I finally jump into the wagon of tapping the Netbook forray. I’ve always been very skeptical on how well this machine will perform. I’ve been trying quite a few UMPCs and my experiences have been really mediocre. Here is my journey.
Several months ago I tried both Fujitsu U (the 1st generation of it, when they still are equipped with Intel A110 processor) and Samsung Q Ultra. Both machine are so under power that they become not practical to use (i.e. YouTube video is so choppy on both machine)
Before that, I also spent some time using OQO, Sony UX(s) and Raon Vega where I found that even tough they are nice and small but they are not quite pocketable as I want them to be. So it is kind of akward to carry those machine (which at the end, I use my iPhone more and more).
So my hunt on the perfect machine continue. I jump to the extreme side and get myself a pretty good deal of MacBook from the Apple store. For less than $900, I manage to grab myself a refurbished MacBook white with 2.0Ghz, 2G RAM and manually upgrade the hard drive to 200G 7200RPM. Of course, performance wise, this is as good as I want it to be and now it becomes my main laptop for most of my work. However, carrying around a 5 pounder in the office during meeting is starting to be a pain 
As soon as Apple releases Mac Air, I ventured out to try it out and see if it can replace my MacBook and at the same time I can shed some weight. That doesn’t take long before I realize that my MacBook is still the right device for the heavy duty work and Mac Air does not come close to become “the replacement”. Keeping both machines are definitely not “economical” for me.
There I am once again, going out there to hunt for my perfect secondary companion machine that I can carry around easily during meeting and travel. I research and research and research and try to compare so many different netbooks out there (that’s what they call nowdays these sub 3 pounder machines). The specifications of different models are pretty much the same. You pretty much get Intel Atom 1.6Ghz, 1G memory and hard drive that ranges from 4G SSD to 160G SATA hard drive. I always love 8.9 inches machine (couple years ago, I had JVC mini note and Flybook which both have the same screen size). I feel that size is perfect for a companion machine. Therefore, based on that, my first initial choices are Acer Aspire One, HP Mini Note 2133 or Dell Mini.
I love the HP Mini Note 2133 because it has better resolution screen and I actually had the chance to play one (I love the aluminum casing of the machine as it looks really sturdy). However, both the high price and the under-powered VIA processor (I had prior experience with this processor when I used OQO) becomes my hesitation to buy. To my disappointment, the new version HP mini note(HP Mini 1000), even tough they upgrade the processor to Atom, they do not keep the 2 features that I like (aluminum case and high resolution screen). So I scratch it out from my list.
Now I am down to Dell Mini or Aspire One. At first, I tempted to get the Dell Mini. But after doing some more research regarding the SSD drive that being used, I decided to not getting that machine. The SSD performance is really week on these Dell Minis. Both the read and the write performance are not as good as a real mechanical hard drive. Also the options that they have for Dell minis are pretty limited too.
So I narrowed my list to pretty much to Aspire One and I brave myself to buy myself one as an early Christmas gift. Amazon has a special offer at $399 and the unit comes with 160G 5400 rpm hard drive and 6 cell battery! That is perfect. Within 2 business days and the unit arrived at my house. Here is the exact machine that I bought:
Acer Aspire One 8.9-inch Mini Laptop (1.6 GHz Intel Atom N270 Processor, 1 GB RAM, 160 GB Hard Drive, XP Home, 6 Cell Battery) Sapphire Blue
To my amazing, this netbook does go beyond my expectation. With XP Home installed, it actually performs pretty well (the SATA hard drive does help). With 6 cell battery, it gives me at least 4.5 hours of usage which is pretty decent (I turned the WIFI on always and have the brightness at 75%). As of the matter of fact, this blog is created using my Aspire One
Now I think I have the right secondary device for what I do. I will still use my “upgraded” MacBook to do all the hard core chores (web programming, video editing, music editing, etc). I leave all the light weight chores to my netbook: web browsing, blogging, note-taking, and more and lastly my iPhone for messaging, facebook-ing and light web browsing.
Looking back, this is actually a time-travel back to my 2-years-ago setup (when I am still using my JVC mini note), but the cost of the 3 devices I have now (MacBook and Aspire One and iPhone 3G) are less than what I spent 2 years ago on a single JVC notebook!!
Well I will continue my post on how I use the netbook on the day-to-day work including what softwares I installed and so on and how I manage to seamlessly work on multiple machines with little down time.
Cheers and Happy Holidays!
