Asus Eee Keyboard to finally launch this year, cost too much

It’s been exactly one year since Asus first showed off a concept Eee Keyboard at CES 2009. The computer-in-a-keyboard is designed to let you stream audio and video content wirelessly to an HDTV. Asus has been working on the device for the past year and has rolled out a number of updates, but a source of mine tells me it will be on display at the Asus booth at CES this year. And according to PC Magazine, it will finally be available for purchase in February.

That’s the good news. The less good news is that you’ll end up paying somewhere between $500 and $600 for this device. Maybe it’s just me, but I’d rather spend $300 or so on a nettop that offers just as much processing power and which has a dedicated graphics card and a larger hard drive. You could always pick up a cheap wireless keyboard to use with the nettop and you’d have weeks of battery life instead of hours.

Of course, then you wouldn’t get the nifty 5 inch touchscreen display that’s built into the Eee Keyboard. But I could probably live without that.

What do you think? Are you still excited about this gadget? Were you ever?

Posted on Wednesday, January 6th, 2010, 11:48 am by Brad Linder

onemadscientist

I used to be excited about it. I think the price is going to be too high for this widget to set sail.
Guest

Replace the touchscreen by a numeric keyboard
Drop the wireless audio video content stream
Make it $300
Then I'll buy it
Fazekas S

I already use my eee 901 as wireless keyboard and touchpad and it has bigger LCD for less!

p.s. VNC
tonythepizzaguy

1. small hard drive=not a problem if you just set up a network hard drive/media server of some kind. so i'm still lookin forward to this thing, now i can get rid of that bulky, ugly tower sitting next to my lovely new 50″ hdtv. maybe i'll repurpose it to finally make that arcade machine.

2. what kinda netbooks have weeks of battery life? i once had a buddy who hooked his laptop up to a car battery in his bag and got about a full day out of it, that was a few years ago, so maybe if you hook a netbook up to a car battery and keep it in sleep mode you can get a week out of it, but i still doubt it.

not sayin im gonna rush out and buy this thing right away, i'm sure there'll be bugs that need to be worked out like with any new gadget (namely the battery life), but i'm willing to pay that price for a device that does what this one does. plus it looks pretty damn cool.
thequinox

I agree Brad. It's a cool idea, and I like to see companies like ASUS innovating in these areas of design, but I don't think this will really sell.

First off, forget the fact that it's using an old chipset, the basic idea doesn't make much sense. When I'm sitting down to watch TV in my own home, I don't want to have to worry about how much battery life my HTPC has left. Then, if low, have to run a cable to a keyboard on my lap.

Perhaps they have a different use in mind, but the whole system looks to me like it's been designed to be a portable HTPC. It makes more sense to me to keep that unit dedicated and tied in with AC power, and keep the input devices that draw less remote and on their own.
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james braselton

hi there your right apple ipad is way more advanced then this eee keyboard asus waited too long apple coninues too inovate and released more avanced technolgies every ones going backwards on tech being less inovated
james braselton

hi there wow the eee keyboard wont stand a chance against apple's ipad tablet $499 for 16 gb ssd $599 for 32 gb ssd and $699 for 64 gb ssd has a A4 cpu in it a 10 hour battery life a 9.7 inch multi-touch led screen too wighs 1.5 pounds 0.5 inches thick and be released april 3 on apples web site then you have non apple tablets or smart books or e-book readers
james braselton

hi there you are right the fcc wants both the apple ipad and the eee keyboard come out on aprial 3 at the exact second soo there holding back the ipad for the same day acidental i dont think soo i think the fcc planed both for the exact second
james braselton

hi there wow the eee keyboard wont stand a chance against apple's ipad tablet $499 for 16 gb ssd $599 for 32 gb ssd and $699 for 64 gb ssd has a A4 cpu in it a 10 hour battery life a 9.7 inch multi-touch led screen too wighs 1.5 pounds 0.5 inches thick and be released april 3 on apples web site then you have non apple tablets or smart books or e-book readers
james braselton

hi there you are right the fcc wants both the apple ipad and the eee keyboard come out on aprial 3 at the exact second soo there holding back the ipad for the same day acidental i dont think soo i think the fcc planed both for the exact second

Asus Eee Keyboard to finally launch this year, cost too much

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