Asus Headquarters Tour and Notebook Product Roadmap (pics)

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Last week I was invited to a conference at Asus Headquarters in California. Getting to meet the people behind the Asus name and getting the chance to tour their facility was an enjoyable experience. Not only did I get to see the products that have already been on the market, but they also revealed some upcoming gadgets and whitebook (barebone) notebooks for 2007.

The G1 and G2 notebooks seen here have been a popular seller for Asus. (view large image)

Asus is going to continue pushing the G1 notebook into Best Buy stores and told me that soon more Best Buy's will be carrying the G1. They also stated that they have been negotiating with Best Buy to start carrying other Asus models, no word on which models though.

They are also proud of how successful the R1 (Tablet PC) and R2 (UMPC) have been. In fact, in the near future we will see newer editions of both models. No comment though on when we will see these newer models, but I think the updated R1 is already in progress and remember that was Asus's first Tablet PC.

Their main focus right now is on the upcoming C90 customizable notebook. In fact, Jonney Shih, Chairman &amp; CEO of ASUSTek, Jerry Shen, President of ASUSTek, Ivan Ho, President of Asus Computer International and Bryan Chang, AOOP Senior Technical Staff, were all very excited about their upcoming line of notebooks built on the Intel Conroe platform. These notebooks will beat the Santa Rosa release and according to them will be more powerful and cheaper.

The C90 customizable notebook, to be released in early May. (view large image)

Asus has been making strides in gaining popularity in the U.S. market. They are already very well known in the European and Asia-Pacific markets. Overall the company has grown 45% from 2005 to 2006, with their notebook line accounting for 29% of their revenue. The company's motto is &quot;Asus Open Optimum Platform&quot; solution or AOOP, which stands for all aspects of technology being open sourced and combining to be one. Slowly desktop technology will combine with notebook technology and then they both will combine with mobile technology creating one ultimate platform.

The upcoming U1, the S6 shown in limited edition pink leather, the W5 and the Lamborghini VX2. (view large image)

I had the chance to have a little hands-on with the upcoming U1 notebook. This ultra-portable notebook weighs almost nothing and has a solid chassis. It also sports the glossy piano black finish and has black leather around the keyboard, which creates quite a nice design. It definitely would be good for traveling and it has that professional appearance. It has an Intel Core Duo processor and up to an 80GB hard drive, still no set date on when they will be for sale or how much they will cost, but the full spec sheet can be found on the Asus website.

The U1. (view large image)

Top view of the U1. (view large image)

Right side view of the U1. (view large image)

Left side view of the U1. (view large image)

Asus's motherboards account for 16% of their revenue, so they had a nice display of them as well. They also had other components like thermal solutions and desktop computers on display.

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Besides what they are well known for (notebooks, desktops and motherboards) they had other devices on display, which will be released in the coming months. It seems Asus is going to test the waters in other market areas as well. They already have a good lead in the cellular phone market coming in above Motorola and Samsung, so I guess we will have to wait and see how these products fare.

The Asus AiGuru S2 Skype phone. (view large image)

The Asus S102 Multimedia Navigator. (view large image)

Unfortunately, I don't have any photos of the upcoming notebooks that are scheduled to be released throughout this year, but I do have a road-map of what will be coming and when. As you can imagine they were very hush-hush on these new models, so there isn't much in terms of specs either.

First to be released is the C90, which comes out in May. Shortly following the C90 is the Asus C91, which is due out in June and is built on the same platform as the C90, but is less bulky. Then due out in July is the smaller Asus C30 series, which will have a 13.3&quot; screen instead of the 15.4&quot; screens like on the C90 series, but it still will have the Conroe processor. Closer to Christmas season in November we will see the C80 series, which will have a 17&quot; screen and be marketed as a desktop replacement notebook. Finally at the beginning of 2008, they will have the 19&quot; Asus C70 series, which like the C80 will have the upcoming Intel X38 chipset (twin x16 PCI Express 2.0 slots, 800MHz DDR 2 and DDR 3 clocked at up to 1,333MHz, 1,333MHz frontside bus), ATI Crossfire certified and DDR3 support (inherent to the X38 chipset). Keep your eyes peeled because Asus is going to be releasing something for every user this year!

 

So a rundown on known upcoming barebone Asus notebooks:

• Asus C90 -- 15.4&quot; widescreen notebook, Intel Conroe processor platform, upcoming Nvidia graphics platform, see more on the Asus C90 here.
• Asus C91 -- 15.4&quot; follow up to the C90 that will be less bulky, June time frame release
• Asus C30 series -- 13.3&quot; screen, Intel Conroe processor, July time frame release
• Asus C80 series -- 17&quot; screen desktop replacement, Intel Conroe processor, Intel X38 chipset
• Asus C70 series -- 19&quot; screen gaming notebook / desktop replacement, Intel Conroe processor, Intel X38 chipset

 

 

hrmm....conroe in a 13.3 kinda just sounds dumb...but maybe that's just me. it still makes me sad inside that they are doing away with the brushed aluminum in their models....

 

When I heard about Conroe inside a 13.3" C30 notebook I thought that sounded like crazy talk as well. But apparently Asus likes Conroe and sees some value in that over Santa Rosa. I wonder if this means they've seen Santa Rosa and are running the other way?

 

Since the Core 2 Duo ULV chips have just been released, will Asus soon put these in refreshed U1Fs?
When Santa Rosa comes out, will we see refreshed S6Fs, U1Fs or them releasing any similar ultraportables like these? Really interested in getting an ultraportable but may just wait till May if something exciting will come out then.

 

Hopefully the C80 and C90 packs a 8800GTX...

 

Sweet laptops. Piano black finishes should be standard on all laptops Sure it' be annoying to have to wipe it every 2 seconds, but it looks really cool!

Personal invite to a headquarters tour? You or the forum are moving on up in the world?

 

so is Asus planning on releasing any portable laptops in the future (similar to the w3j)? Anything with a desktop processor is going to have lousy battery life

 

Oh man, Asus has really impressed me with their notebooks. I've always bought their motherboards and up until recently their graphics cards but they seriously have me considering getting their notebooks.

 

Well the only advantage I can think of of the conroe over the santa rosa is the conroe could possibly be overclocked.

so the battery life on the c90 is 81 minutes with power saving on?

Thats not going to take it very far.

 

Wow, Conroe in 13.3" ?!?!?! thought that size was made to be ultra portable.

 

I'm sad to see nothing too like the V6 series. It was a high quality series. I do like the leather idea though, so long as it doesn't get too hot.

 

They only allowed a sneak peak at their whitebook lineup, no word on Ensemble models.

 

And Asus officially jumped the shark.

Conroe in a 13.3".... I want some of what they are smoking!

"Hey guys, the battery life in the V2Je and the U1 really sucks. We can't have the whitebooks beating the Ensembles, so clearly we have to put DESKTOP processors in them to make the battery life EVEN WORSE."

 

I wonder what the specs on the c30 series will be....mostly interested in the ports available on it.

U1 probably won't be 'refreshed' since it just came out. They'll probably just start using the new procs in them.

 

C70 19" OMG!!!! i cant wait!

 

I wonder how different C90 and C91 will be. If they're a month apart, C91 better not just be all-out better. It should have some downsides. Who's gonna buy C90 then?

 

I'm wondering about C91 myself. Maybe a sleeker chassis? I would prefer something in black as well.