Gigabyte M912

It’s one thing to see a product at a trade show and quite another to get it into your hands and spend some alone time with it. We say this because we’ve been spending the last few days with the Gigabyte M912V, the low-cost tablet/mini-notebook hybrid.

Is it attractive? Yes. Is it the first mini-notebook to offer a touchscreen? Yes. Does it fall short of our high expectations? You bet.

As you will see from the abridged review below, the $650–$700 (no U.S. price yet) M912 is an interesting mini-tablet, but its slow boot time, poky performance, and hot keyboard left us pretty disappointed. On the other hand, we are impressed with its touchscreen and the entire experience of using a mini-notebook with touch.

Below are our initial thoughts on the Gigabyte M912.

Snazzy Lid, Ho-Hum Design
The first thing we noticed about the Gigabyte M912 is the glossy black lid, complete with a silver square inlay pattern that looks like some kind of sci-fi circuit board. We wish Gigabyte had released the M912 in the Mondrian-like color scheme we saw at Computex. But we hear the system will be available with that design soon.

The silver-and-black color scheme is unique in the world of solid-colored netbooks, but the rest of the design is nothing to write home about. Under the lid you’re left with a boring layout.

At 3 pounds (3.4 with the included AC adapter) the netbook is a bit chunkier than other 8.9-inchers on the market, but we weren’t really put off by the size. We slid it into a backpack and didn’t even know it was there.

The M912 has plenty of ports, including 3 USB, VGA, microphone, headphone, Ethernet, SD Card, and ExpressCard. The ExpressCard slot is great; we had no problem slipping in a Verizon Wireless mobile broadband card.

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Arriving just minutes ago, straight from our Taiwanese mini-notebook dealer (yes, we have a dealer) was our very own Gigabyte M912. After seeing Chippy from UMPCPortal fondle the M912 the other day, we just had to get our hands on the first tablet mini-notebook hybrid.

Sure I had seen the M912 at Computex, but it’s quite another experience to pull the netbook from its official packaging.

As you will see in the video, the mini-tablet comes with quite a few accessories. Included are the obvious battery and AC power adapter, but they are joined by a luggage-like case, extra stylus, drivers disc, and user manual. We were a bit puzzled by an included ASUS CD case in our box; since our unit is right off the production lines, we assume that this case fell in somewhere along the way (read: don’t expect to find this).

As for the actual netbook, we’ll have quite a bit to say in our upcoming mini-review. My initial thoughts? This little guy, with its stunning glossy black cover, looks sweet. Unfortunatley, we didn’t get the Mondrian patterned one we saw at Computex, but Gigabyte did tell us they will be releasing that funky system to retail in early fall.

Stay tuned for our mini-review of the Gigabyte M912. Post your questions about the system below, and I will do my best to answer them in the mini-review. Read the rest of this entry »

I sit here jealous as hell. Steve at UMPCPortal.com got his hands on a Gigabyte M912. Seems like Steve (or in the video Chippy) got a preproduction unit, but the mini-tablet is surely out in the wild.

So what are the early thoughts? He seems to think the system is a bit heavy, which could be attributed to the chunky looking 4-cell battery pack in the back. As you can see in the video, the convertible screen is also a bit wobbly. In a nice display of the ports, he points out an ExpressCard slot.

His system, apparently the M912X, is speced out with a 1.6 GHz Intel Atom processor, 1GB of RAM, and Microsoft Vista Home. 1GB of RAM? Though the video doesn’t go into performance I will be shocked if the 1GB works well with the Vista OS.

See the video below for UMPCPortal.com’s unboxing of the Gigabyte M912.

Update: EeePCNews.de is hosting a streaming session of the Gigabyte M912. It will start today (7.24.08) at 2:00 P.M. EST. Tune in by hitting this link http://www.eeepcnews.de/live/. Read the rest of this entry »

We have hoped and prayed ever since seeing the Gigabyte M912V at Computex that we would get more details on the attractive and compelling mini-convertible. Gigabyte recently revealed the specs of the little tablet and now we are even more excited to get our paws on this mini-notebook.

The 2.8-pound netbook will sport a n 8.9-inch, 1280 x 768 resolution 180 degree rotatable screen. The top of the touch-capable screen has a 1.3-megapixel camera. Three USB ports, a mic, headphone, VGA Out, Expresscard, and 3-in-1 card reader slot surround the chassis. It also comes with built-in Bluetooth and a Li-ion 4500mAh battery, which Gigabyte touts as having 3.5 hours of juice.

On the insides the M912V will have a 2.5-inch SATA HDD 160GB, 1GB of RAM and a 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor.

And the OS? As we saw back on the floor of Computex, it will run Microsoft Vista Home. The 55 second boot up time may be a hint that the heavy Vista OS isn’t ideal, but the Vista tablet interface and capabilities might bode well for it. It seems like there will be other OS options, including Windows XP and some flavor of Linux. The missing spec is the price; rumors are that it will be anywhere from $500-$700.

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I really, really like mini-notebooks and all the different shapes and sizes they come in. But at times, particularly in the last few weeks, I feel that if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.

Enter the Gigabyte M912, the first mini-notebook to sport a convertible form factor and touchscreen. Gigabyte released the full specs of the system on its Web site, but I had to find out for myself what a touch-capable netbook could really do.

Sleek Design, Well-Sized Screen
I know I said that the Acer Aspire one was one of the best-looking mini-notebooks I have seen, but that was until I saw the Gigabyte M912 designs. On display were various colored M912s, including a brown, pink, black, white, and a striking multi-colored, pop-art design. Images after the jump.

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