【英语科技】华硕上网本魅力难挡

What is the most influential piece of personal technology of the past two years? Amazon's Kindle? Apple's iPhone? Research in Motion's BlackBerry? All of these North American devices are worthy but my prize goes to the Asus Eee PC made by Asustek of Taiwan.

“A lot of people scoffed at them and I must admit I was an early disbeliever,” says Bob O'Donnell of IDC, the research group, about Asustek, which in October 2007 came up with its small, light, cheap laptop computer known (misleadingly, it turns out) as a netbook.

Few analysts grasped the significance of the Eee because they did not think that people in the developed world would buy a not-very-powerful device with a tiny screen and a small keyboard. Meanwhile, US companies from Dellto Microsoft and Apple gazed studiously elsewhere.

Yet, nearly two years on, evidence of the Eee's influence is everywhere, from the weak outlook reported by Dell this week to Google's announcement that it will build a rival to Windows in its Chrome OS operating system, and Microsoft's move to offer a free web version of its Office software suite.

The Asus Eee, and rival netbooks made by Acer, another Taiwan company, have converted consumers and caused havoc in the personal computer industry, reducing revenues and margins at both software and hardware companies. Everyone except Apple has ended up following Asustek.

This, however, leaves a question. If the netbook, now defined as a mini-notebook with a screen of up to 10 inches, costing between $300 and $600, weighing two or three pounds and usually running on Intel's Atom chip, is so appealing, why did it take so long to arrive?

One answer is that US companies made a mistake. “They thought that the performance was too low and people would not be interested,” says Willy Shih, a professor at Harvard Business School who is in Taiwan this week to research the netbook phenomenon further.

The germ of the netbook idea came from the One Laptop Per Child project led by Nicholas Negroponte, a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which aims to provide low-cost laptops to children in developing countries. Its XO laptop was built by Quanta, a Taiwan company, which encouraged Asustek to experiment.

Early netbooks had limited memory and ran on Linux rather than Windows, but when the screens got larger (the first Eee only had a seven-inch screen) and Windows XP became the operating system they took off, aided by Intel's launch of the Atom chip in March 2008.

That is the innocent explanation; the more cynical one is that it took a long time because some companies preferred netbooks not to succeed. The three-way alliance among Microsoft, Intel and Dell instead preferred laptops to become more powerful and run on fancier versions of Windows.

In revenue terms, this was a way of counteracting the price deflationary effects of Moore's Law (along with the outsourcing of manufacturing to Taiwan and China), under which the cost of processing power, other things being equal, tends steadily to fall.

Personally, I always desired a cheap and light laptop with a long battery life and a decent keyboard that connected to the internet and performed basic tasks such as word processing, but it did not exist. Early flash memory-based machines such as the Tandy 200 and the Hewlett-Packard Jornada came and went, leaving a gap.

The big US companies would only produce tiny tablets and miniature keyboard devices because they did not want to undermine laptop sales. Netbook-sized devices thrived in Japan but were expensive.

It took Asustek to break the oligopoly's grip by making what I – and many others, it turns out – wanted. As soon as it did, all the other computer makers, from Acer to Dell and HP, surrendered.

This coincided with Microsoft's moment of hubris with the bloated and troubled Windows Vista, which required lots of memory and a powerful chip. To beat off Linux, Microsoft had to let netbooks run Windows XP instead.

Microsoft and Intel are still trying to corral netbooks by defining them as a third type of device in addition to desktops and laptops. Intel popularised the term netbook and Microsoft sets strict memory and screen limits for licences.

Consumers are not listening. An IDC study in May found that netbook owners, far from regarding them as devices for connecting to the internet and little else, do not differentiate. “People are using them almost identically to traditional laptops,” says Mr O'Donnell.

Microsoft at least recognises that it cannot ignore netbooks, and will tailor Windows 7, its new operating system, for them. Apple, which has plenty to lose from cannibalising its MacBook line, has not.

Apple is said to be developing a touchscreen tablet without a keyboard as its answer to netbooks. Steve Jobs, its chief executive, talks disdainfully about netbooks and is nothing if not obstinate.

I doubt whether he can avoid making a MacBook Net. Microsoft, Intel, Dell and others tried to resist the netbook imperative and failed. Consumers have spoken, no matter how much Mr Jobs dislikes what they are saying.

Consumers must be given a choice, however, before they can express their preference. For providing it, the Asus Eee wins my prize.

过去两年最有影响力的一款个人科技产品是什么？亚马逊(Amazon)的Kindle阅读器？苹果(Apple)的iPhone？RIM公司(Research in Motion)的黑莓(BlackBerry)？这些来自北美的设备都很不错，但在我看来，拔得头筹的是由台湾企业华硕(Asustek)生产的Asus Eee PC。

谈到华硕，市场研究公司IDC的鲍勃•奥唐纳(Bob O'Donnell)表示：“许多人对他们嗤之以鼻，我必须承认，我刚开始也不看好他们。”2007年10月，华硕推出了体积小、重量轻的廉价笔记本电脑，即所谓的上网本（事实证明，这个名称具有误导性）。

很少有分析师从一开始就认识到Eee的重要意义，因为他们并不认为，发达国家的消费者会愿意购买这种性能不甚强大、屏幕和键盘都非常小的设备。与此同时，从戴尔(Dell)到微软(Microsoft)和苹果，美国公司都把注意力投向了其它地方。

然而，近两年过去后，Eee的影响力已变得无所不在：戴尔上周发布了疲弱的业绩预期；谷歌(Google)宣布推出Chrome操作系统，向Windows叫板；而微软则计划发布Office软件套装免费网络版。

Asus Eee及另一家台湾企业宏碁(Acer)生产的上网本，已经改变了消费者的信念，在个人电脑行业掀起了轩然大波——软、硬件公司的收入和利润率都有所下降。除了苹果，所有公司最终都选择了效仿华硕。

但上述现象也留下了一个疑问。如果上网本——目前它被界定为屏幕不超过10英寸、售价300至600美元、重2至3磅、通常采用英特尔(Intel) Atom芯片的迷你型笔记本电脑——如此吸引人，为什么它却如此姗姗来迟？

一种解释是，美国公司犯了一个错误。哈佛商学院(Harvard Business School)教授史兆威(Willy Shih)表示：“他们认为上网本性能太低，人们不会感兴趣。”史兆威上周正在台湾进一步研究上网本现象。

上网本创意的雏形，来自麻省理工学院(MIT)教授尼古拉斯•内格罗蓬特(Nicholas Negroponte)所领导的项目——“每个儿童一台笔记本电脑”(One Laptop Per Child)。该项目旨在为发展中国家的儿童提供廉价笔记本电脑，其XO笔记本电脑由台湾公司广达电脑(Quanta)生产，该公司曾鼓励华硕进行试验。

早期的上网本内存有限，配置的操作系统是Linux，而非Windows。但当上网本的屏幕变得更大（第一款Eee的屏幕只有7英寸），并且改装Windows XP操作系统之后，它们开始风靡市场，2008年3月英特尔推出的Atom处理器也为其助了一臂之力。

上述解释比较天真。更具批判性的解释是，上网本的姗姗来迟，是因为某些公司不愿意看到它成功。微软、英特尔和戴尔所组成的三方联盟，更希望让笔记本变得更加强大，使用更花哨的Windows版本。

就收入而言，这是为了抵消摩尔定律(Moore's Law)——以及将制造流程外包给台湾和中国大陆——所导致的价格通缩效应。根据摩尔定律，在其它因素保持不变的情况下，处理能力的成本倾向于稳步下降。

我个人一直渴望拥有这样一台笔记本电脑：轻巧廉价，电池寿命长，键盘足够大，能上网，能完成文字处理等基本操作。但这类笔记本电脑以前并不存在。早期基于闪存芯片的电脑——比如Tandy 200以及惠普(Hewlett-Packard)的Jornada——问世一段时间后就退出了市场，因而留出了一块空白。

当时，为了不影响笔记本电脑的销售，大型美国公司只愿生产微型平板电脑和迷你键盘设备。上网本大小的设备在日本颇受欢迎，但价格不菲。

是华硕生产出了我想要（事实证明，其他许多人也想要）的产品，打破了寡头垄断。它一这样做，从宏碁到戴尔和惠普，所有其它电脑生产商都立即投降了。

华硕推出上网本之际，微软正对Windows Vista感到洋洋得意。这个庞大而繁杂的操作系统需要大量内存和性能强大的芯片。为了击退Linux，微软不得不摒弃Windows Vista，让上网本配置Windows XP操作系统。

微软和英特尔仍在试图限制上网本的发展，将其定义为台式电脑和笔记本电脑以外的第三类设备。英特尔令上网本这个词得到广为流传，而微软则为其授权制定了严格的内存和屏幕尺寸限制。

消费者并不买账。IDC今年5月的一项研究显示，上网本所有者根本就不认为，它是一款只能上网、鲜有其它功能的设备，而是将它与其他电脑一视同仁。奥唐纳表示：“人们几乎完全把它们当成传统的笔记本电脑使用。”

微软至少已经认识到上网本不容忽视，将为其量身定制新版操作系统Windows 7。但苹果尚未认识到这一点——拆换MacBook产品线将令其损失惨重。

据称，苹果公司正在开发一款不带键盘的触屏平板电脑，以此作为对上网本的回应。首席执行官史蒂夫•乔布斯(Steve Jobs)谈起上网本时颇为不屑，并且固执至极。

我怀疑，他最终还是免不了推出MacBook Net上网本。微软、英特尔、戴尔等公司都曾试图抵挡上网本的发展势头，但都以失败告终。无论乔布斯多不爱听，消费者已经发话。

但在消费者能够表达偏好之前，他们必须能够有所选择。鉴于Asus Eee提供了这种选择，我眼中的冠军产品非它莫属。

译者/章晴