The wait is finally over for the ASUS Eee PC 1000, a notebook that promises to make a dent in the netbook market. It's the most well-equipped — and largest — in the Eee series and has cast aside the usability shackles of its diminutive predecessors.

Although there are two flavours with slightly different specifications — a Windows XP model for AU$699 and a Xandros Linux model — only the Windows XP model is currently available in Australia. Could this be the perfect balance between portability and function? Or has ASUS lost its way on the path to netbook nirvana?

Design
The Eee PC 1000 has much in common with the Eee PC 901. It's got the same shiny metallic hinges and a curvy-edged lid. Currently, it's available in two colours, glossy black and the pearl white we have become accustomed to with previous Eee generations.

The Eee PC 1000 is the largest of the recent crop of mini-notebooks. Its 22.5cm by 17cm by 2cm chassis is a few millimetres wider and deeper than the MSI Wind, but we don't have too much of an issue with this; it's still very portable. What we do have a problem with is the Eee PC 1000's weight — 1.45kg with the standard 6,600mAh battery. Even without the battery, it tips the scales at nearly 1.1kg, which is what the MSI Wind weighs with its standard three-cell 2,200mAh battery.

The extra weight and larger size places the Eee PC 1000 in unusual territory. It's no longer a 'netbook', in our opinion, but is more like an ultraportable notebook in the same vein as the Sony VAIO TZ series. There's nothing wrong with this per se (ultraportables typically cost well over AU$1800), but Eee PC purists may cry foul.

One thing the purists can't complain about is the 1000's usability. It's the easiest to use on a daily basis of all the Eee PCs and its assorted rivals. The keyboard, in particular, is wonderful. Sure, our review sample felt clunky, but ASUS says it'll iron this out for final machines. The right shift key is way too small at the expense of full-size cursor keys, but aside from this it's the best keyboard on any machine in its category.

The touchpad is fantastic: unlike its rivals, it supports multi-touch gesture inputs, so you can stroke two fingers vertically or horizontally to scroll through documents or use a pinch or stretching motion to zoom in and out of photos. This feature is perfect in a machine whose primary use is surfing the internet — just makes life so much easier.

The rest of the chassis is basically identical to the Eee PC 901. On the left side, there's an Ethernet port, a single USB port, plus a pair of audio ports. On the right, there are two additional USB ports, an SD card reader and a VGA output.

Features
There are few surprises inside the machine. It uses a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 processor, plus 1GB of DDR memory — much like the Eee PC 901, Acer Aspire One and MSI Wind.

Asus is releasing two versions of the 1000, as it did with the 701, 900, 901. The Eee PC 1000-BK002 ships with Xandros Linux and 40GB of solid-state storage, while the (AU$699) Eee PC 1000H-BK007X has an 80GB mechanical drive and Windows XP. Only the Windows XP version is currently available in Australia.

The wireless capabilities of both versions of the Eee PC 1000 are identical. They include 802.11a/g/n Wi-Fi, so you can connect to just about every type of Wi-Fi network, including high-speed 300Mbps WLANs. There's also Bluetooth, but we're disappointed at the absence of integrated 3G for true go-anywhere internet access.

It's worth noting that the Eee PC 1000's 10 inch screen is a high-quality display. The vertical viewing angle is pretty limited, but that's not unusual; the 1,024-by-600-pixel native resolution is also par for the netbook course. Still, it's a pleasure to use: it doesn't have a glossy finish, icons and text are large and readable, and you'll rarely need to peer closely at the screen to see what's going on.

Performance
There's very little difference between the Eee PC 1000 and the rest of its Atom-equipped rivals in terms of performance. The 1000 clocked up 1,512 in PCMark 2005, which is a very respectable score for a machine of this type. During our evaluation, it felt very responsive — if you stick to things like browsing the web, showing presentations and playing the occasional movie (high definition included), you won't be disappointed.

Battery life was pretty impressive. We weren't expecting it to last as long as the Eee PC 901, due to its larger screen, but it did surprisingly well, lasting 3 hours 56 minutes while playing a DivX movie, which is good compared to the 901's 4.5 hours.

Conclusion
The Eee PC 1000 is a fabulous machine. It precariously straddles the line between netbook and ultraportable, but is well equipped, well designed and great for anyone requiring a usable but highly portable notebook. It's more expensive than the similarly-equipped MSI Wind, but has advantages like the multi-touch touchpad and a choice of specification. As a result, we recommend it highly.