Usual disclaimer: I'm not paid to review these products, I just like to share my good finds with my pals.

I've referred to "my new toy that I've yet to blog about" many, many times so I thought I'd finally come clean about it today.

My new toy is an Asus R2H


This review gives all the details and lots and lots of pictures. If you're really interested in it, I'd suggest visiting that site to read more about it. I'm just going to tell you what I love about it.

You might recall that I used to have a Nokia N800, and I really did like it. But it was limited in features that I wanted. I'd say needed, but nobody really needs this stuff, right?

I wanted to find something that ran full Windows programs, but was portable. I did tons of research and came down to three products before I made my choice of the Asus.

The Asus hasn't replaced my laptop at home, but it could. I've purchased the keyboard and I have an external DVD-R so basically, my computing experience is unlimited if I'm willing to hook up a bunch of stuff.

I mainly use the Asus when I'm out and about. It fits in my purse (well, after I bought a bigger purse) and allows me to hook up to the Internet wherever I am thanks to the Sierra Aircard I've purchased. The Asus can hook up to Wifi or Ethernet, but when you're driving around in your car or sitting in the park- it's hard to find Wifi without being a pirate.

Since this is illegal and I'm in the line of business that frowns on that sort of thing, my hornswaggling days have come to an end. Arrh....

I have a fold-out USB keyboard that I use if I'm writing something more than a few sentences, but it's rarely needed. Since this is a tablet computer, you can 'write' on the screen. I'm really surprised at how good the handwriting recognition is. My handwriting stinks, but it recognizes it anyway. It also has a built in on-screen keyboard, but I find the handwriting recognition to be so good, that I rarely use it.

There are two slots for memory cards, as well as a generously sized hard drive. I think between the three, I have more storage capacity than I do on my laptop. After reading some of the reviews, I decided to upgrade the RAM to make the little guy run quicker. If you read the reviews, you'll find that the speed was a big complaint. It was only 100.00 for more memory and installing it is a snap. That was an easy upgrade for me to do and made a HUGE difference in speed. Well worth doing right away.

There is no end to the entertainment I have on this little machine. I have e-books, drawing programs (I love to doodle and this it's really fun on this machine), Internet no matter where I go (of course), games (full sized window's games), Skype (I've yet to use), built-in video camera (yet to use). Since it runs full windows programs, I have Office Professional running on it so I have my Outlook calendar, etc. always with me. BJ and I played Scrabble on the plane too and from NYC. I also have Monopoly, Boggle, Video Poker, and my own personal favorite- Mahjongg.

The Asus has a built-in GPS system and runs Microsoft Streets & Trips, ensuring that hopefully I'll never get lost again. I have GPS in my car, of course, but I've been in lots of situations where I wasn't in my car, and so I got lost.

I have all of my music stored on one of the memory cards, so with this, I can plug in my earphones and listen to whatever I want when I'm on the train and while at work. The sound (with headphones) is really great.

Now that lots of the networks are putting their episodes online, I can use this little guy to watch shows that I've missed. My MIL shared a new(?) service that Netflix is offering which allows you to watch unlimited streaming movies on your computer. I think I'll check that out because it would certainly make the time go faster on the train if I had movies to watch.

I do believe that I've found my ultimate 'toy'. It's not cheap... with all the gadgets and extra memory and stuff I spent about 1,000.00 on it. For me, it was worth every penny and I think will keep me entertained for at least a couple of years.