Asus on Monday reportedly expanded its mini-notebook line with the introduction of an ultraportable PC powered by Intel's new Atom processor.

The company showed off the Eee PC 901 at the Computex conference in Taipei, Taiwan, tech blog Engadget reported. The device has an 8.9-inch screen, a 1.6-GHz Atom microprocessor, 1 GB of memory, and a 20-GB solid-state drive for Linux builds and a 12-GB SSD in machines running Windows.

The latest addition to the Eee PC brand, which includes the original 7-inch model that started at $200, features four to six hours of battery life and supports Bluetooth and Wi-Fi wireless technologies, Engadget said. A 10-inch model called the Eee PC 1001 is expected to be introduced Tuesday, when Asus officially unveils the new products. The 901 models shown at Computex were white and black.

The latest mini-notebook follows the launch in March of the Eee PC 900 at the CeBIT trade show in Germany. The notebook has an 8.9-inch screen and has many of the same specifications as the 901. The biggest difference is that the 900 is powered by an Intel mobile CPU and chipset other than the Atom.

The Atom, introduced in March and formerly code-named Silverthorne, is the successor to the A100 and A110 processors, code-named McCaslin, which is in some ultramobile PCs available today. For mobile devices, the Atom is available in models ranging from subwatt to 2.5 watts and can scale to speeds up to 1.8 GHz, Intel said.

Asus sparked the sub-$500 mini-notebook craze with the introduction of the Eee PC in October. Since then, the Taiwanese company has sold more than 350,000 units and said it's on track to sell between 3 million and 5 million notebooks by the end of this year.

While sales have been strong among computer enthusiasts, the ultra-low-cost notebooks are expected to eventually find their place in the mainstream PC market as an inexpensive option for students and as a second computer for accessing the Web on the road at Wi-Fi hotspots, according to IDC. Worldwide shipments are expected to increase from less than 500,000 units last year to more than 9 million in 2012.