Asus Eee PC X101CH review

The Eee PC X101CH is a 10 inch netbook with an Intel Atom N2600 Cedar Trail processor, a fanless design, and a $270 price tag. It's a pretty good value for the money, but suffers from short battery life and a lack of upgrade options.

[johnheywood]

unbiased, thorough, clear analysis. thanks, defiantly getting this model.

[ZeoCyberG]

@deabru - It's because of the small 3 cell battery. Most netbooks use 6 cells, but this model is only intended for light casual usage.

Cedar Trail basically gives only around a 10% boost in run time compared to Pine Trail, according to Asus. However, standby times are much improved and combined with instant on means you can take days between usage and not have to shut off and boot all the time. You're just limited to just over 3 hours total continuous usage per charge.

[rowdyraider]

I ordered one of these just to have a backup computer or something smaller than my Macbook Pro. When it came in, I booted it off a multiboot USB and installed Mint 13. I've heard some people say when running several applications in Windows the HDD never spins down. I maxed out the CPU earlier in Mint and it only used 5MB of swap in Linux. Best performance bet is to install a SSD (Linux or Win, 7mm) and create a swap partition to help offset the RAM, probably extend battery life some.

[ishanb]

Does it have a HDMI port and does it have a disk input thing and 2 USB slots?

[SharifAbdou]

Hi Brad, thanks for the very informative review. I've been looking for a small, ultra-portable netbook for travel, and my research zeroed in on the Asus X101CH, but I was still on the fence about whether to buy it. Your review helped me decide to take the plunge. One question: Can I transfer data from the X101 to a portable hard drive?

Thanks again, subscribed here and following you on G+ and Twitter :)

[Chillwaving]

would love to see a video on how you disassemble the keyboard assembly for a HD replacement!

[somerandomguy]

in third grade i've got my x101ch for free. it is good, BUT it has 1GB OF RAM! it would be a very good laptop if it would have 2 gb of ram. can i upgrade th ram or swap out the hdd for a ssd?

[swtlady]

i noticed that this laptop doesn't have heat output underneath the laptop. does it heat up quickly?

[TrulyMelly]

In 2014 what do you think this is worth now? Im looking at a used one for $150...

[CywlexeemTacac]

I need a netbook to run classic 2D games like Diablo II or StarCraft. The question is how does it look in 1024x600 resolution? Bigger monitors makes it look quite blurry.

[turkeymayne]

Please answer: I have recently purchased this netbook and found that it has a SD card with various tracks of music on it. I bought this new from amazon and i am curious to see if this was only me.
basically, was this only me who got a SD card full of music?

[MsLKSF]

What about Microsoft Word? Can this netbook hold lots of documents?

[happierabroad]

This netbook is slow. It only has 1GB RAM and is slow as molasses. Was it like that when it was new? The new Dell netbooks have 4GB RAM.

[StratigosDimitrios]

Hi I can Upgrade The WLAN to Intel® Centrino® Ultimate-N 6300??

[renelareve]

which webcam soft ware can i download and use for my laptop cuz i cant take picture from webcam?

[fxaeec]

Is there really a point in installing XP, considering it will be abandonware soon (april of 2014, I didn't check though so I'm not quit sure). Also, are drivers available for XP ? If not, it will probably run pretty slowly anyways. I might be wrong though, since I don't own this netbook.

[JediMasterLego]

it depends on what your needs are and how powerful a [laptop] computer you [need to] use for college.

netbooks are good for notetaking, the occasional web-browsing, perhaps checking your email, and viewing walkthroughs for games while you game online and/or on a videogame console.

for stuff other than EXTREMELY-basic usage (and/or if you need an optical-drive [on the computer]), get something else.

[DanielA-crun]

Isn't it the same as under R11CX, but in white?

[jeskildinho]

any tips to get this computer faster if you cant change RAM memory to 2GB ?

[whackediw]

Hello im interested in this netbook i was just wondering if i install WinXP64bit will this work faster ?