Prime Notebook Computer Review » Uncategorized

About PdNet Blackberry

tito — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 07:17:34 +0000

Pdanet blackberry has been popular now. The reason why people like pdanet

Blackberry are :

They can use blackberry for browsing internet without bring netbook and modem
It is more practice
It is a life style especially at downtown. Most of people in big city usually use pdanet blackberry. Although they no need but
They have it because it like a duty to have it.
We no need modem to connect internet, because pdanet is a modem for blackberry, special modem, good modem.
We just only download pdanet to our blackberry and we can enjoy with pdanet blackberry
Having good acces and browsing

In the past we have difficulty when we want to connect with internet. We must bring netbook or notebook and modem. Two tools make us be little busy. Its way is not practical if we are going to far away. But now, with high technology there are new system that can be used by all people. They are pdanet blackberry. Pdanet blackberry can be used by all.

How is the way to use pdanet blackberry ??

We need to install the pdanet to blackberry. We can find that application easily, so we can install it soon. We can look for on the internet about how to install pdanet blackberry. On the internet we can find many ways and many articles about pdanet blackberry.

If we don’t know about the knowledge of pdanet blackberry we can ask to the internet or blackberry shop. We also can ask to the people who have pdanet blackberry about the advantages of having pdanet blackberry. We just enjoy with our pdanet blackberry because we know what for we have it.

So, if we have much money to buy it? Why we don’t buy pdanet blackberry soon?

Let’s try!!

HP EliteBook 2540p

tito — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 10:15:52 +0000

Tailor designed for well-heeled business users, HP’s EliteBook line enjoys it’s elegant but rugged designs and top-of-the-line components. The actual 2540p ($1,629 as designed), a new 12-inch addition to the collection, life as much as this status, delivering fast Core i7 overall performance and lengthy stamina thanks to the Ultra-Low Voltage Processor as well as big six-cell battery. And in contrast to with Lenovo’s Thinkpad X201s, you get a built-in optical generate. The actual EliteBook 2540p is not ideal, but it’s one of the best business ultraportables available.

Style
The HP EliteBook 2540p is actually billed as an ultraportable business notebook, consequently corporations — and many buyers — anticipate a superior quality associated with materials, superb functions as well as an innovative design. HP’s other EliteBook notebooks fulfill or even exceed those anticipation, however how about the littlest member of the EliteBook loved ones? The main physique of the EliteBook 2540p is covered within the brand new “HP DuraCase” and “HP DuraFinish,” which is essentially a tough plastic material and strong the mineral magnesium metal inner shell – similar its forerunner — and strengthened by a brushed metal external spend that actually resists scratching through steel wool. The base of internet connected computers seems very strong as well as would definitely endure protrusions and bruises that other laptop computers may not. There’s absolutely no bend in the solid keyboard set. The bottom of the notebook can also be likewise rigorous as well as strong along with just a tiny amount of flex in the region instantly underneath the notebook’s eye drive.

The external spend from the display casing is actually metal, but the inner screen bezel is actually plastic. Unlike the actual 15-inch EliteBook 8540p all of us previously examined, the display cover flexes somewhat whenever significant stress is applied to the biggest market of the cover. However it is nevertheless much stronger than we usually see upon other top quality 12-inch company notebooks. Whenever HP states how the EliteBook 2540p was designed “to fulfill the actual army requirements (MIL-STD 810F) with regard to high/low temperatures and dirt,” these people mean the actual notebook should withstand many years of make use of as well as abuse. With all this particular rugged durability included in the design, you have to anticipate a trade-off, which in this case is actually weight. Some 12-inch business class notebooks suggestion the actual scale from three lbs or even less. The EliteBook 2540p has a starting weight of 3.38 pounds with a 6-cell electric battery, but the added durability more than comprises for a small pounds improve. Lastly, just as that the gray as well as african american outside and sleek style fits an expert atmosphere, so do the actual internals. The EliteBook 2540p uses 3 simple plastic covers about the bottom of the notebook (every locked in place with Phillips head screws) so the hard drive, cellular cards as well as Ram tend to be readily available with regard to quick updates. There’s a 4th small expansion slot include on the bottom of the notebook, that is for the dedicated Bluetooth greeting card. The remainder of the actual notebook interior is actually protected through Torx screws that should deter employees through playing around within their work-issued notebooks.

Keyboard and Touchpad
The secrets about the 2540p tend to be coated within HP’s DuraKey coating, which makes them scratch-resistant as well as allows for a nice, gritty finish. We were able to kind quickly, matching the all-time greatest score of eighty-eight words per minute on the Ten Thumbs Typing Check. However, we found the layout to be a little flat, whereas the X201s’ keys possess a chunkier feel that appeals in order to contact typists.

Whilst company users will value using a directing stick, we are not really fans of its concave form. We choose the somewhat convex TrackPoint upon Lenovo’s Thinkpad line. Nonetheless, all of us could move the actual cursor over the desktop along with fairly subtle actions, and we never experienced as though all of us didn’t have total control. The corresponding buttons, that have the rubbery complete, tend to be easy—but not really as well easy—to press. Actually, we quickly came to prefer while using pointing stick to the touchpad, especially because the touchpad measures a little two.7 by 1.four inches.

Features
The actual EliteBook 2540p offers an excellent port selection, however depending on the design configuration, your choices can alter. For example the design with no built-in eye drive includes a two.5-inch hard drive and an extra Hardware port.

Durability and Protection
In addition to the the mineral magnesium metal casing, scratch-resistant areas, as well as spill-resistant keyboard set, the 2540p had been examined in accordance with army specifications (MIL-STD 810G), which includes a drop check through several feet, amongst others tests. HP states the actual notebook can also endure up to 300 pounds associated with stress. Protection features include the finger marks reader, and also a 3d accelerometer that parks the hard disk head any time a fall. The actual 2540p additionally comes with a host associated with HP-branded protection tools, including HP Extra Key, which will help you get back to the computer in the event that you have forgotten your password, and also the Disk as well as File Sanitizer utilities.

Overall performance and Benchmarks
Program overall performance was excellent as well as over what you may expect to observe when compared with thin and gentle notebooks available on the market right now. The actual HP EliteBook 2540p as well as Lenovo Thinkpad X201 tend to be the smallest ‘ninja-like’ notebooks available today. All of us used the Thinkpad X201s for comparison since it gets the same Core i7-640LM processor chip. The actual quicker X201 would be equivalent to the base design 2540p, that has the quicker Core i5-540m processor chip and a 7200RPM 2.5-inch hard disk. Each versions master offering desktop-level performance in every method except 3-D performance. The actual Apple company GMA Hd images is preferable to previous generations but nonetheless lags at the rear of a dedicated images card.

The Core i7-640LM can certainly decode 720P or even 1080P video, play Hd Expensive as well as encoded films in i-tunes. The only system overall performance complaint that we found was the actual rather sluggish 1.8-inch hard disk in designs that include a good optical drive. The model i was sent for evaluate utilized a New laptop drive that peaked just below 50MB/s. Users looking for higher amounts of overall performance should probably opt for the non-optical drive set up that lets you use a standard 2.5-inch drive or configure the actual program having a SSD.

Increase Notebook Battery Life

anti — Wed, 05 May 2010 06:50:52 +0000

Anyone with a notebook or tablet PC knows that at the end of the day, battery life is still the key mobility factor when using a notebook on the road. Some users might turn to extended batteries, while others already have one and are looking to squeeze out handful of minutes before they run out of juice somewhere. An area that many notebook users overlook is the software that is running in the background on many notebooks that acts as a leech, sucking away at your power and making your notebook work harder than it should. With a few minutes worth of simple changes, you can easily crank out some more time from your notebook following our guide.Most of this guide will target notebook running Windows Vista, but many of the same tweaks hold true for Windows XP.

Keep your processor working at a walking pace
Most notebooks offer power regulation software, and almost all have the ability to change profiles using the Vista power manager. Click on that battery icon on the bottom of your screen, and make sure your notebook is set to Balanced or Power Saver. High Performance is great if you are encoding video or playing games, but it makes your processor work harder than it has to, using more power and throwing out more heat.

Tune your radio dial
Keep an eye on your wireless devices, and disable them if they are not in use. If you have your Bluetooth or WiFi device running at all times, you are using chopping off useful battery life that could have been used doing something else.
Change your viewing habits
The biggest power draw on your notebook, especially if it is a large one, is the screen backlight. While it may look big, beautiful, and shiny, you are really hurting your battery performance with the backlight at a high level. Start by putting the backlight to the lowest setting, and increase it slowly until you find the lowest setting your find bearable. Remember that this will vary depending on the room you are in, meaning you might have it set brighter in an office setting, but much lower at home at night.

Don’t be tempted by movies
If at all possible, stay away from using DVD’s or CD’s in your laptop while using battery power. The drive creates a huge power draw on the system while running. On top of the drive, your processor is also working hard to decode the audio and video, sometimes knocking off close to 30% of your overall battery life. If you must watch movies, try to stick with digital content that you download or stream online. iTunes and Hulu.com are excellent alternatives to the evil discs.

Kill unwanted background activities
Right out of the box, almost all notebooks have the following processes running in the background, which eat up precious CPU cycles and trash your hard drive.
Automatic Updates: While keeping your system up to date is a good thing, this should be optional to have done at your own leisure.To disable this activity, go into your control panel and click on ‘Windows Update”. In the next window click on “change settings” on the left side, and make your way to the next screen. Now change your selection to “Never check for updates”, and click OK. Please note that this may make your system vulnerable if you don’t manually check for updates on a regular basis.

Windows Indexing: Windows disk indexing helps to reduce search times when trying to find a particular file on your hard drive, but will wreak havoc on your battery life in the process. To disable indexing, open “My Computer” and right click on your hard drive. On the first screen that shows up, uncheck “Index this drive for faster searching”. You will need to proceed through a few prompts, as well as clicking “ignore all” if prompted. This may take quite a bit of time depending on how full your drive is.

Anti-Virus Software: AV software is a huge performance hog, but also a life saver depending on what type of sites your visit or what sorts of files you encounter. I am relatively savvy enough to steer clear of harmful items in my daily activities, and have yet to need any AV software for years. Not only can they be a huge resource hog and bog your machine down, they sap away a lot of battery life if they start scanning in the background. Be warned that removing AV software from your system can be risky, and should be done at your own discretion. If need more than one hand to count the number of virus problems you have had in the past, don’t follow this suggestion.
The next step of this guide requires you to use the Task Scheduler, and disable a few services that your computer queues up at various times while you are using your computer. This can be accessed by going into your program list, then Accessories, then System Tools, finally clicking Task Scheduler.

In the list of Active Tasks, the following items cause the most unwanted activity in the background. To disable any of these items, double click the selection which will take you to another screen listing more details on that activity. Now all you need to do is right click the item, and click disable to stop it from bothering you in the future.

Consolidator: Runs in the background for the Customer Improvement Program.

Scheduled Defrag: Defragments your hard drive, and will bog down your system in the process.

Clean up after yourself
Having additional programs working in the background when no longer in use can reduce system performance and decrease battery life. If you are done using a certain application, exit out of it properly instead of just minimizing it to the background. Also note that some programs drop down into your taskbar when you click the X at the top right of the screen. These can usually be killed by right clicking them in the taskbar, and clicking exit.

Iomega StorCenter ix2 Review

anti — Sun, 02 May 2010 07:06:06 +0000

The Iomega StorCenter ix2 is the latest compact network storage solution designed for consumers who need a stand-alone storage drive that can be shared by multiple computers over an internet or network connection. This compact file sharing solution allows friends, family, and coworkers to access the same files even if they work on different computers. Notebook users can also benefit by keeping important files on a networked drive at home, so a stolen laptop doesn’t result in stolen data. Let’s take a closer look.

Build and Design
The Iomega StorCenter ix2 is remarkably compact for a network attached storage (NAS) enclosure that contains two 3.5″ desktop hard drives:
• Width: 3.15 in (80mm)
• Length: 7.875 in (200mm)
• Height: 4.92 in (124.97mm)
• Weight: 4.85 lbs (2.2 kg)

The enclosure is all black and has a very simple design with the Iomega logo on both sides. The top, bottom and sides are made of solid metal and the front and rear of the dual hard drive enclosure have vents to keep the drives from overheating. The design isn’t particularly attractive, but we’re talking about a NAS here. Who cares how it looks? You’re going to connect this thing to your network and then stick it behind your router or in your closet.

The back of the enclosure has a dual USB slot, power button, DC plug and a LAN plug along with the cooling fan vent. There is also a security lock slot on the enclosure to deter theft is located on the bottom along with the S/N, Mac address, series code, etc. The construction of the Iomega StorCenter ix2 does make it difficult for accessing the drives inside the enclosure; in fact you would need to remove multiple screws and disassemble the internal framework of the enclosure in order to access the drives, making it less than ideal for do-it-yourself repairs.

Features
One of the main features of the Iomega StorCenter ix2 is that it’s remarkably simple to setup and use. I honestly lack the words to describe just how easy it is to setup this device. The software engineers at Iomega deserve a great deal of praise for creating one of the easiest software installation and setup applications we’ve seen for a NAS enclosure in our office. Simply insert the included software CD, type your desired user name and security password, click a couple of on-screen buttons to confirm the installation and you’re ready to start using your new StorCenter ix2! Network attached storage doesn’t get any easier than this.

The StorCenter ix2′s main configurations are all accessed through the supplied software or via a web browser by simply typing in the IP address. Through web access, users can view all the shared content, add users/groups, and manage RAID settings, network settings, disk backup, etc. from anywhere on either a Mac or PC computer.
The Iomega StorCenter ix2 also has USB connectivity for setting up a print server or adding information directly from other devices, but like most consumer NAS enclosures the built-in USB ports only support USB 2.0 Full Speed (12Mbs).
For those who might be concerned about security, the included encryption from RSA helps secure your data inside the StorCenter ix2 and protect the NAS from malicious attacks during installs and product updates.
Another feature worth mentioning is the low power consumption on the Iomega StorCenter ix2 for users who want access 24/7; the average consumption of this Energy Star qualified system is 12-15W while idle.

Performance and Benchmarks
The Iomega StorCenter ix2 drives are each 500GB separately but the RAID 1 mirroring gives the user a combined total space of a single 500GB drive. The Iomega StorCenter ix2 is rated at a theoretical maximum of 1000Mb (megabits) transfer rate on a 1Gb network which equates to 125MB (megabytes) per second. Atto is one of the standard synthetic benchmarks we use to test the performance of a storage drive. Below you can see the average read and write times for the StorCenter ix2 over a standard 100Mb network connection. In short, the main thing these benchmarks indicate is that the Iomega StorCenter ix2 has more than enough horsepower to push a typical 100Mb network connection (12.5MB) to its limit. Using a 1Gb network switch will allow you to gain even better data transfer speeds. As it stands, this NAS provides transfer speeds similar to a cheap generic USB flash drive connected directly to your computer’s USB port.

Of course, if you’re using a NAS you didn’t buy it for the fastest transfer rates (an eSATA external enclosure is better in terms of raw speed). People buy NAS enclosures so that they can store huge amounts of data in one secure location and access it from any computer with an internet connection. Notebook users should be particularly interested in this because it allows you to store huge multimedia libraries on a secure drive at home and access those files via the internet without having to store those files on your notebook’s hard drive … and without having to pay monthly subscription fees for online storage.

Heat and Noise
The Iomega StorCenter ix2 runs a bit louder than some of the other NAS enclosures we’ve tested. The cooling fan is extremely silent, but both the storage drives inside the enclosure produce a substantial amount of noise when reading and writing files. The twin Seagate 7200.11 hard drives inside the enclosure aren’t known for being particularly loud, so we suspect the noisy “clicks” are the result of the all-metal enclosure and lack of cushioning or sound dampening. Temperatures inside the enclosure remained above 110 Fahrenheit which is still a little hot but isn’t as bad as many other NAS enclosures we’ve tested. Bottom line, long-term stability of the storage drives probably won’t be something you need to worry about.

Conclusion
After everything is said and done, the Iomega StorCenter ix2 is an excellent network storage solution for consumers and small businesses. The amazingly simple software installation and setup combined with the amount of storage and reasonable transfer speeds make the Iomega StorCenter ix2 one of the best stand-alone network storage solutions we’ve tested.

Like almost any networked attached storage enclosure, the Iomega StorCenter ix2 doesn’t offer the same speed as an eSATA drive connected directly to your computer. Likewise, the ix2 suffers from some degree of security vulnerability unless the network is well secured. In other words, if you just plug this drive into your unsecured wireless router at home and don’t use a password on the StorCenter ix2 itself then just about anyone in range of your router could have access to your files. Nevertheless, these minor issues are common to all NAS enclosures.

Overall, the Iomega StorCenter ix2 offers a remarkably easy-to-use stand-alone network drive and gives you lower power consumption than a full desktop running as a networked drive. Road warriors and netbook owners who are either worried about the security of their laptop hard drive or have limited storage space on their netbook might want to consider the purchase of this NAS for their home networks.

Pros:
• Easiest setup software we’ve ever used
• Fast transfer rates over 1Gb Ethernet, acceptable over 100Mb Ethernet
• USB connectivity for more storage
• Solid build quality
• Reasonably compact

Cons:
• Hard drives are a little noisy
• Difficult to access drives inside enclosure if repair is needed

Pricing and Availability
The Iomega StorCenter ix2 ($299.99 for 1TB, $479.99 for 2TB) is available for purchase on the Iomega website or at many retail and online stores.

Flip The Monitor Display

anti — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 06:58:48 +0000

You’re sitting at your desk at work with very little to do and time crawling by. So you decide to have a little fun with your coworkers and flip their monitor displays.

1. Pick an unsuspecting victim. Make sure this person’s desktop computer is already turned on and logged in, unless you know his login.

2. Make sure the coast is clear and then sit at the person’s desk. Quickly press and hold the “Ctrl” and “Alt” keys together.

3. Depending on which way you want the screen to flip, press one of the arrow keys while still holding the “Ctrl” and “Alt” keys. Up = right side up, Right = 90 degrees, Down = 180 degrees and Left = 270 degrees.

4. Once you have the screen flipped, let go of the keys and quickly make your getaway. Now all you have to do is sit back and wait for the fun to begin. Be prepared for some freaking out if the person thinks the computer has contracted a virus.

5. Step in and reveal the joke before the situation goes too far. After all, if you do this at work you don’t want PC Support coming to the rescue over a practical joke since that could mean trouble for you.

Tips & Warnings

1. To fix the screen, follow Step 3 until the screen is returned to normal.
2. This normally only works with Windows XP operating system, but you can try it with Vista.
3. If you try this at work, make sure you will not get in trouble for pulling a prank.

Quick Guide to Efficient Notebook Battery Usage

tito — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 03:10:35 +0000

Even with improving technologies and longer lasting batteries, it is still a pain in the butt having your laptop with a dead battery, in the middle of a 8 hour flight. Laptops tend to lose their charm quickly when you’re constantly looking for the nearest power outlet to charge up. I have seen on how to squeeze every second of juice from your lappy’s battery. How do you keep your battery going for as long as possible? Here are some easy ways to do so.

Defrag regularly – The faster your hard drive does its work – less demand you are going to put on the hard drive and your battery. Make your hard drive as efficient as possible by defragging it regularly. (but not while it’s on battery of course!) Mac OSX is better built to handle fragmentation so it may not be very applicable for Apple systems.

Dim your screen – Most laptops come with the ability to dim your laptop screen. Some even come with ways to modify CPU and cooling performance. Cut them down to the lowest level you can tolerate to squeeze out some extra battery juice.

Cut down on programs running in the background. Itunes, Desktop Search, etc. All these add to the CPU load and cut down battery life. Shut down everything that isn’t crucial when you’re on battery.

Cut down external devices – USB devices (including your mouse) & WiFi drain down your laptop battery. Remove or shut them down when not in use. It goes without saying that charging other devices (like your iPod) with your laptop when on battery is a surefire way of quickly wiping out the charge on your laptop battery.

Add more RAM – This will allow you to process more with the memory your laptop has, rather than relying on virtual memory. Virtual memory results in hard drive use, and is much less power efficient. Note that adding more RAM will consume more energy, so this is most applicable if you do need to run memory intensive programs which actually require heavy usage of virtual memory.

Run off a hard drive rather than CD/DVD – As power consuming as hard drives are, CD and DVD drives are worse. Even having one in the drive can be power consuming. They spin, taking power, even when they?re not actively being used. Wherever possible, try to run on virtual drives using programs like Alcohol 120% rather than optical ones.

Keep the battery contacts clean: Clean your battery’s metal contacts every couple of months with a cloth moistened with rubbing alcohol. This keeps the transfer of power from your battery more efficient.

Take care of your battery – Exercise the Battery. Do not leave a charged battery dormant for long periods of time. Once charged, you should at least use the battery at least once every two to three weeks. Also, do not let a Li-On battery completely discharge. (Discharing is only for older batteries with memory effects)

Hibernate not standby – Although placing a laptop in standby mode saves some power and you can instantly resume where you left off, it doesn’t save anywhere as much power as the hibernate function does. Hibernating a PC will actually save your PC’s state as it is, and completely shut itself down.

Keep operating temperature down – Your laptop operates more efficiently when it’s cooler. Clean out your air vents with a cloth or keyboard cleaner, or refer to some extra tips by LapTopMag.com.

Set up and optimize your power options – Go to ‘Power Options’ in your windows control panel and set it up so that power usage is optimized (Select the ‘max battery’ for maximum effect).

Don’t multitask – Do one thing at a time when you’re on battery. Rather than working on a spreadsheet, letting your email client run in the background and listening to your latest set of MP3’s, set your mind to one thing only. If you don’t you’ll only drain out your batteries before anything gets completed!

Go easy on the PC demands – The more you demand from your PC. Passive activities like email and word processing consume much less power than gaming or playing a DVD. If you’ve got a single battery charge – pick your priorities wisely.

Get yourself a more efficient laptop – Laptops are getting more and more efficient in nature to the point where some manufacturers are talking about all day long batteries. Picking up a newer more efficient laptop to replace an aging one is usually a quick fix.

Prevent the Memory Effect – If you’re using a very old laptop, you’ll want to prevent the ‘memory effect’ – Keep the battery healthy by fully charging and then fully discharging it at least once every two to three weeks. Exceptions to the rule are Li-Ion batteries (which most laptops have) which do not suffer from the memory effect.

Turn off Wi-Fi and BlueTooth – Most laptops have shortcut keys to instantly disable wireless networking. Turn off Auto-save features in Microsoft Office and other applications, turn offscheduled tasks.

Looking for the longest battery life laptop ? Actually, many factors affect the amount of time that a laptop battery can deliver power before it must be recharged.H ow to extend laptop battery life? Here are some more tips to improve your notebook’s battery life:

If you do not use your laptop for extended periods of time (a week or more), remove the battery pack from the laptop.

Do not expose the battery to high heat or freezing temperatures. Do not leave your battery in your car in the summer. Hot batteries discharge very quickly, and cold ones can’t create as much power.

Make sure to plug your laptop charger adapter into a UPS and not directly into a power outlet or surge protector.

If you have a nickel-metal hydride battery, completely drain and recharge the battery once a month to maximize its capacity to hold a charge.

Fully charge new battery packs before use. New pack needs to be fully charged and discharged (cycled) a few times before it can condition to full capacity.

For laptops that work as Desktop Replacement, the battery should be re-installed every 3-4 weeks and allowed to fully discharge.

Hp Mini 210 : Improved Keyboard

tito — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 02:46:32 +0000

If you asked us in the past if we like HP’s netbooks, we’d tell you, “It depends.” We love the business-focused Mini 5102, for example, because of its great keyboard, sturdy design, and over 10 hours of endurance with its 6-cell battery. But the company’s consumer 10-inch netbooks haven’t measured up to the competition from ASUS, Acer, and Toshiba. HP has put its best foot forward with the Mini 210 ($384 as configured), which takes Intel’s Atom N450 processor and wraps it in a sleek new design with an improved keyboard. This configuration also pairs a high-def screen with Broadcom’s Crystal HD Enhanced Media Accelerator for HD playback. However, this netbook doesn’t last as long on a charge as other Pine Trail netbooks. The bottom also runs warm, and its touchpad requires a bit of a learning curve. Should you make this Mini yours?

Design
The HP Mini 210 is a netbook with better than usual styling and design. It feels almost futuristic with its textured lid and base, edge-to-edge glossy screen and concealed touchpad buttons. Furthermore it has no annoyingly visible and extremly bright status lights – it’s almost stealth-like in this regard. The power, hard drive and battery indicator lights can be found on the sides. The Wi-Fi, caps lock, mute and ‘touchpad disabled’ lights are visible on the top of the system, but only when these features are enabled. Even the panel on the base of the HP Mini 210 netbook seems futuristic: you don’t have to use any tools to remove it in order to get to the single memory slot and 2.5in hard drive bay. Simply remove the battery, press the release buttons and pop off the cover with your fingernails. Admittedly it can be a little difficult to remove and at times it feels like the plastic clips that hold the panel in place might snap, but if you’re slow and careful they won’t. The bottom panel of the HP Mini 210 doesn’t have any vents and it is one single piece of plastic. To keep cool, the internal components rely on an air intake vent on the right side and an exhaust vent on the left through which the small system fan pushes out the accumulated warm air. When you use it on your lap – even after a short amount of time – the vents can get blocked and it gets noticeably warm around the hard drive and CPU areas. This becomes uncomfortable after a short while and it’s not a good thing for a notebook that’s designed to be highly mobile and used on a lap.

Features
The exterior of the Mini 210 is so nice that it’s rather disappointing to discover that underneath the exterior lies a rather plain netbook recipe. Windows 7 Starter edition sits on top of an Intel Atom N450 1.66GHz, 1GB of RAM and an Intel GMA 3150 graphics solution. The display screen is a 10.1-inch 1024×600 LCD panel, same as pretty much every other vendor. Wireless is supported, but it’s only 802.11b/g. Officially HP sells five variants on the Mini 210. There’s the entry-level AU$449 1015TU model, and then five models at an AU$599 price point; the 1016TU, 1017TU, 1018TU and 1020TU. The difference between the top tier models is only in the colour of the lid (Black, White, Red and Blue respectively), but the difference between the sole AU$449 model and the AU$599 models lies in storage, power and integrated Bluetooth. The AU$449 model comes with a 160GB hard drive, no Bluetooth and a three-cell battery. The AU$599 models bump that up to a 250GB hard drive, integrated Bluetooth and a six-cell battery. We tested with the 1020TU, which is the model with the blue casing. Aside from Windows 7 Starter, HP also offers up a quick launch operating system based on Splashtop Linux OS. Being HP, it’s subtly re-branded as “HP QuickWeb” and offers a near instantaneous boot for simple web browsing, music playback, photo browsing, Skype and chat applications. If you don’t like Splashtop it’s easily disabled from within either QuickWeb or Windows 7.

Keyboard and Touchpad
Here’s an instance where we’re glad a notebook maker borrowed design elements from the business side of the house. Like the Mini 5102, the island-style keys of the Mini 210 have a rubber-like matte coating that offered a pleasant tactile feel. Due to its nearly edge-to-edge footprint, the keyboard felt nice and roomy, and we were able to reach our normal typing speed and error rate right away. We appreciated the snappy return, proper placement, and sizing of the keys, even along the edges. As with other HP systems, the Function keys along the top row are reversed so that users have one-touch access to multimedia controls, volume, brightness, the wireless toggle, and more. Generally speaking, we’re not fans of touchpads with integrated touch buttons, but the Mini 210 is one of the better implementations we’ve used on a netbook. The 3.1 x 1.8-inch clickpad fills up as much vertical space as possible, jutting right up against the keyboard above it. We encountered a little more resistance than we’d like when navigating the desktop, but the integrated buttons worked well, offering solid feedback. Nevertheless, we continue to prefer the discrete touchpad and buttons on the Toshiba mini NB305. Multitouch gestures were smooth, though there aren’t many beyond two-finger scroll and pinch-to-zoom. When typing, we didn’t find ourselves accidentally brushing the touchpad (even though it’s so close to the keys), but users prone to this issue can adjust the sensitivity in the mouse properties or double tap the dot on the upper left corner to disable the touchpad altogether.

Display
The screen has a native resolution of 1024×600 and it’s bright enough to use outdoors and indoors with the lights on. It has a glossy plastic pane that extends from edge to edge. This will reflect light, which will possibly infuriate you while you try to view photos and videos. It has a webcam at the top as well as a microphone and two concealed Wi-Fi antennea. The netbook’s lid is strong and the hinges hold it perfectly in place.

Ports & Webcam
The Mini 210 has a typical spread of ports for a netbook: VGA, USB and headphone/mic combo ports on the left; Ethernet, 5-in-1 memory card reader, Kensington lock slot, and the remaining two USB ports on the right. We like that the right USB ports sit closer to the back of the system, keeping connected devices out of our way. HP bundled the Mini 210 with ArcSoft’s WebCam Companion 3, which not only allows users to record video and take pictures, but also to edit and upload them to YouTube or Snapfish directly from the program. The webcam delivered acceptable image quality when chatting over Skype, though the output was somewhat grainy. A quick adjustment of the hue setting resulted in truer colors, and upping the contrast produced richer images. Unfortunately, each time we moved our Skype companion we noticed blur, regardless of how fast or slow we were. It wasn’t distracting, but it was

Performance
The Mini 210′s physical build ensures a pleasant computing experience for the most part. Like most thinner netbooks, heat build-up can be an issue. Likewise, in common with other six-cell models, the bulky battery juts out of the back at an angle that can be a little uncomfortable on the lap, but these are minor quibbles. The keyboard response is excellent with well spaced keys and a responsive clickable touch-pad. Atom processors and PCMark05 haven’t always behaved well together in previous tests, and this was exactly the case with the Mini 210 which crashed the test suite repeatedly. Based on simple application testing and the fact that the Mini 210′s innards are quite standard, you can expect a slow performance out of the 210. 3DMark06 did complete, but its score of 155 puts it solidly in the Solitaire-only camp. We ran the Mini 210 through our standard battery testing regime. This involves switching screen brightness to maximum, disabling all power-saving features entirely and setting a looping XviD file to run to the point of battery exhaustion. It’s a test that’s designed to be brutal and give a “worst-case” battery life scenario. In actual usage — especially with a dimmed screen, less intensive processing and judicious use of Wi-Fi only when needed — you can expect a lot more than we get with this test, which only gives us a base line. The Mini 210′s base line was highly impressive, however, lasting four hours and 45 minutes before conking out. HP has historically placed something of a premium on its netbook designs, so the fact that the RRP of the Mini 210 is in line with the current netbook norm is highly pleasing. Combine that with a great keyboard, instant-on Linux capability and very good battery life and you’ve got an excellent netbook.