If you like 8.9-inch screens, you might want to get one now. Asus has said that it'll be phasing out that size in 2009, since 10-inch models are dominating the market.

According to Digitimes, Benson Lin, president of Asustek Computer's Asia-Pacific division said that 10-inch models account for 95% of the company's sales. 7-inch models make up the other 5%.

To be honest, I'm surprised 8.9-inches is not a popular option. Maybe I'm just weird, but I always though that screen size hit the sweet spot between fitting into a purse and still having a somewhat usable keyboard.

I have to be honest, when Julie communicated to her Gadgeteer Geek Gang that we would all be getting a new HP Mini 1000 XP Series Netbook, I was overcome with a feeling much like when I was a kid at Christmas. You know, that happy/joyous feeling of anticipation that fills the youthful spirit until the climax of ripping through the paper on the very last gift. Fortunately, I have been using my HP Mini for a few weeks now and that warm and fuzzy feeling has yet to wear off. I love it, almost completely.

I know that is too vague, so specifically:

I love the small, sleek and ultra-lightweight design. At just under an inch thick and slightly more than two pounds, it is comparable in size to a standard hardcover book. Very easy to carry in a bag, a medium/large purse or comfortably in your hand. The 10.3 x 6.5 x 0.9 plastic shell, which differs from the aluminum case used in the previous model, seems fairly sturdy, passing my creak/pop test. I am sure the switch from aluminum to plastic was done to reduce manufacturing cost and weight.

I love the stylish design. The onyx-toned “Swirl” Imprint design is subtle but provides a certain alluring characteristic to the exterior. The groovy pattern bestows depth to what would be a rather plain glossy exterior. If you really want your Mini to make a less subtle statement, check out the Mini 1000 Vivienne Tam Edition.

I love that the keyboard is nearly full-sized. One of my primary concerns when I considered the size of the device was would I be able to easily type on the keyboard. Well yes, I can easily utilize the Mini’s keyboard without hunting and pecking. HP boasts the keyboard is “92% of the standard size”. Nice to see the engineers did not compromise usability for the sake of size. I think the keyboard, with its over-sized square keys stretching from edge-to-edge, is the biggest selling point for the unit.

I love that the screen is appropriately size and bright. My second biggest concern was the screen. Would it be big enough for me to use without straining my eyes? Would it be bright enough for me to see? The upgraded 10.2″ diagonal screen is nicely sized proportionally with the overall unit and the HP LED Brightview Infinity Display (1024 x 600) puts out plenty of light. I used the device for hours and never noticed any strain on my eyes.

I love the fact that HP did not fill the netbook with a lot of unnecessary pre-loaded software. Netbooks were designed to be highly mobile and offer enough computing power to complete the elementary tasks, such as surfing the Web, working on documents and some fundamental multimedia playback. HP ensures that the basic are covered with Microsoft Works, Windows Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player loaded on Windows XP Home edition. I must admit that I am not a big Works fan but you can easily replace that with the basic Office tool set.

I love the battery life. I was expecting to get 2 hours max out of the 3 CellLithium Polymer Battery. I was pleasantly surprised that from 5 duration tests, I average 2 hours and 44 minutes of life before the battery finally gave out.

I love the sound quality. Again, I think more times then not we often expect small speakers system to lack anything near a decent sound. Fortunately I found the HP Mini 1000 did not comply with that stereotype. The unit delivers above average sound quality without experiencing any noticeable distortion. The engineers ingeniously placed the speaker as the inside hinge, saving space and providing a perfect position for the tunes to flow.

I love the built-in SD card reader. Great way to easily add some memory to your device. For less than $30, you can easily add 4GB of storage with a SD card. I filled a card with my favorite MP3’s and I had my music in my Mini without eating up hard drive space.

Just like any real relationship, we have our dislikes too:

I hate the idea behind the Mini Mobile Drive. The Mobile Drive is HP’s proprietary hardware, like a small jump drive, that fits into the recessed USB port on the unit’s right side. I love the concept of additional memory options but to make it a proprietary piece that you have to buy as an extra leaves a bad taste in my mouth. At this time, the Mini Mobile Drives are not available so I am unsure of the cost.

I hate the glare from the overly glossy LCD screen. I tried to use the unit outside once and the glare made it impossible to see anything. This is opposite edge of the nice and crisp picture that I loved above. If the manufacturer would have included a anti-glare screen, I assume the brightness would have been compromised.

I hate the audio out (headphone) and audio in (microphone) share a single audio jack. I experienced no issue with the shared audio connector but I just think that it might have made more sense to leave the proprietary slot on the drawing board and give each audio option there own jack.

I hate the limited angle of the screen. Occasionally I prefer to work while standing standing up at our kitchen island. To do this comfortably, I normally will extend the screen open to an extreme angle, almost parallel to the counter top. Unfortunately, the Mini will not permit me to open it very far.

I hate the Synaptics Touchpad. I found using the touchpad with the buttons flanking each side difficult to maneuver for navigation. Maybe this is more from my experience with my Dell’s mouse ball set in the keyboard but it definitely took me some time to become proficient. The technique that I most often use is putting my thumbs on the bottom of the device and use my pointer fingers to direct the movement of the mouse.

I hate the built-in WebCam. The concept of including peripherals that are built into the frame of the hardware is great. Unfortunately, the picture quality captured from the camera is fair, at best. Regardless of the lighting, I was unable to improve the quality.

Now that you understand the spectrum of emotions that I have felt using my HP Mini 1000, I hope that you can understand its impact on my domicile. Normally, my family is uninterested in the gadgets that I review. They are usually interested for the first 5-15 minutes of me opening the box, then their interests wanes like ice cream on a August day in Indiana. Unfortunately this was not the case with the netbook.

My wife was instantly drawn in by the look and feel of the HP Mini. The sleek, stylish and lightweight device instantly grabbed her attention and once I completed the initial set-up, including the establishing the wireless connection, I started to notice the Mini and my wife became very close friends.

It started with a simple “let me see that for a second”, and she would take it and check her Facebook account and be done with it in 15 minutes. No harm, no foul. Then slowly I started to witness a shift, she would take the Mini with her upstairs and sit in bed and surf the net. After the girls went to bed, she would wrap herself in the warmth of a blanket with the Mini nestled in her lap.

Now it is to the point where I feel like I have been knocked down the ladder of love. Our girls still command the most attention from her but I have been replaced by the Mini. It is like the device is connected to her hip by some type of electrical umbilical cord. I have to ask permission to use it so that I can get data to write an educated review and even then she acts as if it in a inconvenience.

I almost anticipated my wife’s obsession but my two little girls forced me to do a “say what” double-take. They are less than six years old and the HP Mini 1000’s small size drew them to it like moths to a light. They thought it was one of their toy laptop computers and to be honest it is actually smaller then their play laptops. They both asked a few times if they “could play with daddy’s new toy”.

Interestingly side note, I was discussing this phenomenon with my mother-in-law, who happens to work for an Indiana school corporation, and she was telling me that they recently purchased HP Minis for their second grade student population. When I was seven years old and in second grade I know that me and my peers did not have access to anything close to a computer or anything nearly as cool as these little babies.

In conclusion, just like any natural relationship my HP Mini 1000 and I have our ups and downs but in the end I definitely felt the love. The small, stylish design and the nicely sized keyboard are the two biggest selling points of the netbook, while the glare from the super glossy screen and the touchpad are the major deterring factors.

Overall, I would definitely purchase a HP Mini 1000 if you are looking for a nice, small netbook that offers great options for the highly mobile user. Even if mobile is define as moving in between rooms in your house. My only reservation is that you might want to consider buying more than one or you will find yourself in a situation similar to mine where you have to fight your love ones for the opportunity to utilize this great little device. Gotta go, my wife needs to spend some quality time with the Mini that I am using to write this review.

When Acer recently demoed their 10 inch Aspire One netbooks, many reviewers were pleasantly surprised to discover a netbook that could boast an uptime of nearly 8 hours while under moderate use. That was largely made possible by the battery capacity, which was a six-cell 5800mAh unit. Unfortunately for potential owners of the netbook, the units that reviewers (and some early bird customers) got were “mistakenly” shipped with the larger battery.

Most of the units will actually be delivered with a 4400mAh battery which would in turn have a shorter runtime. Acer claims the smaller unit will still get around 6 hours of battery life, though one review site speculates it’d be lucky to get 5.5 hours, compared to other netbooks with similar sized batteries and specs.

Leave it to Microsoft to make netbooks complicated.

It appears likely the tech giant will offer three different versions of Windows 7 for netbooks. HP officials told Computer World about its plans to offer three different configurations of Windows 7 for netbooks, which suggests Microsoft will roll out this structure for other companies' netbooks as well.

According to HP, the following three Windows 7 options will be available: Windows 7 Starter Edition, which will only be able to run three apps at a time; Windows 7 Home Premium for consumers; and Windows 7 Professional edition, aimed at business users. That could lead to three pricing options for Windows 7 netbooks, depending on the version you choose — in addition to pricing variations when netbooks ship with Linux instead.

Mobile computing has got better with lighter components, better chips and faster processors. But the Achilles heel of a laptop has remained its battery.

Modern graphic intensive operating systems and resource hungry applications are cutting down the life of your laptop’s battery every day. The average battery life per continuous use still stands at a maximum of three to four hours. So, a fast depleting battery could very swiftly put the crutches on your ‘mobile’ road trip.

Falling just short of carrying an extra pack of batteries in the back-pack, are several ways to keep the juice flowing through the batteries.

1. Ship shape with a defrag

   Regular defragmentation helps to arrange data more efficiently thus making the hard drive work less to access the data. The quicker the moving hard drive works lesser is the load placed on the battery. The effect is minimal, but this efficiency goes hand in glove with hard drive maintenance.

2. Kill the resource gobblers

   End the background processes that are not vital. Monitor the resource usage through a ‘Ctrl-Alt-Del’ which brings up the Windows Task Manager (in Windows). If you’re not on the internet, it is safe to shut down the immediate non-essential programs running in the taskbar like the antivirus and the firewall. Weed out unnecessary programs running as start-ups by launching the System Configuration Utility from Run – Msconfig – Tab: Startup. Uncheck the programs which you don’t want to launch and reboot the computer once.

3. Pause the scheduled tasks

   It may be a defrag or a virus scan, but make sure it is scheduled for a time when you are near a power outlet. If not then nix them for the moment.

4. Unplug external devices

   USB devices are the biggest drainers of battery power. Unplug all external devices like an external mouse, PC cards, Wi-Fi, external speakers, Bluetooth and even an attached iPod.

5. Empty the CD/DVD Drives

   Even if you don’t intend to use it, don’t leave any CD/DVDs as leftovers in the drives. A spinning drive sucks battery power like a sponge.

6. Go local

   Desist using the DVD/external drives while running on batteries. Shift the content to the hard drive or run using (free) virtual drives like Pismo File Mount or even Microsoft’s Virtual CD ROM Control Panel.

7. Lower the lights

   The LCD screen of a laptop is another huge power sink. Calibrate the brightness to the lowest level you can tolerate using the Function key toggles or using the Display Settings applet in the Control Panel.

8. Kill the sounds

   Mute the speakers and try avoiding the use of multimedia software to maximize the battery life. Installed sound schemes also drain a battery perceptibly.

9. Rid the screensaver

   To maximize battery life by a little, switch off the screensaver.

10. Visit Power Options

    Get familiar with power management through the ‘Power Options’ applet in the Control Panel. Both XP and Vista come with advanced power management features which shut off components like the monitor and/or the hard drive after specified intervals. This again depends on the chosen ‘Power Schemes’ (for XP) in the same applet. For instance in XP, ‘Max Battery’ under Power Schemes can be selected for maximum battery optimization.

    

    Similar settings can be found under ‘Mobile PC’ in the Control Panel of Vista.

    

11. Turn off the looks

    Today’s OS’s like Windows Vista come with features like ‘Aero Glass’ which are resource guzzlers. One can turn it off and go for the ‘Classic’ appearance which consumes less power. In Vista, click on Desktop - Preferences - View Colour - Appearance - Classic Appearance and Windows Basic graphical interface. In XP it’s - Display Properties - Theme - Windows Classic.

    Linux and even Macintosh are better optimized for longer battery life.

12. Hibernate is better than Sleep

    In the Stand By mode (or sleep mode), the computer turns of the hard drive and the display but memory remains active while the CPU slows down. This draws on the battery. In contrast, hibernation mode is better because the computer saves the current state and shuts itself down completely thus saving power.

13. Get the most…work on the least

    Working on too many programs while on the battery is a sure fire power drainer. Keep use of graphic intensive applications to a minimum. Working on a spreadsheet consumes much less than playing your favourite game. To increase the life of the battery open just one or two programs concurrently.

14. Ram in more RAM

    Adequate RAM reduces the load on Virtual memory which by default resides on the hard drive. Though every extra bit of RAM uses up more power, it increases overall savings by short cutting access to the power hungry hard drive.

15. Keep it clean

    A laptop with blocked air vents will generate more heat thus reducing the life of the battery. Clean the air vents regularly to keep operating temperatures low. Allow for open space around the vents for air to circulate freely. Keep the area around the laptop clean to avoid entry of dust.

16. Temperature is a silent killer

    Undue heat kills off a battery slowly but surely. Avoid leaving the laptop under direct sunlight or inside a closed car.

17. Avoid the memory effect

    A problem more for the older Ni-MH batteries than for Li-Ion batteries on which most modern laptops run. Memory effect relates to the loss of battery charge when they are repeatedly recharged after being only partially discharged. It can be prevented by discharging the battery fully and then completely recharging it. Li-Ion batteries on the other hand have no problems with partial discharges and re-charges and complete discharge is never recommended for this type.

18. Update software and drivers

    This sounds a bit incongruous but then newer drivers and software are often designed to be more efficient (and hopefully less resource hungry).

19. Use the right adapter

    Ensure that the adapter you use to charge the laptop battery is an original one or one with the correct specifications. A mismatch in the wattage could cause an overload thus damaging the laptop and the battery.

20. Pack it up

    If you don’t plan to use the laptop on batteries for quite some time, ensure that the charge is nearly 40 percent - remove the batteries and store it in a cool place.

The Russians have already declared their love, and soon you'll be able to get your mitts on the Samsung N20 and see for yourself what all the fuss is about. It's now available for pre-order from UK retailer BT Shop, priced at £390.98 ($565) VAT included, with a white model due out in February and a black iteration in March. Both models sport a 12.1-inch WXGA display, Windowx XP Home Edition, 1.3GHz VIA Nano U225 CPU processor, 1GB RAM, 160GB HDD, Bluetooth, 3-in-1 card reader, 1.3 megapixel camera, and a 6 Cell battery -- no SSD option at the moment. Additionally, the shop is also showing a new NC10 equipped with HSDPA coming next month for £416.63 ($602) with VAT, which is £107 ($154) more than its non-3G equivalent. Not to worry, US readers, we're sure Sammy will be asking for your Benjamins soon enough.

USA computer supplier JR, have put the new 10″ Acer Aspire One on their website to pre-order for $349.99.

The model listed is the Acer Aspire One AOD150, and comes in white, black red and blue. Atom N270 1.6Ghz processor, 1GB of ram, 160GB hard drive and a 6-cell battery.

Apple has informed retail partners that iMac availability is going to be strained in the coming weeks which might mean the company is slowing down production of the current lineup ahead of announcing new models. The iMacs are anything but outdated, but the model line definitely isn’t cutting edge either. Intel’s low power, quad-core CPUs should replace the Core 2 Duo processor along with an NVIDIA GPU architecture that the company seems infatuated with lately. A Blu-ray drive would be nice too, but that likely will not happen due to Apple’s stance on physical media in general.

It’s hard to tell exactly when Apple will launch the new models - if there are new models to launch - now that Macworld isn’t the soapbox of years past. The company is sure to send out invites to a cleverly named special event where the new lineup will be announced. And yes, we will be there.

Lenovo's IdeaPad series of notebooks is quite different than the company's popular line up of ThinkPads. Ideapads are currently available in three series of products. The "U" series designates an ultraportable style with 11.1" or 13.3" widescreen displays and Intel Core 2 Duo processors. The "Y" series is for family entertainment and is available with up to a 17" screen and Intel 2.8GHz Core 2 duo processors. And finally, there is the super mobile "S" series netbook with its Intel Atom 1.6GHz processor and 10.2" display. Within the "U" and "Y" series there are a lot of models to choose from.
The Lenovo IdeaPad lines differ quite a bit from the Thinkpads we have reviewed in the past, such as the Lenovo Thinkpad W700 Mobile Workstation or the Lenovo ThinkPad X200 Ultraportable Notebook as you'll see in the pages ahead.
In this article, we'll be showcasing the Ideapad Y530 specifically, which offers a competitive array of features at a reasonable price point. With multimedia capabilities being a focus these days, we thought this model would more than cover the bases with its generous yet rather portable 15.4" display and Intel Core 2 Duo processor packed inside.

USA computer supplier JR, have put the new 10″ Acer Aspire One on their website to pre-order for $349.99.

The model listed is the Acer Aspire One AOD150, and comes in white, black red and blue. Atom N270 1.6Ghz processor, 1GB of ram, 160GB hard drive and a 6-cell battery

We already asked this question with "1.6GHz" in place of "1.86GHz," but seriously Sony, is there some sort of weird embargo on high-speed chips to America that we aren't aware of? While we Yanks have exactly one CPU option for the newly released VAIO P (that'd be the 1.3GHz Atom), those in Japan can order up the VGN-P90S with a 1.86GHz Atom Z540 processor. Of course, it's a ¥15,800 ($174) option over the baseline Z520, but an option nonetheless.

an Acer spokesperson told ZDNet UK that the 10-inch Aspire One “will be available with XP or Linux, and HDD or SSD”, and confirmed that the Linux distribution would be Linpus. However, buyers will not have these options in the initial release of the netbook, which will launch in mid-February and cost £299.

The SSD will have a capacity of 16GB. There is, as yet, no launch date or pricing for the Linux flavour of the machine.

Unlike the 8.9-inch Aspire One, the 10-inch version will not have a second SD card slot. In the earlier version, the second SD slot was there to hold a flash memory card that would be more-or-less permanently housed in the netbook to augment the 8GB or 16GB SSD. According to Acer’s spokesperson, the new version lacks that second slot “due to the increase in standard storage sizes

Before you get all riled up, remember, this is just a man in a suit speaking his mind. Got it? Good. On AMD's most recent earnings call, CEO Dirk Meyer casually confessed that "the distinction between what is a netbook and what is a laptop is going to go away," and he continued by saying that there would be "a continuum of price points and form factors." Now, we're not about to believe that the whole note book category will simply dry up and vanish in the near future -- much to the chagrin of Psion Teklogix, we assume -- but it's not like we haven't heard equally odd remarks from the CEOs of intel and rim. On second thought, shove a Core 2 Quad CPU, twin GPUs and 4GB of RAM into a Mini 10 chassis while nixing any and all heat issues, and you can call it whatever you damn well please.

If there was any question that the gap between ultraportables and netbooks is ever-shrinking, Dell's newest model answers in the affirmative. Though it's definitely a netbook (determined by its undersize keyboard and Intel Atom platform), the Dell Inspiron Mini 12 ($524 direct) is the only model of its kind with a 12-inch screen—a compelling size for multitasking. Dell, being the powerhouse that it is, was able to strong-arm Intel (the company that has the firmest grip on the netbook market) into letting it produce such an anomaly. More enticing is that its weight is approximately the same as that of comparable but smaller, 10-inch netbooks like the hp mini 2104 and the msi wind. The Mini 12 isn't without some drawbacks, though. An undersize keyboard and the slow-spinning hard drive are signs that it won't threaten the market for more expensive ultraportables, though the screen alone should rid it of some netbook stereotypes.