I was thinking of getting for my husband for his birthday, something that just internet, maybe games. We have a wireless router, with very good speed, so I'd need basically a Wifi device. I've seen them months ago at Best buy -like $300.00 and again at COMP USA. Anythoughts? Or any good brands? He's not really a computer person, so a laptop would be a waste of weight and computer space. Of course your's truly would be the one maintaining it.

Are you talking about the netbook computers? (mini laptops)? If so, I can't say enough good things about the ACER netbooks! We bought one a year ago, and it has been flawless. I am somewhat of a computer guy, and recently upgraded it to Windows 7. Ours is set up just like a laptop, a very portable laptop.

Well I don't pretend to know a whole lot about netbooks, but I will second nc's commendation about Acer....it's a great quality brand and I've heard wonderful things about its tech support as well.

I used to work for a reseller-only computer distributer and Acer was always one of our best selling monitors....and came back with the least amount of complaints.

I love my netbook. I have an Assus eee that has a very long battery life. I love it as it fits into my purse and can go anywhere. I will say that the keyboard is small, but Mr. Scotty who has rather chubby fingers, can easily use it.

I have a Lenovo and a Dell (got them both free - score!) and I am using the Lenovo full time at work with Windows 7 on it. WORKS AWESOME! It is not a beast, but it gets the job done and it is extremely mobile. Ya gotta hook up a monitor to it if you are going to work on it for an extended period of time.

Check the keyboards out on the different models. The lenovo and Acer have beveled edge keys that seem too small, but the Dell I have the keys are full size without the bevel and easier to get to.

I carry both of them along with my camera and three lens in this bag Rockin Camera / Laptop bag and it doesn't even come close to being overstuffed and bulky.

Holy cow! Wow! Thanks. The reviews I've seen mentioned 2 of the ones above. The only complaints - monitors - very small (duh, of course, it is a tiny notebook) and possible speed issues. (oh and keys breaking)

So these things have hard drives? I just thought they were internet only? I just figured you couldn't do work on them or store stuff. Didn't know if I could get games on them too? Probably add a mouse if need be. These are WIFI accessible right?

Probably won't be heavily used, but if it is and it goes down, they're like $200-$400.00 and if they break down in a few years it's not as big a loss.

This thread almost sounds like a setup for today announcement from Apple that the iPad is here. Well, not actually "here" until March and April ...

http://www.apple.com/ipad/

Will this become the tool we grab when we travel? Is this the new devise for your family room? I am intrigued.

Netbooks are wonderful. Acer is rated highly as is Toshiba, but beware, they may not be very good for gaming. They are low end computers, meant only for accessing the internet and simple programs. Games generally require powerful video cards, which netbooks don't have. Also, the standard models don't come with CD/DVD drives, so you'd need to add it if you wanted one. With all that said, I like them, they are super light-weight and work just as well as a low-end laptop.

I have a mouse with mine. Microsoft Office and all other programs work just fine.

scotty: stupid question time: how do you get Office on a netbook? download it?
also, does anyone know if you can download ical (i have an i-mac for the main home computer) for a netbook? $499.00 for an ipad...i can wait.

I have an external cd/dvd drive. That wasn't a stupid question.

I have a desktop computer as well, on the wireless home network. You can wirelessly link the netbook to another computer that has a cd/dvd player, set the cd/dvd drive to "share", and then control it from the netbook. This is how I've installed all of my software onto our netbook. It works great. However, I did buy an external cd/dvd burner from Fry's this past weekend to put Windows 7 on the netbook. It cost $50 bucks. I figured installing a new operating system probably required a dedicated drive.

For normal computing and light gaming, the netbook is great. But, like itthom said, if you're going for heavy graphic games, it will probably struggle. This is evident by my acer's ability to play our HD home movies. It struggles a bit. However, to be fair, the much stronger desktop did too until I juiced up the graphics card.

If you get one, try to get one with Windows 7 already installed. Windows 7, in my personal opinion, is simply fantastic!

I use an Asus 1005HA-P. Lots of computer in a tiny package. Originally, I got it as a remote backup for photos while on trips, but has grown to be quite useful for lots of other computer chores. Has both a C and a D drive (partitioned). Boots very quickly. I added a memory upgrade to 2GB for another $28 from Amazon. 12 hours on each charge.

They now ship with WIN7 Home Starter and you can get up to a 320GB HD and 2GB already installed, depending on where you buy it. Hint: B&H.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: GESince1958,

I agree with 1958, do get that upgrade on ram and you have a fine mini!

I've got a Sony netbook to take with me when I travel. I only use it for writing & basic web surfing, though - no movies or games or anything. It's not really that powerful. The keyboard is smaller but didn't take any time to get used to it. Some netbook keyboards are not configured in the usual QWERTY way, but the Sony is; the keyboard is just more compressed. Again, it didn't really take me any time to get used to it.

But I do love it for what it is - light, cheap, & basic.

So I go out and get a nice little Asus and give it to my husband on Saturday. Works great. Had a little trouble with WIFI at first but had to a major reset with my box and provider but it ended up coordinating up just fine. My two three questions -for now-are: How do I conserve power?? I mean constantly turn off the computer or is just clsoing the lid good enough. I bought the basic one, only 4 hour capacity. So I plugged in and closed the lid and I believe it went in to standby. When out. When I came back, it seemed like the power was the same when I took it off of the cable and opened the lid and started to use it portably. So what the moral of the story here? Don't leave it in standby -ie over night? It is set up for Laptop power mode, meaning, stuff either turns off or standby within 20 or 30 minutes, but what does that really mean?
2nd: Should I get the extended wararnty? It's like $129.00 for 2 years. Worth it?
3rd - My husband is worried he won't master the little pad, (I've installed a game on there just to get him started-it's a slow go right now) so I suggested I'd get him a little mouse. Just a basic laptop mouse should be okay? Do they still have the side mouse pads they had back a few years back?

I don't know about the other two questions....but assuming that you're talking about an actual mouse pad to go under the mouse, if you get a laser mouse (MUCH easier to find, anyway) you won't need a mouse pad.

I have a Logitech mouse which is quite small. I don't have the model number, but it is the small one that uses a usb plug for power.

I have found that it saves power and if I have the Assus on, I usually remove the battery pack. However, I always keep it on and usually also plugged into the house power. We have had no problems at all.

I bought a $7 corded medium sized USB mouse that plugs into one of the three ports. Works much better than the touchpad, though you'll give up the zooming gestures. CTL + mouse scroll will do that anyway. To conserve power with mouse usage press the upper left oval button (above the ESC key) twice to disable the touchpad completely.

To conserve even more power, click on the EeePC tray utility and disable bluetooth and the camera, if you won't be using them.

I regularly turn off the LED backlighting when I step away using the Fn + F7 icon. It's the same power saving as hybernation as far as I have found. Nudging the mouse will turn the display back on.

To gain more screen room, auto-hide the taskbar. To get more still, emulate 1024 x 768 using the EeePC utility or Fn+ the icon on the F4 key to toggle between the display sizes.

Playing solitare will help mastering the touchpad. In fact, the reason solitare has always been included in Windows was to teach mouse usage to beginning computer users.

Warranty. I wouldn't. I look at a netbook the same as a cell phone. If it breaks its time for a new one. On that subject, I've already dropped my 1005 from 3 feet onto a marble floor. Other than a scuff, it survived just fine.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: GESince1958,

GREAT ADVICE GESINCE!! thank you!
I'll print out and use later.
I was going to steal a mouse from work and try it out for a short time. Yeah, I got the basic Asus and it really has a charge time of 2-3 hours, so I don't know what happened. I don't have anything installed yet, in fact will probably take stuff off. I only installed one game. I'll try to turn off stuff now. I put into standby about a 1/2 hour ago and I'm going to see the usage that draws. IE like if I left it over night. I always hard turning off and on a computer. I feel it wears the drive. But if a laptop is different....maybe that's what we'll be doing.