ASUS pioneers Intel’s ultrabook platform with the Zenbook

Zen and the art of competing with Apple

Having formally launched the ultrabook at the end of May, Intel and ASUS have kept us waiting over four months before we can actually get our hands on one. But that's exactly what we did at a champagne-fuelled launch event last night.

The celeb host of the launch event was Suzi Perry from the Gadget Show, who attempted to whet our appetites for the new thin-and-light notebook platform despite only having had a few hours to check it out herself.

She was soon followed by ASUS regional director Benjamin Yeh, who revealed that the ASUS ultrabook is called the Zenbook. Here he is making the announcement, followed by a shot to show how thin it is, hand modeling ably provided by the glamorous Andrew Wooden.

Yeh highlighted the key differentiators of the Zenbook: design (it does look nice), quick start-up, long battery life (provided by the ‘Super Hybrid Engine II'), good audio, and the latest Intel processors. You can see further pix ‘n' spex below to substantiate these claims. The pricing of the two models is also detailed, and they'll be available to buy online from Currys, PC World, Comet and Amazon.co.uk from 21 October.

While ASUS was given the greater prominence on the night, this was clearly an Intel event. I was organized and manned by Intel's PR agency and it's well known that Intel is chucking money at the ultrabook platform in an attempt to take back some of the mobile computing initiative from Apple.

Right now Apple is calling the shots at both ends of the mobile computing market; with the iPad at the low end and the MacBook Air at the high end. While Intel provides the chips in the latter, it's not healthy for Intel if the rest of its OEM ecosystem struggles. Furthermore Apple is a notoriously capricious partner and if, for example, ARM chips become a viable alternative for MacBooks, Apple will not hesitate to drop Intel like a bad habit.

There was also an Intel spokesperson at the event - UK consumer director Dan Belton - and when he was asked by some Beeb hack whether the MacBook Air qualifies as an ultrabook, he said no, without specifying why. It was clear that he was already exasperated by people banging on about the MacBook Air whenever he mentions the ultrabook platform.

But there's a reason for this - they are very similar. There's nothing wrong with Intel trying to help its other OEMs replicate Apple's success, but there's no escaping the comparison. ASUS is clearly the lead partner in this endeavour, and we expect it to have a few weeks' head-start on the likes of Acer. The Zenbook is, sensibly, priced significantly below the equivalent MacBook Airs, but we'll soon find out if they're cheap enough to entice people away from Apple.

Pix 'n' spex