Life with the HP Mini-Note

I’m sitting on the patio at Cafe Flore in the Castro on this balmy spring evening (70 degrees at 11 PM) in San Francisco, blogging on my HP 2133 (Mini-Note) instead of my MacBook Air – oh the things I do for my dear readers :)

Now that I’ve played with my Mini-Note for a couple weeks, I’m really not quite as excited about it as I’d like to be. Here’s a summary of my experience so far…

Pros:
- Small
- Über sexy anodized aluminum
- Nice build quality
- Great keyboard
- Good screen resolution (almost too good?)
- Integrated Bluetooth
- Lots of memory and storage

Cons:
- Too heavy for its size (> 3 lbs)
- Bulky 6-cell battery and AC adapter
- Screen too dim at times (and no LED backlight?)
- Small trackpad (and horrible buttons)
- Fan is almost always running
- Overly sensitive accelerometer
- Poor video performance

I’m still running Windows XP Pro, now with the official drivers – I’ve also upgraded to XP SP3.

The screen resolution is good but possibly too good for my eyes. As a result, I’ve set the screen to 144 dpi (150% original size), which is a definite improvement.

I’ve downloaded the official SuSE Linux disk image, and I may be taking it for a spin very soon.

Overall, the Mini-Note is a nice machine with good features for the money, but I’m not sure it’s the right machine for me.

I think the upcoming Asus 901 (Eee), with its Intel Atom CPU, integrated Bluetooth, multitouch trackpad, and more manageable 1024×600 pixel screen resolution, may be a better choice for me.

Besides, I already know from my Asus 701 (Eee) that I’m comfortable with the smaller keyboard.

I’ll keep you posted!