HANOVER, GERMANY -- Asus Computer will offer what it claims to be the thinnest and lightest notebook PC with a 15-inch screen, the company said this week at the Cebit trade show here.
Some versions of the V6800V series will be .9 inches thick and weigh 5.6 pounds, and will be the thinnest and lightest available with 15-inch screens, according to Holger Schmidt, a spokesperson for the company.
Different versions of the V6800V series that have a more powerful battery will fit in the same casing, but weigh a little more at 5.7 pounds, he says.
The smaller 4-cell battery will enable the notebook PCs to operate for about four hours, while the versions with the larger 8-cell battery should allow about eight hours of operation, he says.
Going Wireless
All of the V6800V series models will come with the latest version of Intel's Centrino technology, which is code-named Sonoma, the company says. Centrino is a combination of the Pentium M processor, the Alviso chip set, and an 802.11 wireless chip.
The notebooks will be available with various Pentium M processors with three different clock speeds starting at 1.73 GHZ, according to the company.
"These are small and light notebooks that are nearly as powerful as desktop [PC] replacements," Schmidt says.
An entry-level version has a 60GB hard drive, while other versions will have 80GB hard drives. The company is considering adding 100GB hard drives for later versions, Schmidt says.
Different specifications will be available for versions of the notebook sold in different European countries and in regions such as Asia Pacific, but the company doesn't plan to sell the light version in Germany, he says.
The light versions will go on sale in Taiwan this week and in Hong Kong in about two weeks, says Marvis Hsiao, deputy director of the company's Asia Pacific sales and marketing group. The light versions should be on sale later this year in China and South Korea, but no versions will be sold in Japan, Hsiao says. Company officials decline to provide pricing information for the lightest versions of the computer.
The company also declines comment on whether it plans to sell the V6800V in the U.S.
