Three models of Asus netbooks with Ubuntu preinstalled

Three models from the Asus EeePC series will be sold with the Ubuntu 10.10 “Maverick Meerkat” operating system preinstalled, company representatives say. In addition, some proprietary drivers and codecs and Flash, which are not included in the basic configuration of a “free” OS, will be installed immediately.

EeePC 1001PXD, 1011PX and 1015PX models, as stated in the announcement, should be available in Europe from the 1st of June (can anyone confirm?).
Asus has previously used Linux as the default system on netbooks of the EeePC line. Then the Xandros Linux distribution was chosen.

Chris Kenyon, a spokesman for Canonical OEMs, notes the tremendous importance of this event for Ubuntu developers.
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“This will spread Ubuntu to a wide audience,” he says in an interview with The Inquirer. “People who themselves probably wouldn’t want to download Ubuntu will be happy to have an OS on their laptop that works perfectly on their hardware.”
"We expect that the miniature and great design of Asus netbooks in conjunction with Ubuntu's brilliant work will bring a buzz to the market."

Stanley Chang, head of production at Asus, said that “strategic collaboration with Ubuntu is a huge win for both parties.”
It was also announced that other models with Ubuntu pre-installed are already planned for the future.