Does anyone have any experience with the new offerings for the ultra-portable notebooks?

I'm thinking of getting rid of my Toshiba for something that would be much easier to carry when traveling. Even though it's only a 15.4" screen, it's large & heavy enough that I often don't take it on trips with me. I have both of my computers at work set up for remote access as well as my desktop/server at home (I just use it for music/video storage). Pretty much the only thing that I use my laptop for is internet & remote accessing one of my comps at work. I haven't even installed any apps since I wiped the HD a couple of months ago other than FF.

Anyway, is there any reason to NOT get one of these things? I'm primarily looking at the new Dell mini & the Acer Aspire One. Seems like the Dell has the advantage for adding RAM & offering bluetooth but the Acer has a larger HD. I'm looking at the $350 cheapies btw. I've got several SD cards lying around that I'll use for extra "HD" space if I end up needing it but I don't plan to store much on it.

Any suggestions or experiences?

9/7/2008 1:06:10 AM

from ones that i've tried, including the eee pc's that they're selling at the bookstore, their keyboards are DAMN hard to use. you either need small fingers or a lot of patience to type.

9/7/2008 1:47:39 AM

^yep.

that's the main drawback. supposedly, the new eee pc's have improved on this somewhat... not sure if that is indeed the case or not.

9/7/2008 3:57:09 AM

Yeah, I know the keyboard is going to be a hassle to start with but it seems most of the long term reviews that I've read state that the users got used to them after a while. The small original EEE PCs seemed to be the worst with the others having a slightly larger keyboard.

I'm really not interested in the newest EEE (& others) with the larger screen(10"+) & HD as the price and extra size partially negate what I'm looking for. While I like the smaller size, I'm not willing to pay $500+ for a laptop with a slow processor & small screen (plus I don't care about the big platter HDs). I'm pretty much looking at the 8.9" models that are $320-400 tops. I'd really like to find someone local that has one that I can test for a few hours but I haven't had any luck.

9/7/2008 12:09:15 PM

i thought best buy stocked them

and the bookstore has some as well

9/7/2008 12:42:22 PM

is there any particular reason you need one of these? for $400 on craigslist/ebay or by watching slickdeals.net (or some similar sites) like a hawk you can eventually get a decent machine that will far out perform one of these things..and be a hell of a lot more functional

9/7/2008 12:43:55 PM

^ i think he was mainly looking at the portability aspect.

9/7/2008 1:08:15 PM

I've had an eee 4g and the 901, I really like them a lot, especially for international traveling and taking to classes, when they're smaller and lighter than pretty much any textbook in your pack (they also are easily concealable in your lap or if there's someone sitting in front of you, can't really do that with a regular laptop in a class where the teacher objects to them)

just slap a custom ubuntu on there first, because the default Xandros build is horrible

as for the keys, yeah it definitely takes some getting used to, and not having fat fingers is a plus. It took me about a week but by then I was touch typing almost as well as on a fullsize keyboard. Actually whenever I use a fullsized laptop now the keyboards feel incredibly awkward and too spaced out, I'm so used to the netbook feel.

9/7/2008 1:38:41 PM

^^^^ I'm not in Raleigh and the BB here hasn't had them when I've checked. It's been a couple of months though so I'll go by again.

^^^ I thought I explained that in my posts. I have a nice, fast Toshiba now and I don't use it for anything other than internet & remote accessing my work desktop anymore so it's pointless. Something from CL would be the same thing that I have now (or worse, Hickory CL sucks). I'm looking for GREAT portability for when I travel while still allowing me to do the things that I use my laptop now for.

^ Is there a big difference between the keyboards of those two? I've also read that about the Asus' Linux so I planned to change it to ubuntu or one of the ultra-lightweight XP (though I doubt I'll do that. most likely stay with some kind of linux). By any chance do you have any experience with any of the others out there?

9/7/2008 2:19:06 PM

The keyboard feels a little better on the 901 than the older 4g model, though they are very close to the same size. The keys might be marginally bigger or wider, I feel like I can type without always touching the edges of other keys on it. The 901 is slightly wider and taller open than the 4g but is still very small and portable.....i'd definitely go 901 for the battery life with the atom and the 1024x600 vs 800x480 resolutions make a huge difference for everything you do

engadget has a lot of stories about them including picture comparisons and things like that....

9/7/2008 2:35:30 PM