerful than I need while traveling. The Eee fills in the area that I would most likely consider buying. It’s powerful enough to do everything I need it to do and small enough and inexpensive enough that I feel like I’m not wasting money or space by getting it and using it.
I really does make a lot of sense. Almost all of the time, you aren’t really using your processor for anything other than keeping the operating system functioning. It’s best to have a nice, powerful, but stationary desktop and a truly portable laptop. In most cases, the only thing you need on a laptop is a video card capable of decoding decent quality video and drawing windows.
I think the Eee is a great move for Asus, as well as helping linux gain popularity.