The Asus Eee PC T91 touchscreen tablet netbook was announced at CES in January of this year with Asus hoping to repeat the netbook revolution it started with the Asus Eee PC 701 but this time with an Eee PC that has a touchscreen which can swivel around to turn it into a tablet. The T91 went in sale in the USA this week and should reach the UK soon. The question is should you buy one or stick with your iPod Touch?
The T91 is a 8.9 inch netbook with a 1.33GHz Intel Atom Z520 CPU (which is a but slower than the traditional 1.6Ghz Atom found in many notebooks), 1 GB, a 16GB flash drive (often called a solid-state drive or SDD for short) and the normal networking options including WiFi, wired Ethernet and Bluetooth.
The Asus Eee PC T91 is the first netbook from Asus that turns into a tablet. To do this you fold the screen down over the keyboard and like a convertible sports car you now have a tablet. Since it is a touch screen device Asus have choose to create a suite of touch-friendly applications rather than use Windows XP Tablet Edition. The T91 comes with XP Home Edition as standard and the Asus apps make the netbook easier to use with your finger or the included stylus.
So what are the reviewers saying? Liliputing think the T91 is “a mixed bag,” and while they don’t like the small keyboard and slow processor they remind us that “you'll be hard pressed to find another small form-factor tablet-style notebook this cheap.”
While Notebookreview say, “The new ASUS Eee PC T91 deserves serious praise for being the first budget-priced tablet netbook on the market.” and “The hardware specs might not seem too impressive at first glance, but if you’re in the market for a low-cost tablet this is indeed your only real option priced below $700 without rebates or coupons.” They conclude with “Is the Eee PC T91 a better choice than lower-priced netbooks with bigger screens and better specs? Possibly. Is it a good tablet to buy if you just want a cheap secondary computer to carry with you for taking notes, staying connected, or sharing video, photos, and music? Absolutely.”
If you follow the adage that you get what you pay for then the T91 is excellent value for money. If you want something to fit in your pocket then go with the iPod touch but if you want a small but netbook with touch screen then you can’t beat the T91’s price tag.