14 DAY TRIAL // According to recent details in the industry, Micro Star International plans to unveil the new 10.2-inch Wind U110 and U115 portable computer systems at next year's Consumer Electronics Show in Los Angeles. The Taiwanese manufacturer is expected to showcase the new systems, built on Intel's Menlow platform, which is designed for mobile Internet devices (MIDs), at CES in January. Part of the company's Wind family of products, the new U110 and U115 portable system were previously expected to expand MSI's netbook range of products. However, according to recent details, the 10-inch systems are to be part of the company’s notebook line.
Both new Wind portable systems have recently been showcased on various markets worldwide. The Wind U110 and U115 provide similar specifications, as both have been designed to boast a 10.2-inch LED-backlit LCD panel, and are based, as already noted, on Intel's Menlow platform, which features the Atom Z530 processor and the SCH US15W chipset. The platform chosen for these two new MSI portable systems is priced a bit higher than Intel's netbook platform. However, the devices running on this specific platform should feature a lower power consumption, and thus provide a longer battery life.
A recent article on Digitimes indicates that, thanks to the implementation of Intel's Menlow platform, the upcoming two devices from MSI are expected to come out with a higher price tag, as opposed to the current Wind netbook lineup. Apparently, the U110 will be priced at NT$19,000-20,000 (approximately US$566 – US$596), while the U115 is expected to fall somewhere around NT$23,000-25,000 (US$685.28-744.89).
Despite their higher pricing, the new systems should ultimately provide a better performance, when compared with most Intel Atom-powered netbooks on the market. The U110 and U115 are expected to provide 1-2GB of memory and an interesting feature called hybrid storage. Basically, the upcoming Wind systems should be packed with both an SSD solution, as well as a basic hard disk drive, a combo that is meant to boost performance and storage capacity for small-sized, low-power portable systems.