Epson, Onkyo, Viewsonic as well as other smaller companies have reportedly contracted Taiwanese laptop makers to build ultrathin notebooks for them, which could help drop the initial prices to $599(456 EUR).

According to unnamed sources, the companies mentioned have contracted Pegatron Technology and Elitegroup Computer Systems(ECS) to build their Ultrabooks. Pegatron, in particular, plans to begin mass production of no less than five Ultrabooks in April and May this year, while ECS is said to start shipping two such ultraportable machines until the end of the second quarter.

For now, no details were released about the actual specifications of these Ultrabooks, but there are reports that their prices will be between $599 and $649 US(456 to 494 EUR). The cheapest Ultrabook on the market today is the Toshiba Portege Z835, which sells for $799.99 (594 EUR). This, however, is only a Best Buy exclusive deal, as its regular retail price is actually set at $929 (689 EUR).

Intel has developed Ultrabooks in order to counter the ever-increasing popularity of tablets, which are eating away into the PC market. However, the high costs associated with both manufacturing and the hardware needed for such ultrathin laptops have kept Ultrabooks from becoming as widespread as Intel has hoped for.

via softpedia

Epson & Other Computer Peripheral Manufacturers to Build Cheaper Ultrabooks is a post from: Eee PC

Link to post: Epson & Other Computer Peripheral Manufacturers to Build Cheaper Ultrabooks - from: Eee PC | One comment | © Admarket, 2012.

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen an Epson netbook, but this looks to be the Japanese company’s whitest one yet. Akihabara News has it that this new model will sport about the same specs as the original, with a 10.2-inch 1024×600 LCD screen, Intel 945GSE Express, 160GB hard drive, Intel Atom N270 processor and 1GB of RAM. However, aside from being available in a color that’s a tad bit whiter, it will also be offered cheaper, about 3000 Yen cheaper according to some estimates. It won’t be winning any “best netbook ever” awards and certainly doesn’t have a killer design, but anyone looking for savings can look this one up and be satisfied.

Via Akihabara News

Epson whitens, cheapens its Na01 mini netbook in Japan is a post from: Eee PC

Link to post: Epson whitens, cheapens its Na01 mini netbook in Japan - from: Eee PC | No comments | © Admarket, 2009.

From somewhere in South Korea, we now go to Japan where EPSON is joining the netbook war with its very own Epson MiniNote netbook. Quiet frankly I think PC manufacturers should at least sit down with their employees to brainstorm on a very important aspect of product launch – brand name. How many netbooks can you think of which use the MiniNote name already?

Aside from branding, Epson seems to have not done its job as well in researching how they can come up with a netbook that would stand out from the rest of the netbooks available in the market today.

Anyway, what are we looking at here? The Epson MiniNote netbook would have the following specs:

• 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 processor
• 10.2-inch WSVGA screen
• 945GSE Express Video Chipset
• 1GB SDRAM
• 160GB HDD
• LAN
• WIFI

Pricing information and release dates are still unavailable though.

Via Akihabara News

Another MiniNote Netbook, this Time from Epson is a post from: Eee PC

Link to post: Another MiniNote Netbook, this Time from Epson - from: Eee PC | 2 comments | © Admarket, 2008.