The Asus 1008HA (Seashell) Netbook is one of the mainstream models in Asus' rapidly evolving line of netbook computers, one of many models with a 10" display and Intel's 1.66ghz N280 Atom cpu running Windows XP. Released in late May of 2009, the 1008HA has received a lot of interest due to its compact but fully functional "Seashell" design, featuring a glossy white or black exterior with curving edges that close together like a seashell. The 1008 HA weighs only 37.5 ounces, is only 1" thick at its thickest point, and has almost no exposed ports (a design seemingly inspired by the Macbook Air). While there are USB, audio, ethernet, and vga ports, the ports are all hidden by covers which fit into the external lines of the body. Only the power connection is normally exposed.
Features of the 1008HA include:
1GB ram (Samsung PC5300 DDR2 ram on the one I purchased) 160 gb hard drive (a 5400 rpm Seagate ST9160310AS Momentus SATA drive) 802.11N Wifi adapter and ethernet Bluetooth 2.1 A nearly full size keyboard (w/ large shift, return, Caps lock, and backspace keys) 1.3 mp camera Microphone "Multitouch" mouse pad Intel 945 chipset and Intel 950 graphics Small, lightweight power adapter/charger with 5' long cords (10' total) Zippered slip case included Two external USB, one ethernet, mic, headphone, and VGA ports. sd card slot 10 gb online storage for 18 months Stereo speakers 1024 X 600 display Li-ion polymer battery (NOT user replaceable) No DVD/CD Drive
Some of these features (and consequently performance) are common to many netbooks. That's because Microsoft only provides inexpensive Win XP licenses for use on netbooks with hard drives no larger than 160gb and no more than 1 gb ram, consequently, most netbooks match that limit. If you're comparing netbooks, the features that vary between models include keyboard layout and feel, stereo bluetooth and "N" wifi options, flash memory slots, expansion options (memory, battery, hard drive replacement, etc), and size and weight. In almost all these areas, the Asus 1008HA excels, with the notable exception that the 1008HA offers no expansion options. If you're looking for a similarly designed netbook with expansion options, consider the ASUS 1005HA. The 1005 is similar in design and appearance, but thicker and heavier (about 10 ounces heavier with the largest battery). With the extra size comes an optional larger, replaceable battery, and a user-accessible memory slot.
Appearances and Controls The 1008HA weighs in at just over 2.3 lbs. It feels solidly built, and it is widely recognized as on of the most attractive and "useable" netbooks available. Closed, the laptop is 1" thick at the back, tapering down to about 0.7" inches at the front. The only noticeable port is the power connector on the left side. There are flaps on the left and right side that cover 2 USB ports (one on each side), a mini VGA port (left side), and audio ports and an ethernet jack (on the right side). The spring loaded sd card slot is also on the right side. There are no ports on the back, and no removable access covers on the bottom of the 1008HA. If you want to access the hard drive or memory slot to upgrade, its a major undertaking, as you'll need to take the case apart and remove the keyboard just to get started.
In the US, the 1008HA is available in glossy black or white. Other colors are listed as available in other countries. I've not seen a thinner or lighter model available with anything close to this feature set from any other manufacturer.
The keyboard layout is quite good, especially if you consider that ASUS had to fit it into a 10" netbook form factor. ASUS saids the keyboard is about 92% of standard, while the keys appear to be full size, the spacing between keys is much less than normal. The shift and return keys are large enough you won't have any problems hitting them. The backspace key is oversized, the delete key is in the right location in the upper right. The only real trade offs I see are the small arrow keys in the lower right corner of the keyboard. The feel of key board is pretty good, feedback from key presses won't match a desktop keyboard, but they're equivalent to most of the flat keyboards you find on standard laptops, and better than most other netbooks. ASUS provides a "fn" key to access screen brightness and audio volume from the keyboard.
The "multitouch" touchpad is a rectangular area below the space bar. The touchpad surface is bumpy, which allows you to distinguish it by feel from the surrounding surface. Users can chose to use either the left or right side of the touchpad as a scroll wheel, running a finger up or down the edge scrolls whatever is on the screen, or, at least it's supposed to. In practice the scroll action is erratic. When browsing the web, it often doesn't work while web pages are still loading, or if the cursor is over a clickable hotspot. The multitouch feature allows you to zoom in and out on the screen by touching the pad with two fingers and then moving your fingers close together or further apart. In practice, this works about 80% of the time, suffering the same limitation as the scroll feature.
Battery Life
The Asus 1008HA is powered by a 32 whr Li-ion polymer battery. Li polymer technology lets Asus fit the largest possible power source in the available space. Most shoppers will find the lack of a user changeable battery in this laptop its biggest drawback. It is nice to have the option for buying a second and/or larger battery for long trips, or just to know you can replace your battery yourself when it starts to fail. I've had my 1008 HA for a couple of months, and I'm satisfied with the battery life, even though the battery is only a 3 cell model. I ran one test of battery life by watching a streaming Netflix movie over the an internet wifi connection. Video brightness was set at 50%, and the sound was routed through headphones. The Asus battery optimization utility (the "Asus super hybrid engine") was set in "Auto" mode. The laptop ran for 3 hours and 45 minutes, impressive results for a netbook with a battery this size, even though its significantly less than Asus' stated 6 hour battery life. If you're not using the wifi connection and decoding video constantly, you'll likely get 4-5 hours of battery life.
Display
The 1008HA has a LED backlit 1024 X 600 LCD display, standard for most 10" netbooks (though Dell offers a higher res option on their mini 10). The display can be set to 1024 X 768, but only a 1024 X 600 section is diplayed at any time. Moving the cursor to the top or bottom of the display scrolls to the unseen areas. It takes a while to get used to the 1024 X 600 aspect ratio, the screen height is lower than what you find on most desktop and larger laptop widescreen displays, which means you see less. This is particularly noticeable when browsing web pages. If you have a menu bar, address bar, and a tool bar on the top of your browser window and an status bar and task bar at the bottom, you find there's not as much space left for actually viewing the web page.
Left and right viewing angles are very good, if you're off center to the left or right, you won't have any problems viewing the display. Vertical viewing angles are quite poor, if you're more than about 10 degrees above or below the display, you'll notice a loss contrast in the image, and colors start to wash out.
As long as you view the screen on line, the glossy display looks very good, colors are bright and realistic. Images and text are sharp on the screen. The display is very glossy, not a problem in indoor lighting, but screen glare is a problem in sunlight.
Using the ASUS 1008HA Including the power adapter, the ASUS weight about 2 1/2 lbs. If you're used to traveling with a 5 or 6 lb laptop plus charger, the 1008HA feels almost trivially light. Its small enough to fit fully open on the tray table on most planes, unlike most mainstream 14" or15" laptops, where it is difficult to fully open the screen in the limited space between seats.
For most "mainstream" applications, word processing, web browsing, and viewing standard definition video, or syncing an iPod with iTunes, the 1008HA performs quite adequately. The netbook comes with a 60 day Microsoft Office trial, and I found those applications ran without problems, though I was mostly handling simple documents. In comparison to a mainstream laptop, the 1008HA feels a little sluggish, especially when browsing when I open several web pages at the same time. I also use a Dell M1330 laptop, with a 2Ghz T7250 core 2 duo cpu running Vista, and it feels snappy after using the ASUS netbook.
I've watch several streaming movies and TV shows from Netflix, which played without problem. Standard definition video on Youtube plays fine, but HD content is very choppy, almost unwatchable. I've ripped a couple of DVD's to the hard drive using H264 codec (using Handbrake), and they play back fine.
Any kind of gaming that requires 3D acceleration is out of the question for this netbook. Casual games work well though, I've installed and played Plants vs Zombies, World of Goo, and Crayon Physics Deluxe without seeing any problems or slowdowns.
I've made several phone calls using Skype out, and sound quality was fine on both ends. Similarly, video chats over Skype using the webcam worked well.
Wireless Networking
I've not found any problems with the wireless networking adapter. I've carried the netbook and an iphone with me on a couple of long trips. Often, the 1008HA "sees" and can connect to more wireless networks than the iphone sees. I often watch Netflix videos over my wireless connection (I have a Dlink DIR 655 router), and Netflix finds the signal quality/strength is high enough to play the videos in HQ model from anywhere in my 4 bedroom signal story home, or even outside my home where I am about 50 feet from my router.
Conclusion
Netbook manufacturers make a few tradeoffs to achieve the low price and portability the defines netbooks. Fortunately, ASUS made a lot of good choices when designing the 1008HA "Seashell" netbook. Even though it is one of the lightest, best looking and useable models available, there's really been no missing features, you get bluetooth, an "N" wireless adapter, a webcam, and all the standard features you expect. The biggest tradeoff is the lack of a user accessible battery or memory slot, choices ASUS made to make the 1008HA as thin and light as possible. On paper, the battery sounds a little small, but real world performance is quite good. You probably won't get the 6 hours ASUS claims, but 5 is quite achievable, especially if you use ASUS' convenient tray utility to turn off the wifi and bluetooth adapters when not in use. If you want to get the lightest weight netbook available without sacrificing performance or battery life, the 1008HA is as good a choice as you'll find. And if you want the ultimate in battery life, the similarly designed, but slightly thicker and heavier 1005HA is your choice.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 400 Operating System: Windows Processor: Other Processor speed: over 1000 Screen Size: 10 inches RAM: More than 256
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