Classmate PC Whitebook

Last Friday, I posted on Twitter that I saw a Philippines whitebook version of the popular Intel Classmate PC. I had promised to post a picture online, but forgot to because of the accident we were involved in (I blogged briefly about it here and here).

Well, here it is. The Neo Explore X1:


It was rather fortunate though that I posted about it a few days later. I now know that the unit I saw was from the 2nd generation of the Classmate PC. I confirmed that when I checked the specs here. The specs are as follows:

• Processor: Intel Celeron M ULV 353
• Processor Speed: 900 Mhz clock speed, 400 Mhz FSB
• Chipset: Intel GMS915 + ICH6-M
• Memory: 512 MB DDR2
• Display: 7" 800 x 480 LCD
• Hard Disk Drive: 30 GB
• Networking: 10/100 Mbps LAN
• Wireless: 802.11 b/g WiFi
• Card Reader: SD/MMC Card Reader
• Battery: 6-cell battery, 3-4 hours
• Weight: ~ 1.45 kg

Neo is selling the laptops for Php 16,800 with Windows XP Starter pre-installed. Though I doubt that would be as useful as something like Ubuntu or PCLinuxOS, Both would be better suited for the X1 as far as maximizing the available hardware.

You'll also notice (in the pic above) that the X1 is sitting right beside an Asus Eee PC. Rather tongue-in-cheek if you asked me. While they share the same roots, starting off as laptops for students who don't necessarily need that much processing power for classroom computing, the Asus Eee PC has been adopted by both geeks and ordinary people alike because of its low price and conservative styling. Even with it's diminutive dimensions, the Asus Eee still looks and feels like a traditional laptop (sans the full-sized keyboard, that is).The Classmate exudes a toy-ish feel. Kinda looks like a VTech toy laptop for toddlers.

For the general laptop-using internet-surfing public, the only edge Classmate PC has over the Asus Eee would be its 30 GB of storage. That's huge compared to the paltry 4GB of the Asus Eee PC. It makes it more flexible when it comes to saving your work or files. Both laptops have their own selling points. It'll come down to what's important to you.

Comments? Which would you consider buying? What everyday computing tasks would you use it for?