Acer’s Timeline range of notebooks spans the gamut from 13.3-inch ULV ultraportable to 15.6-inch mainstream laptop, promising prolonged battery life with an affordable price tag. The company sent over their Aspire Timeline 3810T, a 13.3-inch 1.4GHz ULV machine with heady runtime estimates and an $899 sticker, for SlashGear to try out; check out the full review after the cut.
It’s turning into something of an Atom unboxathon today, with MSI’s X-Slim X320 following hot on the heels of ASUS’ Eee PC 1008HA. This time it’s NewGadgets.de doing the honors, whipping the 13.4-inch WXGA notebook from its surprisingly classy packaging.
MSI prompted some consternation last month, when official listings for its X-Slim X340 ultraportable appeared with a $1,099.99 price-tag. That might seem vaguely reasonable for a super-skinny 13.4-inch notebook, but considering MSI had been bellowing beforehand about a sub-$1k sticker there were some understandably disappointed would-be buyers. Now, the listings have changed – the X340 is still not in stock, but its price has flipped to TBD (”To Be Determined”)
MSI have officially listed their X-Slim X340, complete with pricing, and it’s something of a disappointment to anybody lured in by the company’s promise of a sub-$1,000 sticker. Both the MSI X-Slim X340-021US (in black) and the MSI X-Slim X340-023US (in white) start at $1,099.99, with Core 2 Solo 1.4GHz SU3500 CULV processors, 13.4-inch 1366 x 768 displays and 2GB of DDR2 memory.
With the rise in internet shopping, suffering the anticipation of waiting for a new gadget to be delivered can become simply too much for the average person. Take, for example, this happy fellow and his brand new MSI Wind U123 netbook.
Unboxing video after the cut
We can’t get enough of the MSI X-Slim X340 ultraportable here at SlashGear, and after catching up with MSI themselves at CTIA this week this is one notebook we’re really looking forward to trying out. You can see our video demo of the X340 here, but if you’re wondering just how thin the latest X-Slim is, NewGadgets’ photoshoot should prove educational.
We grabbed some hands-on time with the MSI X-Slim X340 at MobileFocus, but LaptopMag’s Mark Spoonauer is obviously far more persuasive (or light-fingered) than we are, as he got to take the slender ultraportable back to his hotel room for the night. That gave him time to try out the Intel CULV notebook’s media credentials, as well as run some preliminary benchmarks.
After MSI confirmed the US specs for their Wind U123 netbook and larger X-Slim X320 and X340 ultraportables yesterday, we were keen to spend some hands-on time with the slick notebooks. Of the selection, the MSI X-Slim X340 is undoubtedly our favorite, but there’s plenty to recommend the others: how about 5.5hrs runtime from the 6-cell battery, or 8.5hrs from the 9-cell, on the Wind U123?
Video demo after the cut
MSI have announced full specifications for their Wind U123 netbook and X-Slim X320 & X340 ultraportable notebooks. As in Japan, the 10.2-inch U123 has the Intel Atom N280 1.66GHz processor, WWAN and a TV-tuner; meanwhile the X-Slim X320 has an Intel Atom Z530 1.6GHz processor and optional 3G/WiMAX. The X-Slim X340 uses Intel’s SU3500 CULV processor.
MSI have released the first advert for their X-Slim X340 ultraportable notebook, announced this week at CeBIT 2009 in Germany. The X340 has the same super-skinny casing as the X-Slim X320, but boosts performance by switching out that netbook’s Atom processor for a Centrino ULV chip.
Watch the MSI X-Slim X340 promo after the cut
SlashGear Japan
