Customer Reviews

HP Mini 311-1025NR 11.6-Inch Black Netbook - Up to 6.25 Hours of Battery Life (Windows 7 Home Premium)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this netbook off of hp.com, not off Amazon, just to be clear. I'm reviewing this model as it contains windows 7, not XP. My specs are as follows:

* Black Swirl
* Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit
* Intel(R) Atom(TM) Processor N280 (1.66GHz, 512KB L2, 667Mhz FSB)
* 2GB DDR3 System Memory (1 Dimm)
* 250GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive
* NVIDIA ION with a 5-in-1 Digital Media slot (For the N280 processor)
* 11.6" diagonal HD LED BrightView Widescreen Display (1366 x 768)
* HP Mini Webcam
* Wireless-G Card
* HP Color Matching Keyboard
* 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
* External LightScribe Super Multi 8X DVD+/-RW w/Double Layer
* Microsoft(R) Works 9.0
* HP Home & Home Office Store in-box envelope

Price: $579.98
Tax: $52.52
Shipping: $29.00

GRAND TOTAL: $661.50

1st impressions....quite impressed. Size is very convenient, I find the keyboard comfortable. The trackpad is way too sensitive and I had to disable tap functions just to use it.

I think these 11.6" screens are really the sweet spot for screen resolution, I find it very comfortable for viewing and light work. I don't like dim screens in battery mode, so my battery life is about 4 hours.

It's definitely not as fast as my Core 2 duo, but hey...its a netbook. I'm using a logitech nano wireless mouse which works great other than it prevents the computer from re-booting or starting if left plugged in during re-start. I still have to iron that out.

The external DVD drive works well, although it adds weight to the package. If going to the office, I will probably leave it at home.

This is my first time using windows 7 and its definitely much more friendly than vista, with limited pop ups. I haven't tried out any HD quality movies yet, but regular AVI's look pretty smooth.

I'm definitely looking forward to the new version of flash, and I intend to try out Warcraft III on here one of these days. Still a work in progress. All in all, very fun to use, uber convenient, light, excellent screen resolution for a netbook, and a good deal of power for its class. I'll see if I can post product pics of my own netbook.

I have the HP Mini 311 netbook, custom configured with 3GB memory, Windows 7 and HP's new 80GB solid state disk. Overall, it's a great combination of power and small size, and I never feel like I'm surrendering much versus using my high-powered desktop or conventional laptop.

In terms of construction quality, I give it four stars. It seems fairly solid and doesn't get too hot on the outside (important in a small PC like this). The keyboard is comfortable to use, reminding me somewhat of the feel of the new Apple wireless keyboard. It has adequate USB connectors, although a few are placed rather closer together than I like (a big memory stick blocks one of the ports). It also has slots for a variety of memory cards - I'm a photographer, and I like that I don't need to bring an external reader with me now. I'm not thrilled with the pattern HP etches into the plastic case, but I guess that's a pretty small complaint.

With the 1.66 processor, 3 GB of memory and the SSD, it's fast to boot...maybe about 30 seconds with Windows 7, and faster when resuming from "hibernate". I especially like the SSD. Not only is it fast, it's also cool, nearly half a pound lighter than a conventional disk, quiet and vibration free - you don't know when the disk is being accessed unless you glance at the disk lights. 80GB is more than adequate for me on a small system like this.

I get about about six hours battery life typically. I tend to use a Bluetooth mouse, which seems to drain the battery faster than I expected. It also seems to take a while to recharge, compared to other systems I have. Still, with the small size of the unit, I can easily carry a pair of batteries and work all day without plugging in - very handy.

The wireless networking works well and seems fast. I've used it on open, WEP and WPA2 networks with good results. I don't have the built-in broadband adapter - instead, I use the very good Verizon MiFi card which looks like a standard 802.11g access point to the netbook. I prefer this so I can have my iPod and other devices online all at once, versus just the computer.

The display is small for my aging eyes, but usable. Color, contrast and brightness are good, and while I would prefer to be sitting at a larger screen, it's not as bad as I thought it might have been.

The HDMI port works well, syncing easily with my TV. One feature I wish I could have would be an Apple-style mini displayport output in addition to the HDMI. I have a 27" iMac that provides for MDP input, but so far I can't find a way to connect HDMI to it. Still, this is a fairly minor issue (and frankly more of Apple's problem than HP's).

Overall, a great choice in a small system you can actually do productive work on.

I purchased the netbook for my wife, but would not mind getting one for myself, too. This version of the HP 311 has enough RAM (2GB) and hard disk capacity (250GB), and it has Windows 7 Home Premium.

It is small and neat, the keyboard is quite ok, and the display/resolution is surprisingly good. Setup was automatic and simple, and soon the netbook was connected to our (hidden) WiFi. I connected it to my 46" Samsung TV (LN46A650A) to check out the HDMI connector and it looked very good. We haven't had a chance to test the battery life, so can not comment on that.

BTW, the price shown on Amazon was over $600, but I was charged for just over $500. Not cheap, but this is probably the best you can get in this class.

I purchased the HP Mini 311 from (...). My build included:

* Black Swirl
* Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit
* Intel(R) Atom(TM) Processor N280 (1.66GHz, 512KB L2, 667 Mhz FSB) with NVIDIA ION graphics
* 3GB DDR3 System Memory (1 Dimm)
* 160GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
* 11.6" diagonal HD LED BrightView Widescreen Display (1366 x 768)
* HP Mini Webcam
* Wireless-G Card with Bluetooth
* HP Color Matching Keyboard
* 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery

All in all it's a good netbook. It plays a number of current / modern video games at great resolution and speed. The OS is very responsive, the keyboard feels solid. The track pad is a little touchy and the slightest brush will cause mouse movement, but that can be adjusted. The expansion ports are easy to access and the battery life on the 6 cell is good (though not noteworthy). The Mini 311 can stream HD quality video (MP4, AVI, MKV) pretty well and the HDMI out is handy enough to make this my new media center PC.

I have to say, I am slightly disappointed in one major area: FLASH VIDEO SUCKS!!! Yes, I've already downloaded the Flash 10.1 release candidate. It improved the speed of flash videos a little bit but I still get choppiness on sub-HD quality flash videos from youtube. I watch a LOT of flash videos on Youtube and Hulu. The thing that drives me crazy the most is that my previous netbook, the Acer Aspire One (which sells for LESS THAN HALF of what I paid for the mini 300) ran flash video flawlessly. Go figure....

All in all a decent netbook, but since it doesn't perform in one of my major focus areas I'm left feeling like I'm missing out. If you watch a lot of flash stuff, this is NOT the netbook for you. Go with something that has a Broadcomm HD decoder instead of NVIDIA Ion.

As I was changing roles, I was turning over my company laptop. I thought about buying a full size notebook, but decided to give this netbook a try.

I custom ordered mine thru HP. It seems most of the HP 311's sold in the stores had the Atom N270. Well the Atom N280 is only a $25 upgrade option. Not much difference probably in performance, but a little helps.

I also ordered the netbook with xp and only 1gb of ram, and decided to add the 2gb ram upgrade myself.

My order in all, came in under $500.

For browsing, and most applications I say this netbook works just fine. For portable machines I usually prefer the "eraser point" mouse control over the touchpad. And this netbook only confirms that feeling. If you tend to rest your palms as you type, you'll find yourself accidentally tapping the touchpad and moving your cursor around. Palms up, wrists straight, they keyboard works pretty well. The mouse buttons are a bit stiff and have a loud click sound when in use. Eventually I forget about it, but it may be a minor annoyance for some.

The construction feels pretty solid. The 11.3 size is probably the sweetspot. It is small enough that it is very portable and lightweight, yet easier to manage and use than the 10" netbooks.

As a gamer, I'm a bit disappointed in the 3-D performance. That is more a reflection of the ATOM processor. It does however handle most of the streaming video and ripped DVD performance that other netbooks can not handle. That is a nice point for me. This machine seems to be the perfect travel rig.

Battery life is pretty good, as I can get about 6 hours of run time. The LCD screen is a little glossy, but colors are nice and is an improvement from the notebooks I've used in the past.

Ultimately, there are more capable gaming machines but they are not nearly as portable. I give the product overall a 4 star rating. It will not replace a more powerful notebook, but it fills most duties. I'm sure somewhere down the line there will be a netbook with more video capabilities but it is hard to find a machine with the perfect size, power and battery life.

I've considered trading to a more powerful machine, but the size is what makes me want to keep this netbook. It's just powerful enough to satisfy most of my needs.

I got this HP netbook (directly from HP online) after trying out the Samsung and Acer Aspire One netbooks. The slightly larger screen and almost full-sized keyboard really makes a difference. The 10.1" screens on the Samsung and Acer were a little small and made viewing a little difficult. The almost full-sized keyboard is wonderful and makes typing so easy. As I've read in other reviews, the cursor does tend to "jump" around the page from time to time, but I think it may be due to me inadvertently touching the mouse pad when typing (this happens on my 16" Dell laptop too). Windows 7 Home Premium is great - I love the new features and interface that sort of resembles Apple. And it is definitely faster than XP or Vista. Most laptops either come with XP or Windows 7 Starter which, I understand, doesn't have all the new features.

For a little more than what you'd pay for other netbooks, you get more RAM and more hard disk space. This was one of the things that sold me on this netbook. The Nvidia Ion graphics card makes watching my online t.v. shows a breeze (I did download that latest version of Adobe Flash Player). This was another reason I settled on this fabulous netbook! Since purchasing my HP netbook, I hardly use my regular laptop.

I loaded one program I use regularly - Adobe Elements 7. And so far it works without a hitch. I also activated the Office Home and Student 2007 and that's been working fine too. Needless to say, browsing the Internet (Gmail, Facebook, even YouTube) has been working great.

I'm going to Japan in the spring and can't wait to bring this with me! I am very glad I purchased this netbook!

We bought this to replace an early-model netbook and are amazed at the improvements newer models have applied. We carefully compared several models, including other stock models from HP sold by Amazon, and determined this one was the best bang for the buck.

My wife and I are authors and primarily use this for word processing, but also use it for in-bed media (Hulu/Netflix) and gaming (old school games with minimal requirements). The keyboard size was an initial concern for us, because we never fully adapted to the really small keys of our previous netbook, but upon receiving the unit, we had no problems adapting to the keys in any way.

The screen is very bright by default and we have not had the glare or underlit problems we have had on other screens. We have successfully used the HDMI connector on several different TVs without any issues. The speakers can get decent volume, but the quality isn't too great. Most of our media runs just fine. Flash Player 10.1 is supposed to increase the speed of video playback of certain types, but we didn't experience a significant gain, but it could be user error/browser choice/etc. Netflix runs just fine and Hulu runs perfectly in its normal size, but full screen it chugs.

I'm not thrilled with the power adapter plugging into the left side of the machine (prefer it in the back), but with the long battery life with minimal performance degradation, I just leave it out, even if a plug is nearby. My wife, however, is just fine with its placement, mostly the aesthetics of having the sleek back.

Speaking of the aesthetics, the shell casing is very attractive and does not collect as many smudges/fingerprints as we would have thought. The unit is very light with enough stability that we don't worry about crushing the screen against the keys if we squeeze too hard. We're able to tote it around the house and on quick trips without feeling any burden physically or time-wise.

Some of these pros are relevant to netbooks as a whole, but this particular build with a REAL version of Windows 7, extra RAM, and upgraded hard drive make it a winner. The processor is the lesser of the two major Atoms, but I doubt anybody would be able to realistically discern a difference even in a side-by-side test. We love it!

My son has a gaming computer with 16 GB of RAM,TB HDD, quad core 2.66 processor, 1 GB video card, etc. He doesn't want to drag it around for connectivity so asked me to get him a netbook due to being cheaper than a laptop. He has been completely satisfied with this machine and based on his gaming computer's capabilities that seems like high praise indeed.

Bought this a couple of weeks ago, and I must say I'm very happy I did. Overall performance is fully acceptable (which is better than any other netbook I've tried), and the gaming performance is amazing for what you pay.

This item gets great battery life, and runs reasonably well. Unlike most netbooks, the keys aren't little tiny squares so it's easier to type on. Physically, this thing seems fairly well built. My only complaint is the design of the mousepad, which is really easy to accidentally touch while typing, and it can mess you up if you aren't careful. I still have yet to find a way to make it less sensitive. Other than that, this netbook is pretty good.