I’m guessing that PC World UK don’t really have a clue what’s going on outside their HQ when it comes to Easynote XS pricing.

DavidW just wrote into the forums to tell us that he’s played with a Packard Bell Easynote XS in Dixons, Holland today (that’s the same company as PC World) and as an ex R2H owner he was quite impressed. Not only with the device, but with the price too! 599 Euros. I quote from the forum…

First impressions are that it is an absolute winner. The size and weight are amazing. The screen though small is very clear (once we set it to 800×480 (the factory default was set higher which made for 3pt text). The screen did seem to have a lot of wasted space around it. I felt they could have got another cm in both directions out of it – it looked like the screen could have been a size bigger or the PC a size smaller, but I am sure there are good reasons why it is like this.

There’s more positive feedback in the forum entry.

So Brits, get yourself a cheap ferry crossing to the Hoek van Holland and buy an Easynote XS. Its got to be a better trip than PC World!

More Easynote XS info and links.

This has been a long time coming. Bundling. Today I spotted the first 3rd-party mobile phone reseller offering the HTC Shift with a 24 month contract.

How does an HTC Shift + Flat-rate HSDPA data + 200 hours WiFi for €740 + €50 Euro per month sound?

That’s Flat-rate (5GB) 3.6mbps (where available) un-proxied, open Internet and use of over 8500 WiFi hotspots on one of the best networks in Europe – T-Mobile. Total cost of 2-year deal: Under 2000 Euro. That’s less than most ultra portable PCs cost on their own. This is superb value!

Considering that I’m paying 20 Euro per month for 200MB without WiFi, a 24 months contract is only going to cost me 30 Euro’s more. After hardware discounting is taken into consideration, I would be paying just 13 Euro to boost my contract up to unlimited Internet. PLUS the initial cash layout is much much less. PLUS I can swap the card into any other 3G capable device. PLUS I get hotspot access. If I was to go for the Q1 Ultra HSDPA, I can guarantee that I wouldn’t be able to find this sort of offer. I wonder how many other people will be interested in a UMPC when they see these sort of deals?

I’ll be contacting the company tomorrow (it’s a holiday in Germany today) to see if I can work out a deal and get some availability info. I won’t push the button just yet though because there are bound to be more offers filtering through in the next week or two. I’ll be looking for a similar offer with my existing operator, Vodafone, but if I can’t find one i’ll move my data over to T-Mobile.

Vendor: Handyattacke.de