Asus Eee PC S101H

Full Review

Asus' Eee PC family of netbooks has a shiny, elegant member in the form of the Eee PC S101H. It is certainly more attractive in terms of looks and design and encases the feel of a premium ultraportable with the inexpensiveness of a netbook. Weighing just 1.1 kg, it comes with an SSD for storage. The Eee PC S101H sports a glittering, metallic brown screen cover; despite being glossy, it doesn't attract as many fingerprints as one would imagine, and looks pretty neat. The feel-good factor extends when you prop open the netbook; from the tightly-knit keyboard to the screen, even the gemstone-encrusted tubular hinge tries to make a style statement. The brushed metal finish of the palmrest and touchpad also adds to the premium feel. The 10.2-inch matte screen is bright and evenly lit but it has average viewing angles. Above the screen, a 0.3MP webcam is grooved into the glossy bezel. As is the case with most netbooks, the innards of the Eee Pc S101H comprises of all the usual suspects: 10.2-inch matte screen (1024x600 resolution), 1.6-GHz intel Atom processor, 1GB of RAM, and Windows XP Home edition. But it comes with a 16GB SSD, which is much faster than your average spinning hard drive. Connectivity options include Draft-N wireless support, though lack of Gigabit ethernet and expansion slot is disappointing. Asus includes a portable mouse to make life a little easier while navigating the screen. The Eee PC S101H also offers extended online storage of 30GB free for 18 months after you create an account at www.eeestorage.com. Install the Eee storage application, assign folders to upload online, and they're automatically uploaded everytime you make a change to them. You can, of course, access these files conveniently through a web-browser. When it comes to using it, the Asus S101H is a decent netbook to work with. The keyboard is tightly packed and offers no flex. And its 4-cell battery lasted an acceptable three hours while browsing the Web at full screen brightness. The Asus Eee PC S101H breaks the cheap and simple monotone of a netbook by bringing style and design to the table. It definitely looks more expensive than its asking price of Rs. 27,990, and we feel the slight premium you pay for its looks is worth it.

Bottom Line

Asus' premium netbook, the Eee PC S101H is one of the most elegant netbooks out there. It comes with a 16GB SSD, with additional online Eee storage. But it is slightly expensive than the others.