Guess who belongs to the aawesome ensemble of technology in that pic?? ;)
Yup, that's the ASUS Incredible J notebook which His Royal DIAOness co-designed early last year, putting his own stamp on every aspect including the beautiful cover design, the special J key on the keyboard, the start-up tune, the Secret Time Travel score line on the panel inside, yadayadayada....
I was very happy that Jay had done this ASUS project; such a welcome change from soft drinks, milk tea and mobile phone endorsements.
He had, once again, managed to try something new and reinvent himself whilst maturing well.
And what could be more DIAO than a notebook??
The notebook was beautifully conceptualised and realised, with so many personal touches that connect with who and what he is.
The clefs, music notes, nunchakus, playing card suites, Chinese-style shape and not least, the PINK and black combination....they are all SO JAY and were calling out to me...*buy buy buy*
And I was very pleasantly surprised at the retail price in Singapore, as I thought it would definitely be waay more 'cos of Jay's contributions and the B&O technology.
As it happened (serendipitiously!), I was in the market for a non-Mac notebook at that time so in the natural order of things, I am now happily writing my blogs whilst tapping on the keys of the Incredible J. :)
It's such a thing of beauty that even after one year, I still run my fingers lovingly over the smooth shiny cover, whilst revelling in the seven notes which herald its start-up. Seeing Jay's signature and the musical notes add to my pleasure. :)
There was an incredible (pun intended!) buzz leading up the the launch of this notebook, which the members of multistars forums followed with glee and I shall post some links to the pics and vids collected over the course of that period.
Jay was involved in the design of this notebook from the very beginning:
Here's a vid about the design process:
"I feel special to be a designer here. It's the first time I'm designing for a notebook; previously I'd only designed clothes.
The ASUS designers are very good; they know what I want, like Chinese and baroque styles, like in my music, and they designed accordingly.
We discussed everything and brainstormed and they could grasp what concepts I wanted.
The design team also listened to Jay's music, watched his MVs and movies before working with him.
East meets West is very important to me as it's quite a distinct feature of my musci.
I don't have a particular style...more a fusion of Eastern and Western flavours, whic to me, is the best representation.
The round shape is typically Chinese like the base of the flower pot but I wanted something other than a flower pattern.
So within the semicircular form is a mixture of symbols synonymous with Jay like magic, nunchucks, piano keys.
This is a very distinctive East/West confluence.
We tried out calligraphy to write my name, which to me was a new thing as I had thought of using it for fashion previously.
My handwriting is not very good but with a brush, it's different as whether it looks pretty depends on the individual. Out of the hundred I try, there will be one that's nice.
When a song is done, it has to be mixed to get the right sound.
This notebook has the sound in it; so you don't need to play music on a separate CD player.
We were trying out the sound when I just came up with a tune for the bootup and shutdown tones.
This has been a great collaborative team effort.
I have high expectations of myself, like for my music.
If I don't like it, I would not release it.
If it fails to move me, how can I expect others to feel that way?"
Here's the link to the ASUS website for this Incredible J:
http://sonicmaster.asus.com/en/DesignStory.html
Here's a link to a news article from xinmsn about Jay's role and the press conference:
http://entertainment.xin.msn.com/en/celebrity/buzz/asia/article.aspx?cp-documentid=4989894&page=0
Another link to vrzone about the event:
http://vr-zone.com/articles/asus-and-jay-chou-jointly-announce-special-edition-n-series-notebook-pc/12795.html#ixzz1QgRieq00
A few lines from the above article about the design:
No, it isn't exactly a celebrity endorsement; Chou was the chief designer who has worked with the ASUS design centre on the laptop. Shih said that the company's vision is to produce more of such distinct products which are incomparable and he is happy to have Chou as the designer for the special edition N-series. To conceptualize the design, it boils down to how the combination of the consumers sixth senses and ASUS' advanced technologies, and bring out the incomparable experience to the users. According to Chou, he had used "incomparable" as the theme for one of his concerts and that the design of the special edition N-series is very much like east meets west.
And here's a link to vrzone's (good) review of the Incredible J and the specs:
http://vr-zone.com/articles/asus-n43sl-jay-chou-edition-review-not-perfect-but-almost-incredible-/13247-1.html
Links to a thread on multistars which has more vids of the press conference:
http://www.multistars.com/forums/index.php?topic=14502.msg287349#msg287349
I still remember very clearly the day I hotfooted it down to a local dealer which was one of the first to bring in this notebook.
And the joy I felt when I laid eyes on it in the shop....and now still loving the look and performance of Incredible J tremendously!
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