Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Worth every penny, March 14, 2009
I'm a 24/7 on-call sysadmin, so I needed a suitably light machine I could chuck into my bag and bike around town with, and ended up deciding on the HP Mini 1000-series after seriously considering several others (including its businessy cousin, the 2140)
I was in a hurry to order it so I bought the 1120NR option instead of a build-to-order. If I had BTOed, I'd probably have 2GB of RAM, 802.11n wifi, and an internal Bluetooth adapter. I'm actually quite glad I didn't go overboard, because I spent $330 on a computer and got every penny's worth. It's so cheap, I decided to forego the warranty as well.
I am quite impressed by MIE. I'm a Linux power user, and probably my first task was figuring out how to get a shell open (and I now have gnome-terminal bound to Alt-F3), but this is a polished system, and I have to give HP some credit. The only non-trivial tasks I had to perform which required some manual intervention were setting up tethering to my 3G phone and setting up a VPN connection to the office, both of which work flawlessly with just an hour's fiddling. (I'm using a Cirago BTA6210 USB adapter for BT; it was instant plug-and-play in MIE and required no configuration). I may eventually get tired of the inability to customize the home screen and panels, and install stock Ubuntu, but this machine is ready, with a few hours' work, for everything I need it to do. Well done, HP.
Best features: the display (may be low resolution but is very bright and sharp), and the keyboard. I had almost no trouble adjusting to it and can type at my usual speeds with ease.
The most disappointing features of the machine are ones that aren't likely to bug me, with the exception of the mouse button placement, a problem which is obviated by the fact that the trackpad supports tap for middle and right-click, so who cares? The silly wasted USB slot for the "Mini Drive" inspires a big "whatever". As does the need for a VGA dongle... the likelihood that I'll ever need to hook up an external monitor to this thing is almost nil. If you want premium features, spend the extra $$$ (and it adds up, quick) for a 2140, especially when the HD screen comes out. But this thing works, it's cheap, and it's pretty. If you need a machine for mostly internet purposes (isn't that the whole point of a "netbook"), this is perfect, and it's got one of the prettiest and most headache-free Linux distros I've ever worked with.
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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Great product with great flaws, March 8, 2009
The keyboard is wonderful and lives up to the hype. The MI interface is pretty solid, though I have the feeling that if I were able to disable the Elisa media interface (which I would love to do, as it is worthless, crappy software), it would be better yet. The BIG problem is that this little netbook which will likely be bought by other students like myself freezes completely every time it tries to connect to a WPA2 Enterprise secured wireless network. Which is what just about every university uses. Atop of that, HP's support is entirely unhelpful, and it is entirely unclear whether they ever plan on addressing this issue. It's also been pointed out that the webcam window in the display bezel was erroneously manufactured with reflective film over it like the HP logo opposite it on the lower portion of the bezel, making the webcam nigh useless. The fan runs pretty consistently and the system can feel sluggish at times. Nevertheless, it's very sturdy, the keyboard is wonderful and I'd be incredibly happy with it if I could connect to the internet without a system freeze. It's ridiculous to have to seek out coffee shops or lug around an ethernet cable half the size and weight of the computer because I can't connect to my university's wireless, and disconcerting that HP doesn't seem to recognize this problem.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Nice hardware, Blasé software, March 9, 2009
I bought this mainly for the hardware configuration. I only played with the MIE OS briefly before wiping it out and installing XP. This may not be the way to go for many, but the pricing of a comparable model with XP can get pretty pricey. Other than having to dig around and find the drivers needed for everything, it was a smooth installation.
I've owned this for about 2 weeks and so far battery life has been decent with quick shutdown/boot speeds. At times, running an Antivirus and several applications can cause slight pauses, but nothing that shouldn't be expected with an Atom processor. These weren't meant to be power horses so don't expect to run photoshop on this
If you're looking for a simple "NET"book to surf on, this is a good deal.
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