back to article Orange to bundle free Eee with HSDPA modem, airtime

Orange will tomorrow offer Brits Asus' newly announced Eee PC 900 16G for... well... nothing at all. Orange will expect however, punters to sign up for a two-year, £25-a-month airtime contract. That package grants users up to 3GB of data transfers a month and up to 100 text messages sent from the machine. Asus' old Eee girl …

COMMENTS

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Yes please

    Id buy that for a dollar...

    The laptop ain't bad either

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Good deal

    I use my HTC Hermes + eeePC together all the time while travelling- they're a great combination. And a 3GB data plan is pretty good for anything you'd want to be doing on the move (i.e. no porn marathons, no/limited youtubing, no multiplayer gaming, no torrenting, etc.)- I've got a mere 1GB and have never filled it (even including some of the above at times)

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Your review

    of the 901 says it is what the 900 should have been. So signup with Orange for 2 years and get a phiss poor laptop that is already obsolete. You can#t even give these away and Orange is trying to.

  4. 4.1.3_U1
    Heart

    Which OS

    Is this linux or MS?

  5. Anton Ivanov
    Linux

    Which one?

    So which one is it offering? The MSFT or the Linux edition...

  6. Anthony
    Unhappy

    OrangEee

    'The Eee 900 16G comes with an 8.9in display and 16GB of solid-state storage.'

    ...and a battery that lasts an hour if you're lucky!

    Under average use my Eee 900 lasts a little longer than 50 minutes between charges. And, after charging, it loses some battery juice whilst still plugged in (you need to unplug as soon as it's topped up and take the battery out ASAP or you're losing precious charge)

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Newly announced?

    I thought this had been more or less superseded by the Atom-based 901 model.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    alternatively

    Or alternatively you can buy the 16G from here:

    http://www.shop.bt.com/productview.aspx?quicklinx=5689

    for £222, get the £15 a month Orange data option (which includes the USB modem) and save yourself £20 over the course of 2 years, and this only has an 18 month contract.

    If you look around I bet you can even get a Data SIM only deal, buy the USB modem outright also, so saving yourself even more money, and not be tied down to any contract.

    All in all, this seems a very poor deal to me.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Actually not bad...

    £25 per month for 24 months is "only" £600 - when you consider the EEE will be probably half of that, you're only really paying £300 for 3GB data and 100 texts per month from the thing, so that's only actually £12.50 a month.

  10. Delboy
    Thumb Down

    Orange - you gotta be joking

    Orange could offer me a free Rolls Royce and I still wouldn't go back to the cretins.

  11. simbr

    Thay're not the first..

    Retailers have been offering free laptops (although the regular bulky sort) for a while - I was offered one in a T-Mobile store and CPW also have a range of laptops available (none that I took a fancy to last I looked). You can also get a free Eee (not sure of the specs) or Advent's atom-based Wind clone at PC World on a number of networks, or up to £400 off any laptop you choose depending on the length and monthly charge of the contract.

    I'd' still prefer a built-in 3G adaptor, something Acer as supposed to be working on for the Aspire (and is already included with some Sony laptops that cost the earth).

  12. Adam Williamson
    Thumb Down

    Overstock

    I think Asus are trying to dump a big overstock of the 900 caused by everyone wanting the 901 instead. A friend who distributes Eees was offering me the same 900 / 16GB SSD model for a very cheap price yesterday, with the 901 costing a few hundred dollars more. Bit of a miscalculation...

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Question

    Does it come with the blonde?

  14. Dan Keating
    Linux

    Orange .. orange.. lemon!

    What a fantastically useless offer. Orange always cease to amaze.

  15. Adam Williamson

    @AC 14:52

    It's technically "newly announced" because the Eee 900 *16G* is a new 'model' produced by taking the 900 and sticking a 16GB SSD into it. Asus appear to be engaged in setting a record for the most pointlessly overextended product line.

  16. mike panero

    Here at toys r us

    12G XP EEE white £269

    I see the 4G Linux is down to £180

    link

    http://www.toysrus.co.uk/Category.aspx/TruHome/TruComputers/TruComputersLaptop?ref=TruHome%2fTruComputers

  17. Steve
    Thumb Up

    @ AC - alternatively

    @ AC - alternatively: Think your being a little unfair there, its not charging dramatically over the odds. £20 "Profit" is penuts on a £600 deal, and probably wouldn't cover cost of credit if you bought an EEE and paid it off over the next 24 months - which is effectively what your doing...

    @ Good deal - Good Deal: You won't be torrenting very effectively anyway - Orange internet everywhere gives you a 10.x.x.x address range and nats you out, so you don't get control over inbound ports. This also scuppers any online gaming you might try (Although obviously there would be lag issues anyway) and makes some VPN a bit of a pain in the bum.

    Would be nice to see one of the companys make an effort to get an intergrated HSDPA card into the EEE.

  18. Roy Stilling
    Thumb Down

    @Which OS/Which one

    It's the WinXP: http://shop.orange.co.uk/shop/mobile_broadband/eeepc

  19. Steve

    @Roy

    XPs a sensible choice, The Ikon 225 requires hacks to work under Linux. Fine for geeks, but they're not selling to geeks. (And if your a geek I'm sure you can slap a linux distro on there)

  20. Ishkandar

    and desperation sets in...

    ...so they try it on the Great British Unwashed Masses !! Trust Orange to extract the Michael with their "Great deals" !!

  21. Alan Scully
    Paris Hilton

    In Japan

    50p Eee, UNLIMITED data for 30quid per month.

    Great data plan (I'm on it).

    The sooner the UK gets rid of data limits, the better.

    It limits the use of, say, being able to upload photos to Flickr.

    Paris, because she's becoming jealous of the Eee PC models.

  22. Max

    Math

    I get 3GB a month on my HSDPA for 15 quid and it's pay as you go. (25-15)*24=240

    So you are still paying 240 for the lappy but its broken up into 24 small payments...and you are locked into a 2 year contract.

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    A good idea... if...

    ...it was properly marketed. I work in an Orange shop (hence the Anon) and frankly, our marketing of this promotion is rubbish. Before, we had a laptop accessing (a very limited version of) the Internet via wifi to demonstrate our home broadband.

    Now, the eeePC (which in itself looks very good) is basically stuck to the counter with alarm cables coming out of it. The cables are *sellotaped* into place so that the alarms don't go off. I mean, come on! What's more, despite the wifi router next to it, the laptop has to get by with the "HSDPA" dongle plugged into it. Given we're in a shopping centre, I'm guessing the speed averages at 200kb/s. Great demonstration of mobile broadband... shocking.

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    re: A good idea... if...

    another reason why orange stink of death

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