Mini-Laptop Myths

Minilaptop computers accounted for about 10 percent of laptop sales, recently. They led the charge as sales of laptop computers overtook sales of desktop computers. They are definitely small useful devices. The big lie they tell you is that they are laptop computers and can replace the computer you are using now.

Intel is driving mini laptop or net book sales with their Intel Atom processors. Intel doesn't call them computers -- they call them Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs). They are very good for what they are designed for, e-mail, surfing the internet and having a long battery life. You can even write a short piece on them about as fast as you can on a standard laptop or desktop computer, if you're a poor typist like me.

Netbooks are presented as

inexpensive which the entry level models are

more portable which true netbooks are

with longer battery life which most have

fast compared to what is the question

able to run Microsoft Office which depends on what you consider running something

I have seen all these things said on the internet. Almost all of them must be taken with a grain of salt. If by more portable, you mean simply easier to carry around, you're right. You have all the same problems connecting to the internet with a netbook as you do with any other computer. You need a hotspot or mobile broadband.

I saw a posting on the internet where the writer said his Atom N270 powered netbook was the fastest computer he had used. I'm using a seven year old desktop. Everything about this computer, except transferring data from the hard drive, is faster than anything in that net book. The seek time for the hard drive will be faster in the netbook, if it has a solid state drive (SSD).

SSDs are a selling point for mini laptops. Unless you get one 16 GB or larger, you will be hard pressed to run Microsoft Office at all. Office and Windows XP take up more than 4GB on my hard drive. The screen size and resolution on most of the netbooks sold up to now, make it a problem to see the entire desktop in a usable way. Word, PowerPoint, and Outlook are usable. Don't try to open more than one at a time though-- its deadly slow. Forget trying to use Excel. I imagine Access is impossible too.

Aesthetically, I like Linux. Most netbookss with small SSDs come with some flavor of Linux operating system. Most of the things we take for granted these things on a computer, not in the same manner or at all under Linux. For example, I-Tunes does not have a version for Linux.

A laptop computer is a device that uses mini-fills a useful function for those who already own a computer and need a wearable device for their particular. No one who uses a computer than surf the Internet, accessible e-mail and short notes should be underconsider a mini laptop as their primary computer.

My Links : Sony VAIO VPC-CW23FX/P