Despite being one of the world's largest computer manufacturers, Taiwan's Asustek Computer has never quite made it as a household name. At best, Asus is known as a giant among motherboard makers but, in general, it is not known at all.
It is a situation that deserves to change. The company, which already makes many of the notebooks that typically appear with the familiar logos of Sony, Samsung and Hitachi, expects to ship two million laptops this year and has just added Apple to its customer portfolio.
Unlike the global brands that use Asustek's manufacturing skills, the Asus brand avoids their high marketing costs. The result is a top-notch notebook at a very reasonable price.
Distributor Hornington Computers describes the M2400E as a superslim system. In comparison to some of the recent machines from the likes of Toshiba and Samsung, it would be better described as a mid-size system.
But for a 14.1-inch display, the 2kg M2400E still compares favourably with the typical four kilo monster that most US brands prefer to release. It also looks and feels as tough as a Dell or an IBM.
The machine is the first from Asus to run on Intel's Centrino platform with built-in Wi-Fi wireless networking. It is powered by a 1.6 gigahertz mobile Pentium processor. As for memory, there are 512 megabytes of Ram and a respectable 40 gigabyte IBM Travelstar hard drive.