MSI Wind takes the fight to ASUS Eee
ASUS' Eee PCs might be all the rage right now, but it could all blow over (excuse the pun) when MSI's Wind Notebook lands in June.
Wind, pictured below, will mark MSI's entry into the low-cost ultra-portable notebook market. Weighing in at approximately 1kg, MSI claims Wind to be ideal for outdoor use.
Marketing blurb aside, Wind does seem to pose a viable threat to the ASUS Eee, at least on paper. MSI states that Wind will be based on Intel's Shelton '08 platform, we presume therefore that it'll be using 45nm Diamondville Atom processors, which happen to be due in June.
MSI states that the processors will range from 1.0GHz to 1.6GHz and be accompanied by 1GiB of RAM. A 2.5in hard drive provides 80GiB of storage and reports indicate a whopping seven hours of battery life - some five hours more than the ASUS Eee.
Wind will be available with two choices of display size; an 8.9in or 10in LCD, both of which will provide a 1,024 x 600 resolution. The notebook will also use the same keyboard found on MSI's larger notebooks, so you shouldn't feel cramped - a problem some of our HEXUS readers have found with the Eee.
Bluetooth 2.0 and a 1.3 Mega Pixel webcam both feature as standard, and users will have a choice of Linux or Windows XP as their operating system.
Reaching Europe in June, Wind is expected to be priced at between $470 (£235) and $1100 (£555). It'll be going head to head with ASUS' forthcoming Atom-powered Eee PC as the low-cost notebook war heats up.
What do we think dear readers? Are we feeling a change in the wind?
Official press release: MSI Wind Notebook
