Eee PC and Eee Box gain free Norton security software - but only just

Stephen Withers
Friday, 09 January 2009 10:05

Opinion and Analysis

Buyers of ASUS's Eee family of netbooks and nettops will come with a preinstalled copy of Norton Internet Security. Trouble is, they only get a very limited free look before being expected to sign up as paying customers.

Regular readers may recall that I've been toying with the idea of buying a netbook for some months.

One of the reasons I've been thinking about going for Linux (factory-installed or otherwise) is that I'd prefer to avoid the overhead of security software on a relatively low powered system.

Consequently, I'm been a bit disappointed that several models only seem to be sold here with Windows. I know I can always replace the operating system, but why pay for a licence that I won't use?

Anyway, the Global Financial Crisis has struck particularly hard in the publishing sector, so it looks like I'll be taking my ageing PowerBook G3 on the road for a while yet. Such is life.

But I'm still keeping an eye on the netbook market, and so I was interested to see that ASUS - the company that led the netbook wave with its Eee PC - is set to begin shipping Norton Internet Security on all Eee PC and Eee Box systems worldwide.

"Given their unprecedented ease of use, the Eee PC and Eee Box have introduced the Internet to legions of users with little to no prior computer experience — many of whom may be unaware of the dangers posed by adware, spyware, viruses, worms, spam, and so forth," said Ellis Wang, Eee PC software PM department director at ASUS.

He might be right about that, though I'm not completely convinced. Almost all the Eee buyers I have come across are using it as an additional computer, but that might just be a demographic thing.

What else did the ASUS spokesperson have to say? Please read on.