It's no secret that netbooks are hot items on the tech market at the moment, and Asus is one of the biggest players in this relatively young niche product line. It is a very healthy indication of just how big a player Asus is that they organized and hosted a 5-day, 4-night tour extravaganza to Shanghai as a dealer's appreciation event, bringing together over 40 members of the Philippine's many computer retailers.

                                             Asus' Philippine dealers and distributors near one of Hangzhou's numerous gardens.

The main course of the 5-day event was a look at Asus' facilities located outside of Pudong, Shanghai, but the events leading up to the 4th day, when the actual plant tour occurred, served as the most excellent filling for the buffet that was the whole trip. The first day gave us a real taste of China with a stop at Hefang Street, a famous shopping area surrounded by traditional Chinese architecture to make the most modernistic architects salivate at the possibilities; such were the number of dragons, tiled roofs, and red-hued pagodas. There were traditional Chinese food stalls aplenty too, with Starbucks and Dairy Queen just at the periphery of the eye.

                                             A view of Hefang's traditional artisans and pedestrian avenues.

                                             Chinese calligraphy brushes for sale along Hefang.

Traditional Chinese artisans abounded, while modern department stores hid just around the corner of many a traditionally-clad building. The participants were treated to a beautiful light-and-water show on the West Lake of Hangzhou on the same day, simply entitled "Impression West Lake", and boy were we impressed. Who wouldn't, with a nearly mile-wide lake populated with submerged walkways, smoke machines, powerful lights, and superb actors and actresses who dances and pirouetted their way through two hours of water-borne choreography?

                                             A typically red food stand along the streets of Hangzhou.

                                             A "fire" bicycle! It was parked along a pedestrian shopping street.

The second and third day had activities aplenty for the participants, starting with a breath-taking look at the Six Harmony Pagoda, so named to signify the harmony between heaven and earth plus the four compass directions of North, South, East and West. In quick succession, we were able to view the poignant weeping willows along the West Lake of Hangzhou in a beautiful frame of rough bark and greenery - it was especially beautiful with a deep-red sun just setting to one side of the frame composed by the myriad tresses of the willow trees. The second day was perfectly bookmarked by a delicious dinner at the Louwailou restaurant, the oldest dining place in Hangzhou – it being nearly 170 years old.

                                             Weeping willows framing the beautiful West Lake in Hangzhou.

                                              Tranquil gardens abound in Hangzhou.

Day three would not let up on our orientally-beguiled senses and was the most packed yet.  It started with a walk through some of the most beautiful gardens these eyes have seen - never mind that this Unesco Heritage Site is named the "Humble Administrator's Garden" - if that was humble, we would be utterly lost in the more boastful of garden architecture. The Suzhou Museum, of architect I.M. Pei fame, was also on the agenda, and is fortunately right beside the 5 hectare garden, as we had a date with a traditional Chinese riverboat on a quick "Grand Canal" cruise, a quick trip that nonetheless drove home the history of early trade and transportation in this section of China, as this stretch of canal served as the main artery for the early industries during the Sui dynasty, when it was first strung together to eventually form a 1,770 km long artificial waterway – a length just a bit shorter than the Philippine islands’ total length of 1,851 km from the northernmost tip of Luzon down to Mindanao.

                                              A view of one of the many ponds within the Humble Administrator's Garden, a UNESCO Heritage Site.

                                             A portion of the Grand Canal that once tied together a length of land nearly as long as the Philippines.

We ended the day after arriving at Shanghai with a boat cruise under the stars and under the lights of the increasingly colorful skyline of one of the most vibrant cities in Asia. The Orient Pearl TV Tower, the new 101-storey SWFC (Shanghai World Financial Center) 40-story LED displays, the Bund! - it was all too much light and too many buildings for an hour's worth of river cruising, and it was over much too soon, although both stars and skyline-lights accompanied us all the way back to our lodgings.

                                              The river cruise along the Huangpo River showed the super-colorful Shanghai skyline to great effect.

                                             The Bund, on the "Puxi" side of the river - a grand example of European architecture.

Now it was on to business on the fourth day. In addition to touring the many wonders of Shanghai, old and new, central to the whole trip was the visit to Asus' Pegatron manufacturing facilities, primarily centered on the manufacture of Asus' many laptop and netbook models. Also found inside the same campus-style, 210 hectare compound are research and development centers, dormitories, testing facilities, and recreation areas. Naturally, we were drawn to the manufacturing facilities, as we were curious on where those thousands upon thousands of netbooks and laptops currently flooding our market came from, and how these many units of laptops still maintain their excellent level of quality and durability.

                                             A slide detailing the Pegatron facilities shown during the briefing before the actual plant tour.

The Asus notebook manufacturing line came as a huge revelation. While the expected ranks of high-tech machinery and computerized equipment were present, interspaced between the different stages of production were lines of skilled human workers attaching components to motherboards, visually inspecting connections, and plugging in the main components. The two disparate manufacturing methods combined and resulted in a whirring, flowing display of speed and efficiency - and I don't just mean the laptop units coming out of the assembly process to be packed.

                                             Location map for the Pegatron facilities in China.

We followed the manufacturing process from bare green PCB right up to the testing and packaging of the finished units. Actual assembly of the motherboards was evenly divided between machines and skilled hands, with the smaller chips and components attached by machine, and the larger components such as CPU sockets, coolers and protective film attached by the technicians. POST testing is also performed by the technicians to determine the board’s fitness for the next step.

                                             Dealers and distributors after the plant tour of Asus' Pegatron facilities.

The next process is to integrate the motherboard into their laptop shells and to attach LCD and keyboards, CPUs and memory and other major components. The nearly-complete units are tested again using a customized script that tests all major components and displays a “Pass” or “Fail” message on the laptop’s screen when finished. The laptop units then go through final preparation which includes installation of operating systems and packaging with other necessary laptop peripherals such as battery and power adaptor.

Of much interest as well was the testing procedure leading up to the manufacture of the different Asus units. Before actual production of a laptop or netbook model can commence, the Pegatron facilities host a kind of huge technological obstacle course for pre-production models to test how they will stand up to real-world conditions. Specifically, accelerated-wear testing of hinges, ports, slots, buttons and the like segue to microscope-wielding technicians trying to find the smallest blemish in the solders, traces, PCBs, while packaged products were dropped onto concrete floors, units subjected to controlled humidity and temperature levels, and multiple software tests performed on the units to determine their worthiness to carry the Asus name – all these were shown and demonstrated to the participants.

Naturally, many of these procedures were being done by skilled human hands as with the actual manufacturing of the units, though there were naturally many sophisticated pieces of equipment being used during testing such as the environmental chambers designed to simulate humidity and temperature variations and “shakers” that subjects the pre-production models to various combinations of vibration to test the units’ robustness.

All throughout the tour, we noticed nary a scrap of debris, all of the facilities were arranged exactly to specifications (even the tables and wastebaskets has their own line of fluorescent tape to mark off their position in a room), and the atmosphere had a heady and intense feel to it, almost like the camaraderie of a high school sports team’s locker room.  

                                             A quick look at the milestones passed by the Pegatron facilities.

It is unfortunate that photographs were not allowed during our meandering within the Pegatron factories, as these would have shown how efficiently designed the manufacturing process is. Suffice to say that all Asus factories within the Pegatron facilities shipped a total of 1 million notebooks as of March 31 of 2008, an amazing feat considering the number of steps in the testing and manufacturing process and the obvious level of quality in all Asus products. The testing and the manufacturing process combining the traditional and the cutting-edge obviously produces results, an excellent indicator being the number of units pushed out by the participants of the tour over the past year.

                                            An SWFC marker.

The Asus plant tour is neatly sandwiched between the two halves of the China trip – if the first portion showcased traditional China at its best, the second half wowed us with a sampling of the cutting-edge – starting off with the Shanghai World Financial Center (SWFC), a 101-storey, 492 m skyscraper comprising hotels, offices, shopping malls and observation decks. Looking like the world’s biggest bottle opener, this skyscraper was completed on August 29, 2008, and is the highest building on the Chinese mainland, including Hong Kong.

                                             101 floors nearly did not fit into the camera's viewfinder.

The view from the highest observation deck on the 100th floor is breathtaking; clear glass panels on the floor of the observation deck show a view of the nearby 88-storey Jin Mao Tower below the viewer’s feet, and a view out of the windows show the imposing height of the Oriental Pearl Tower at 468 m reduced to something like the Six Harmony Pagoda – visually imposing but quite short compared to “modern” buildings.

                                            It is an awe-inspiring experience to look *down* on an 88-storey building.

Evening brought to the participants a look at modern artistic culture at its best – the world-famous “Era” acrobatic show, a performance extravaganza not unlike the Cirque de Soleil, but infused with Chinese cues from kung-fu to bicycles, including an amazing “death-cage” finale composed of 8 motorcycles circling around a (tiny) mesh cage. The Era webpage describes the performance as “The Multimedia Theatrical Spectacular” and names it an “Intersection of Time” making it “..universal, without language or cultural barriers” – a fitting finish for the jam-packed day and no less choreographed and practiced than Asus’ troupe of excellent workers.

The highlight of the last day was definitely the maglev ride – it was like a 30-kilometer underline for our whole trip, lending a properly technological flair for the whole affair that was sprinkled with both the old and the new. With a maximum speed of 501 km/h, and a normal operating maximum speed of 431 km/h, the Shanghai Maglev Train turns what is normally a 30 to 45 minute amble to the Pudong International Airport into a 7-minute thrill ride that would do Superman proud, although it did make it seem like we were rushing out of China and leaving behind all of the wonderful sights of the past few days.

It is similar to how Shanghai is rushing towards the future, while keeping its feet firmly on the traditional ground of Chinese culture. It is no surprise that this Asus plant tour is accompanied by a tour of both old and new China, as Asus also strives to keep to their timeless values of quality and performance present since its inception yet also strives to incorporate the best and most cutting-edge of technologies in its products. More pictures to follow.

                                              A peaceful stretch of the Grand Canal.

                                             A pond in a tea village near Suzhou.

                                             The Six Harmony Pagoda in Hangzhou.

                                            A view of West Lake in Hangzhou.

                                             The Impression West Lake performance in Hangzhou.

                                               Light and effects were hardly comparable to the natural beauty of the lake.

                                              A view of the skyline. The SWFC can be seen in the background.