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Archos announces new 10-inch, 9-inch netbooks

Archos, the company better-known for its innovative hard drive-based portable media players and Internet tablets, is making a big push into Atom-based netbooks. At Mobile World Congress this week, the company announced a thinner version of its new 10-inch MiniPCs, and said it was working on several new versions based on both current and unreleased Intel chips and chipsets.
Written by John Morris, Contributor on

Archos, the company better-known for its innovative hard drive-based portable media players and Internet tablets, is making a big push into Atom-based netbooks. At Mobile World Congress this week, the company announced a thinner version of its new 10-inch MiniPCs, and said it was working on several new versions based on both current and unreleased Intel chips and chipsets.

The Archos 10s MiniPC will have a 10.2-inch LED-backlit display, Intel Atom processor, 1GB of memory, hard drives from 60- to 160GB, and Windows XP Home. The 10s is an update to a model Archos announced only a few months ago. The new version is thinner, at 0.8 inches thick, and it will have a metal casing that looks more like Archos Internet Tablets. Archos did not announce pricing for the 10s, which will be available in April, but the Archos 10 currently sells for $400 with a 3-cell battery or $450 with an extended 6-cell battery.

Archos is also working on a 9-inch MiniPC without a physical keyboard that will measure 0.7 inches thick and weigh only 1.8 pounds. The device will have a virtual keyboard touchscreen and a trackpoint mouse. It will be based on an Intel Atom Z series processor, and the company says it will offer the same features and performance as regular netbooks including 60- to 180GB hard drives. This should make for an interesting comparison with the OQO model 2+ Mobile Internet Device (MID). The 9-inch MiniPC will be available in third quarter. Finally, Archos said it is working on next-generation devices based on Intel's Moorestown platform, which will replace Intel's current netbook and MID platform sometime in 2010.

[Via UMPC Portal]

[Read the Archos 10s press release] [Read the Archos 10 press release]

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