So no highly toxic chemicals used in the manufacture of the internals then? That'll be a first.

Right. Chop down a bunch of bamboo to make schmancy laptop skins, rather than say, donate to a land conservation fund, or invest in cleaner materials for the laptops proles can afford.

Way to distract, Asus.

Ahh, but you missed the point that the processor is also made out of wood - balsa. The motherboard is made out of traditional English oak. The NVidia graphics card comes in ... wait for it ... mahogany!

The only problem with this change in manufacture is that the rainforest will just have to come down

I'm waiting for the panda skin covered laptop. It'll be a by-product of chopping down the bamboo forests so that's alright.

Judging by the final photograph, the bamboo cover is just a pull-off accessory - surely the manufacturing effort involved in chopping down the bamboo, feeding it through a big pulping machine, putting the pulp in a mould, forming it into mock-planks, and then cutting the resulting goo would outweigh the environmental benefits of a rottable cover?

Perhaps in the future laptop cases can be grown in vats, and ultimately perhaps the laptop's components can be grown. Right now it would probably be more environmentally friendly to make a laptop that can easily and indefinitely be upgraded to an acceptable standard of use, thus postponing its disposal; or to adopt a mindset whereby laptops are not thrown away after eighteen months because there is a newer and more attractive model available. The kind of people likely to buy a flashy bamboo-covered laptop are the kind of people who are likely to throw it away after eight months in order to buy the next latest model (perhaps grass-covered).

I think this product is a perfect demosntratino of just how facile the whole ecological movement has become. In the 50s and 60s it was about cleaning up the mess. When that was done, it was about preserving the rainforests (which seems to have worked in some places and failed in others, but at least it was tried). Then the 90s came along and people didn't btoerh saving forests; they shat on them, whilst undermining their roots, and pretended they were 'protecting the environment'. Swampy and his ilk did more damage to the world than any megalomaniac corporation. Now the very idea of being 'green' has been commercialised and exploited by the very people that the green movement used to say they were against.

Now me, I'm all for coating laptops in bamboo, mahogany, crocodile skin, human skin, kitten hearts or whatever as long as there's no pretence about motivation and a market for it (and assuming anyone would actually buy a kitten-heart encased laptop). I can't stand is this phony feel-good wankery. If you're going to coat your laptop in panda food, don't pretend you're doing it to save the environment, or to appeal to the environmentalist lifestyle, because it makes you look stupid.

Gorgeous. Way prettier than an Apple even. Makes the auld hipster's standard, the Macbook, look quite dour and utilitarian.

Oh by the way, can I just point out to those who're scathing about the inadequate eco-credentials of this machine, that it's not organic cabbage you're typing on there...

> can I just point out to those who're scathing about the inadequate eco-credentials

> of this machine, that it's not organic cabbage you're typing on there...

Well cabbage it isnt since that would smell, but recycled plastic it is. Is this bamboo recycled ?

When I was in grade school we had a bamboo computer in my classroom - it was called an abacus.

I would like to draw your attention to the easter egg box variant; and remind the casual green/exploitative company what 90% of internet/computer usage is for, and well .. that sir is going to stain....

And the marketing guru that came up with this idea was no doubt rewarded with a non environmental friendly all expenses paid, Champaign swilling flight around the world to visit bamboo forests…..

I can see it now, a whole new generation of computer "bugs".

You may have trouble finding it on a wooden desk if the lid was down. Unless the battery sets it ablaze, in which case problem solved.

Sheesh, so much opinion, so much ignorance.

Bamboo is one of THE most ecological materials available.

The bamboo used for cabinet making and kitchen worktops and the like is NOT the same type of bamboo grass that pandas eat. It is also extremely fast growing and therefore a marvelous renewable resource not unlike hemp.

CO2 footprint? Who cares!

It's critical that people wake up and recognise the truth before we are all paying lung exhaled CO2 tax under the blatant lie that is man made climate change.

At least you can put the lid down and use it as a bread board...

Bamboo doesn't combust as easily, so you're bound to get a few more hours battery life out of the laptops before they explode violently.

Oh hang on, that's bad. . . . .

... if they were promoting this by its design/look good on them, they do look fairly smart) --- but to claim environmental responsibility is ridiculous (as has been proven by all the comments above!)

Your reader's comments are a mixed bag of truths and misconceptions..

A woode laptop case and mouse as long as it made from certified, renewable forsts is definitely more ecological than plastic or metal alternatives... This can be measured in a number of ways, such as energy consumption in production, brominated flame retardants used in plastic, PVC's that are toxic, and so on.

However, no computer can claim to ecological unless the insides can be subject to the same or equivalent evaluation. The problem is that there are bery few ways of establishing overall econological performance. There are evaluation programmes (labels) that meadure energy preformace only (energy star) but leave out toxic substances, electromagnetic emmissions, noise, and life-extension (PC's thata re obsolete n three years can hardly be called ecological).

The only standard we have been able to identify which has overall coverage and independent (not industry-based) assessment if the European Eco-Label for PC's. This label which carried the authoritity of EC commissioned expersts has been treated with contempt by most commercial PC manufactures, who have ignored it.

MicroPro, an SME based in Dubin, committed to genuine ecological standards, has form some eays been involved in the development of a PC that meets thse standards. It is called the iameco (www.iameco.com) and is currently being tested for the comprehensive Eco-Label. When it secures it it will be the 1st computer to achieve this comprehensive standard, a true eco-computer.