The Watering Hole

First of all, I really don't like laptops.  They don't fit my hands and the older ones that had enough power to do real work were big and heavy.

That said, in the near future it looks like I'm going to have to get some form of portable computer.  I just saw these cheap little netbooks that actually have more harddrive space and more memory than the laptops I last looked at a few years ago (no internal DVD/CD player though - I've got an external for that if needed however).

So what are your opinions about the netbooks?  Something nice and small is great for meetings, especially those at restaurants without a lot of room.  But are there downsides that I'm not aware of yet?  Do any of you have one?

For example, I saw this one (the HP Mini 311) today while asking questions about cell phones: http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/netbook/?page=products

TIA! :)

I love them.  Personally, I'd rather have an iPad, but netbooks are slick.  Especially if you don't need a lot of horsepower and don't mind a small screen.

I picked up an iPad a couple weeks ago - very happy with it.

I've never had a laptop or smart phone etc. so the whole "browse while outdoors" thing is new and majorly awesome for me.

typing anything longer than a search term or three is a bitch but for reading web sites and stuff, it's perfect.

only real gripe: it tries to capitalize the first word of every sentence for me. which, given my typing habits, looks weird - but that's not a big deal.

kinda off the topic for Craig... but had to +1 the iPad :)

I think you can change that capitalization thing in the preferences somewhere.  it often drives me nuts when i double-space and the iphone types a period...

Actually, for this, I'm not married to a Windows platform (in fact, from what I read in the reviews, the Windows 7 OS netbooks crash all the time).  I still have 20/10 eyesight so the smaller screen (as long as the resolution is high) doesn't bother me much.  I'd rather see more of the screen smaller than have to scroll up and down, and side to side a lot.

I'll have to go off and research the iPad, but I'm sure that it costs a lot more than the $99 to $199 range the netbooks were in! :)

Wow, iPad sticker shock! :o

I knew it would be higher, just not that much!  Spending $199 for something that has a much larger screen, a 160gb harddrive and a faster processor doesn't seem so bad now.

Looks like Generation 2 (or some Android based tablet that's apparently coming out soon) is the thing to wait for though...

Most of us got sticker shock in the opposite direction with the iPad... $499 seemed surprisingly low to me.  

It's unbelievable how much something like a touchable screen with multi-touch features can change the way you enjoy interacting with technology.  I have no legitimate need for the iPad, but I want one anyway.

I just spent a bunch of time on the Achros website.  Looks like there's a lot of fun stuff out there that I've been missing.

Fortunately, I'm noticing BEFORE I've gone out and bought anything so I think I really need to decide what, exactly, I need to be able to do before I go out and buy any new toys.

charger — May 05, 2010Most of us got sticker shock in the opposite direction with the iPad... $499 seemed surprisingly low to me.

Maybe that was only the introductory amount?  I didn't find any that were anywhere close to $499.  Some were even over $1,000...

found the pref for capitalization - thanks!

agree on the reverse sticker shock - especially for an apple product.

CraigBert — May 05, 2010[quote author=charger link=1273022032/0#6 date=1273097973]Most of us got sticker shock in the opposite direction with the iPad... $499 seemed surprisingly low to me.

Maybe that was only the introductory amount?  I didn't find any that were anywhere close to $499.  Some were even over $1,000...


http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_ipad/family/ipad?afid=p219|GOUS&cid=OAS-US-KWG-iPad-US