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The Eee 2G Surf is very cute and can get on the internet without a problem, You won't be able to play any Pogo games on it and the DIVX movies are a little jurky, I found expanding the movie screen to full screen got the video and audio out of sinc and drove me crazy but leaving it and just expanding the player was best.
It is relatively stable (but when it crashes it goes down hard). Awful linux interface. Writing is hard enough.As soon as a I can, I'm going to sell this thing, sell my imac, and get a macbook pro. Forget web surfing.
Painfully slow. But its painful to use this thing. Yes its a 300 dollar laptop. But the experience sucks. Tiny postage stamp of a mouse pad. It's not really feasible to reread your work on a monitor this size, and editing is so key for improving your writing.
When it works, it connects to the internet reasonably fast, and I can use google docs to write stories. And if anything goes wrong, good luck fixing it, linux is still for techies, and completely unapologetic for the non technical crowd. Yes I still use this thing, so it can't be that bad. It's a nice color. Keys that trip you up and cause you to delete whole sentences in a single slip (thank god for undo). It IS light, you won't even notice it in your backpack. What you save in cash you pay for in frustration.
Installing software feels like you're hacking the system. A year ago I bought this computer to write with, and my experience with it has taught me the value of not skimping on things like screen size, keyboard size, and mousepad size. Tiny screen. Unimpressive battery life leaves you tethered to an outlet.
Only to discover Amazon won't let me sell it used on Amazon. So Don't Buy It If You Are Not Sure You Will Want To Keep It. I bought this nearly a year ago, figuring something small and portable might be useful for taking notes and jotting down ideas when travelling. Apparently they only let "specially approved" dealers sell some things. Some things like the small keyboard are not obvious from the web - borrow someone else's or buy it from someone with an extended return policy. Unfortunately the keyboard is much too small. I kept trying to work around but finally gave up.
And all those features are realized in this tiny little computer. It lasts up to 2 hours, sometimes less, depending on what I'm doing.SUMMARYOnce I got it configured just so, this computer is everything I wanted it to be. Impressive. Of course, I am a woman with long, slender fingers. It took me three whole days of surfing the internet to find instructions, trial and error through which I thought I might just mess everything up so badly I'd need to reinstall everything from scratch -- until I finally found someone who posted step-by-step instructions for installing this thing (bless him, but I can't remember where I found the instructions). SIZEThat is one comment I get from everyone, "That's the smallest notebook I've ever seen." It really is small, under 9" x 6 ¼ x 1 ½".
My kids use it more than I do, and I bring it with me whenever I need a computer or I know my kids will be waiting somewhere for a long time (i.e., doctor's office or sibling's activity) and will be bored. I have the ASUS Eee PC 2G Surf. While my husband chides me because I could have bought a larger notebook for just a little more, that wasn't why I bought my eeepc. I don't know Xandros, the operating system that came installed.
Just select the network and click "connect." I found the WIFI works very well, and surfing speed is quick, but I wanted internet everywhere, so I got a Sprint Airbus 595U.Setting up the 595U was a bear. All the information and passwords are stored. I installed Glubble so that my children could surf safely. It's a terrific buy.
It's under the "work" tab and not the "internet" tab, so not as convenient as it could be, but I'm happy with Thunderbird.BATTERY LIFEI've watched entire tv episodes via my 595U connection on one charge. Perhaps a person with larger hands would find difficulty.DURABILITYThis little thing goes in my purse and it's been dropped, but nothing ever broke and no data has been lost. I highly recommend Glubble to anyone giving this to their kids.EMAILThere is no email client built in, but I was able to get Thunderbird working by browsing the internet. I wanted little, I wanted portable, I wanted durable, I wanted to surf the internet.
Now that it's set up, I can connect quickly and easily.The computer comes with Firefox, which I found easy to use. Once the network connection is established, reconnecting is easy. It fits in my purse and I can take it anywhere.I don't find the smaller a keyboard a problem at all. The flash drive feature helps, as I'm not worried about breaking a delicate hard drive.WEB SURFINGIt's easy to get a WIFI connection when one is available.
I would definitely tell anyway who needs a small laptop or an additional one for on the road to get the Asus eee PC. It is so easy and very durable when using. Bought for my sister for xmas, excellent laptop for her since it is so small and easy to just throw into your bag. She uses it for the internet and to play her iPod music.
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