EEE PC -- Present to self

I recently completed New York Institute Of Photography's Professional Photography Course and decided to reward myself with a netbook.

After looking around, the ASUS EEE PC 1215n seemed like it would be a good fit. It has the new dual processor Atom 525 CPU, comes with 2GB RAM, a 250GB hard disk and Nvidia ION2 video, but costs less than $400.

Kubuntu Linux 10.10 installed flawlessly. The 1215n runs TheGimp and digiKam quite well. Audio, wireless and the onboard NIC all worked perfectly, once I removed the exasperating NetworkManager that Kubuntu installs by default.

The main reason I wanted a netbook was to be able to sit with my E-dog; Samantha, and work on photos at the same time. This isn't a replacement for a graphics workstation, but is great for pruning photo albums, viewing images downloaded from the camera and reading .pdf's. I may decide to replace the internal hard drive with a solid state drive at some point to lower shock sensitivity, but things are fine for now.

I have little tolerance for the tiny LCD screen on the back of my camera, or the frustrating underpowered, overpriced, crippleware of smartphones. The EEE PC with its ninety-something percent sized keyboard is wonderful when paired with all the features of Kubuntu Linux.

That being said, I also must state that after only a couple days of use, a keyboard key managed to stick itself permanently in the down position. The ASUS people appear to be honoring repair under warranty, so, my wounded EEE PC is on its way to the repair center for a keyboard replacement. I'm hopeful that this is just a one-in-a- million kind of problem and all will be well after repairs are made.

As for the making of this photo, the EEE PC computer is sitting on a piece of curved white Acrylic with the rear corner propped up by a small block of wood. The photo was shot with a tripod mounted Canon 40D and a Tamron 17-55 f/2.8 lens at a focal length of 50mm. Exposure was 1/250sec f/11 ISO 400. There was a 42 inch silver reflector positioned horizontally just above the frame. A Canon 580ex Speedlite, with a white cardboard flag attached (to prevent lens flare) was positioned below the camera and fired diagonally up into the overhead reflector to make a specular reflection near the power button at the far upper corner of the keyboard. There was also a 430ex Speedlite at upper camera right positioned to graze the top of the computer display. The 430ex was added to illuminate the EeePC logo and webcam lens above the LCD display. The image was converted to monochrome with TheGimp.