Netbook for the wife
- Thread starter Adcadet
- Start date
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
My girlfriend is looking to get a netbook and I'm helping her. I'm looking for something with an 11 or 12 inch screen, 6-cell battery, ability to upgrade to 2GB RAM, a decent CPU, and a GPU capable of playing HD Video.
From what I've read the GMA500 has hardware acceleration for most things, but it's unsupported in XP, which is what most of these come with. Does anyone know differently? If I have 1080p content, is there any chance on earth one of these will be able to play it?
I'm considering the following models:
Acer Aspire One AO751h-1545 - XP Home, z520, 1GB, 1366 x 768, GMA 500
Acer Aspire One AO751h-1893 - Vista Home, z520, 2GB, 1366 x 768, GMA 500
Lenovo Ideapad S12 - XP Home, n270, 1GB, 1280 x 800, GMA 950 (I can get this for $441 with a discount)
ASUS Eee PC 1101HA - XP Home, z520, 1GB, 1366 x 768, GMA 500
Are there any other valid competitors that I'm missing here?
From what I've read the GMA500 has hardware acceleration for most things, but it's unsupported in XP, which is what most of these come with. Does anyone know differently? If I have 1080p content, is there any chance on earth one of these will be able to play it?
I'm considering the following models:
Acer Aspire One AO751h-1545 - XP Home, z520, 1GB, 1366 x 768, GMA 500
Acer Aspire One AO751h-1893 - Vista Home, z520, 2GB, 1366 x 768, GMA 500
Lenovo Ideapad S12 - XP Home, n270, 1GB, 1280 x 800, GMA 950 (I can get this for $441 with a discount)
ASUS Eee PC 1101HA - XP Home, z520, 1GB, 1366 x 768, GMA 500
Are there any other valid competitors that I'm missing here?
Last edited:
time
Storage? I am Storage!
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
The specs for what's allowed in a netbook are mostly set by Microsoft and its desire to not supply Windows XP to anything with actually decent hardware. So Netbooks have Atom CPUs instead of Celerons, support for at most 2GB RAM and use older graphics chipsets.
$350 will buy a 1.6GHz Atom + 1GB RAM + a 160GB hard disk and a 10 or 12" screen, or it'll buy a 2GHz dual core Celeron + 3GB RAM + a 15" screen + a DVD burner, all in a package that will run for about 1/3 as long on a battery.
Stereodude
Not really a
Review for the Acer 11.6" 'mini-notebook' here.
Sorry guys, I think you both need to take a cold shower.
That thing is a known pile of crap, and not the model I'm waiting for. That has a slow as heck Atom with a gimped chipset made for MIDs. The 11.6" Acer I'm interested in has a much more powerful Core 2 Solo coupled with Intel's GMA4500MHD chipset.I take it you didn't actually click my link.
Stereodude
Not really a
I'd wait for the CULV based 11.6 machines. They have very low power consumption Core 2 solo (5.5W) or Core 2 Duo (10W) processors with the much better GMA4500MHD chipset. They sacrifice a little battery life for a much more powerful and usable machine.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
How much do you think these machines will cost?
Stereodude
Not really a
The MSRP on the Acer in the US is $499. Dell has an 11.6" Inspiron Z series coming soon, but no pricing is known.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
Do you have any guess on when they will be on the market?
Stereodude
Not really a
You can pre-order the Acer now. You can get any of the three colors for $405 from J&R after 10% bing.com cashback. My wild guess is that I would expect it by the end of the month.
To bad it comes with Vista Premium Home. Though I guess that makes it eligible for a free Windows 7 upgrade.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
Stereodude
Not really a
I sure do!
I ordered up the black one. :cooler:
Now I get to wait for the transaction to show up in my Bing Cashback Account...
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
Great, thanks. Are there any reviews published of this model yet?
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
Also, do you know if the screen is glossy or more of a matte? I hate glossy screens.
Stereodude
Not really a
Nope, no reviews yet.
My best guess is that it's glossy. Acer calls it a, "Acer® CineCrystal 11.6" WXGA (1366 x 768) high-brightness (200-nit) TFT display with 16:9 aspect ratio and LED backlight".
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
Stereodude
Not really a
Let me know how that works out for you. :rotfl:Maybe I can take some sandpaper to it and turn it from glossy to matte
Stereodude
Not really a
Where's that? :bglaugh:Oh, now I see where SD is getting info and posting.
Stereodude
Not really a
I post all over. I always use the same username, so it's not too hard to track me down. :beye:
Stereodude
Not really a
Hah, I don't have any dupes here or anywhere else.
time
Storage? I am Storage!
Hey, I clicked on your link, but perhaps you didn't?
For me at least, it doesn't link to any specific laptop, and in fact I can't spot the one you're talking about anywhere on those tabs (maybe I was too quick, but whatever).Anyway, the review link was intended as a cautionary tale, particularly for timwhit. I knew it wasn't the one you were after, but I think it had the same or very similar graphics, for instance. When you said "Video acceleration - check", my skepticism flared up. Can you point us to some independent verification of its ability to successfully play HD?
While I'm at it, can someone please explain why you would need 1080HD on a 768 line screen? Or is this for use as an HTPC? I'm not a Home Theatre nut, so I really don't get it ...
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
If I have video that is encoded in 1080p that I want to play on a screen that's smaller than that I'll still need additional processing power. Correct me if I'm wrong. I would rather not have to re-encode 1080p video to 720p to be able to play it on the netbook.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
I preordered the Acer AS1410 last night. If it's not good, I'll just blame Stereodude.
Stereodude
Not really a
If you have acer.com blocked with NoScript or Javascript blocked it won't take you to a specific machine.Hey, I clicked on your link, but perhaps you didn't?
Well, it has the Intel GMA4500MHD which according to the nice table at Wikipedia has the following features:
MPEG-2: VLD + iDCT + MC
VC-1: VLD + iMDCT + MC + LDF
AVC: VLD + iMDCT + MC + LDF
The GMA950 used in most netbooks have these features:
MPEG-2: MC
VC-1: None
AVC: None
The GMA500 used in some netbooks have these features:
MPEG-2: VLD + iDCT + MC
VC-1: VLD + iMDCT + MC + LDF
AVC: VLD + iMDCT + MC + LDF
Definitions:
VLD: Variable-length decoding
iDCT: inverse discrete cosine transform
iMDCT: inverse modified discrete cosine transform
MC: Motion compensation
LDF: In-loop deblocking filter
However, the GMA500 was intended to drive low resolution panels found in MID and other handheld devices and reported the acceleration doesn't work under Windows XP. Whereas the GMA4500MHD is derived from a desktop chipset that actually works. ;-)
Because you don't want to have to recode / transcode things you download so you can play them on your PC.
Stereodude
Not really a
Don't blame me! I got talked into from the people on the forums at NotebookReview.com
ddrueding
Fixture
Feel free to blame me, I'm used to it.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
I've got to blame somebody.
Stereodude
Not really a
I don't think you'll need to blame anyone. You can follow along here.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
One thing I've found in my life as a tech is that everything with an Acer badge (I don't know who makes their stuff) on it has a REALLY delicate screen.
Also, Acer's support site is really bad.
I'm sure that thing is pretty nice other than that.
Also, Acer's support site is really bad.
I'm sure that thing is pretty nice other than that.
Stereodude
Not really a
I'm thinking to cancel my Acer Aspire 1410 pre-order and waiting for the Dual Core version of the 1410/1810. It will have a SU4100 (1.3gHz x 2 w/ 2MB of L2) instead of the SU3500 (1.4gHz x 1 w/ 3MB of L2). The SU3500 doesn't have hyper-threading and I swore off single core systems that lack HT when I got my 3.06gHz P4 w/ HT and became hooked on the responsiveness it offered.
I have purchased four Acer noetbooks over the years and none had/have display problems. The last one was about 2 1/2 years ago, so maybe they are getting worse. The appeal of the 1410, or 1810 etc., is the low cost for the size. For occasional consumer use I think they should be sufficient, but probably not in everyday business use.
Stereodude
Not really a
Well, I canceled my order. I'm going to wait and see what happens in the 11.6" CULV market space before jumping in.
ddrueding
Fixture
I'll be ordering a Lenovo IdeaPad S12 for a customer in the next week or so, along with a Vertex SSD and more RAM. I'll get a mini-review up when I can.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Relative to the number of notebooks that I fix, and relative to the number of Acer notebooks I have ever worked on, Acer notebooks are by far the most likely to have an issue that requires replacing either the display or the inverter.
I've done 11 in the last two years. The reason that's a big deal is that I don't support any businesses that use Acer notebooks; every one of those has been a system that some random person has brought to me (including my own brother) rather that one poorly made model or other.
The ODM for Acer is also used by Gateway and Toshiba, but Acer seems to be the problem child; I think Acer's lower pricing makes its notebooks more appealing to less responsible people.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
Is this a jab at me?