The partner has just left her job. I am now lucky enough to be supporting her full time - which can be pleasant. However, when she left her job, she left behind all of her technical apparatus as well. Obviously, her cell phone requires replacing - I’m still negotiating this purchase with her. I am trying to get her to just accept a second hand iphone 3GS. (I want the iphone 4), but it isn’t going well up to this point in time. I’ll keep you up to date.
Now, naturally there is her laptop. Among her complaints about her work laptop was its heaviness and bulk. Having to carry it across the city from meeting to meeting resulted in a miserable evening for me, paying attention to her moaning regarding the ache in her back and shoulders. During the worst days, it would mean a wasted half hour for me massaging the affected regions. So, when she requested a substitute, and knowing that she still travels a good deal, I suggested a Netbook. An Acer Aspire One. An incredibly attractive piece of kit in white. Let us run through the specs:
Acer Aspire One 531 Perfect for mobile computing
10.1" Widescreen (1024x600)
Intel® Atom™ N270 1.6GHz CPU
160GB Hard Drive
Microsoft Windows 7 Starter
1GB DDR2 Memory
Built in Wi-Fi
Integrated Acer Crystal Eye VGA Webcam
3 x USB 2.0, RJ45 10/100, Mic Input, Headphone Output
Built in Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g
Built in SD Card Reader
VGA Output
power source gives 7 hours mains free operation
12 Month Warranty
So, what’s good about it?
The power source lasts for a very long time:
This really is excellent. The power source life goes for days, which makes this a truly mobile device. So, on a practical sense, it is possible to slip it inside your handbag (or the wife can) and never worry about taking the power adaptor with you. A big plus point.
The physical size:
It’s small, portable and you are able to transport it everywhere. The wife puts it in her handbag and takes it out with her all the time. And she says she is very pleased with its weight being so light. So I do not have any further moaning.
Price:
When I bought it around 5 months ago, it had cost somewhere around £300. Which I thought was fairly realistic. I think you can now get a similar spec. machine for around £250.
What's bad about it?
It is underpowered:
Being quite honest, it is quite a stretch running Windows 7 on the netbook. It’s not just that it is not fast. It feels underpowered. You can not use a netbook in the same way as you use a laptop or PC. The main thing you will probably notice is that you have to become a lot more disciplined. You’re not going to get away with opening multiple applications with numerous different browser tabs. It’s much more linear. You are going to need to carry out tasks one at a time.
Now, while the missus does not really find this much of a problem, there's one thing that really annoys her. It just doesn’t appear to have enough resources for running Skype effectively. The camera in the netbook is fairly average anyway, but even when you have closed all the other applications, it sometimes does not have enough resources to run Skype. And then you will find ones self tinkering with the task manager to close down system processes to get it to run. This can be very irritating, for the reason that, invariably I can't be bothered. I might be watching Coach Trip or something equally riveting. I have stop watching my program to boot up my laptop and play with it to allow her onto Skype so she is able to chat with her parents and her sister, who live in Australia. A right annoyance.
The screen:
For me, it is just a bit too small. On facebook for example, you will require to scroll up and down to discover the following and former image tabs. Just a little irritating. It is the vertical size of the screen that is mainly annoying. Titles and headings seem to be just below the visible screen so you're constantly using the trackpad or keypad to read them. This actually makes surfing the web harder than on the smart phone. The iphone for instance has more vertical space so you scroll up and down less frequently.
The keyboard
As a final point, the keyboard. For myself, it is just a little too small. The wife has more petite fingers than I do. And she also said that it took a few weeks to get used to it, but now she has no problem. Maybe, I could get used to it after a couple of weeks too. But my fingers are like shovels and I kept finding that I hit 2 keys as opposed to one.
The lack of a DVD drive:
'Obviously, it has not got a DVD drive - it is a netbook!' I explained to my missus. However the missus says that she misses it because she likes to watch a DVD when she’s on the train, or at least possess the option to watch a DVD. For me this is not a significant drawback. It is easy to obtain the film in a compressed format and put it onto a flash disk. But, she is not as excited about technology as I am. You simply can't please some people.
And so the conclusion:
Well, for what it is, you can't really have a lot of complaints. It is small and light, and the power source lasts a long time. My other half seems pleased with it overall and that's who I purchased it for after all. And if it had been perfect, she wouldn't have anything to complain about, so we probably wouldn't talk at all.... Personally, I wouldn’t buy a netbook again. I’d probably buy a small laptop. Something with a minimum of a 12" screen and appropriate CPU. It is my opinion the netbook is too slow and does not multi task very well. The screen and keyboard are merely a little too small. For surfing the net on the go, It looks like the iphone is perfectly adequate. Although I wouldn’t do serious surfing using the iphone, maybe just to look up things on IMDB for example, I probably would not want to do any real surfing on the netbook either.
So what is the answer:
Employ a huge man to lug around the full size laptop for you or, failing that, surely, it has got to be a significant sized laptop which includes a minimum 12 inch screen along with a smartphone. Covers all bases.
Author Resource:
This doesn't cover everything that may be involved, but with a bit of luck I have given you an insight in to what exactly is involved. There are numerous ebooks and such bits and pieces that you can find around the world wide web. I always go to a company called computer repair london . They don't just repair computer systems, additionally provide IT support as well and they are always helpfull if you get stuck on anything technical.
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