The cost of entry into the world of touch-screen Windows 8 laptops has been falling since the first $1,600-plus systems we previewed in the fall of 2012. Many of the early examples were north of $1,000, but by the time the holiday shopping season got into gear, Black Friday specials brought a few basic models down below $600.
Asus VivoBook X202E
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
The 11-inch Asus VivoBook X202E is $549, even apart from holiday sales (technically the list price is $599, but it's widely available for $50 less). For that, you get an Intel Core i3 processor -- rather than the more common Core i5 version -- plus a 500GB HDD and 4GB of RAM.
That CPU downgrade is the X202E's biggest concession to affordability, and it's something to seriously consider. There's a definite performance difference between this and a touch-screen Windows 8 laptop with an Intel Core i5 processor, which can cost you about $200 or more extra. On the other hand, we've also tested a handful of Windows 8 systems with Intel Atom CPUs, and despite not costing any less than this, those Atom systems are slower on our performance tests by a large margin.
The physical design is a bit of a mixed bag. The X202E is relatively slim, with a part-aluminum body, but thicker than one might expect in today's ultrabook-centric world. The keyboard is small but functional, but the touch pad is frustratingly unresponsive at times, requiring frequent use of the touch screen as a backup.
I'm confident that we'll see many more sub-$600 Windows 8 touch-screen laptops in 2013, and hopefully that will include Core i5 systems as well (perhaps with Intel's upcoming fourth-gen version of the i-series chips). In the meantime, the X202E is one of the better bargains around if you're looking for a low-cost way to get Windows 8 and a touch screen in a mostly usable package.