Move over EEE PC, Say Hello to the EBOX

Well, thanks to a leak covered by both electronista and the Inquirer, we know a little more about the ASUS PC that I blogged about back in March. I will be called the EBOX and still bares a remarkable similarity to a Nintendo Wii. Apart from this not much has changed, we have no new release images nor any concrete facts about the CPU. It is likely to be an Intel Atom based on murmurings surrounding the series 900 second revision (or possibly third generation EEE PCs) which would make sense. Apart from this, the unit is rumoured to contain a healthy 2Gb of RAM and a traditional spindle hard disk drive with purportedly 160Gb storage. All of this will run ASUS’s custom flavour of Xandros. Given that this is the same tailored OS that ASUS have used in the EEE PC laptop range, it is likely we will see a similar GUI / interface for the EBOX.

I am a little puzzled as to why ASUS would move away from solid state disks for the EBOX. Whilst power considerations no longer have as much importance on a desktop platform, the EBOX is unlikely to attract the ‘one pc’ crowd as it will not replace the traditional computer in the home. I think it could potentially fit very well as a satellite computer in a kitchen or other room in the house were basic surfing / computer usage is required, but this only reinforces the question, why did ASUS go for a traditional hard drive? Satellite systems are typically that, lightweight machines which almost act like thin clients for other machines or storage or services on the home (or office) network. As such and given the EBOX PC is not designed to be portable, space is not as important a commodity as it is on the EEE PC laptop.

Well enough supposition for now, official release / preview is apparently scheduled for the 3rd of June, I daresay all questions will be answered then.