Comment by iamelgringo | Hacker News Reader

Comment by iamelgringo | Hacker News Reader

So, the apple version of my netbook costs $1k. Wow. Apple makes gorgeous, intuitive products, but... Wow.

I bought an Asus Aspire 1. I put in 2GB of RAM($40), Installed a OCZ SSD ($160), and bought a 9 cell battery for it($55), and put Windows 7 Ultimate on it (TRIM support for SSD's and free with a BizSpark subscription).

I now have a machine a bit thicker than an iPad that runs a full version of Windows 7 Ultimate, has a 14 hour battery life, and an extra battery with 10 hours on it. It's "Instant On" because I never turn it off, it just hibernates, and the SSD I'm using is crazy fast and sips battery juice through a cocktail straw. All for a bit more than $500.

Oh, did I mention that I can replace the memory, battery and Hard Drive without voiding my warranty?

I understand the appeal of a MacBook Air. I do. But the appeal of beautiful design, a glowing logo rules telling me to keep my hands off my own hardware... It's just not work the extra $500 for me.

Since when did your Atom become the same thing as a C2D ULV? They aren't even in the same class. Nearly every subnotebook (yeah, the original name) using Intel ULVs runs over 800 dollars. The difference in processors (seriously, a C2D ULV will absolutely smoke an Atom) and graphics card (320M will leave whatever crap Intel packages with the Atoms now standing still) makes up a large part of the price difference.

Why the price of Windows was not in calculation? Did you also get aluminum unibody, full-size backlit keyboard, camera, multitouch trackpad? By the way, I am curious is Windows wake from sleep as instant as it is on OS X?

When you go back to using non Apple hardware the keyboard and touchpads are generally very bad. Bearing in mind the time spent using the keyboard and mouse having a good one makes the difference.

Even more important, the screens. Apples have historically had very good screens.

I look back at one of my older Windows laptops, which had exquisite res (1680x1050) and maybe cost me $1600. When I compare it to any of my Apple devices (even the low end ones), the screen is so horrible that I don't even know how I was able to work on it day in, day out.

It's fast enough. But it can be flaky/unreliable on no-name hardware.

But the apple version is not your netbook. I've owned Acer Aspire's and they are cheap and shoddy plastic units that start falling apart after only a few months of use. And the keyboard is all wrong. I picked up a 13" Macbook when I started wearing through the keys on Acer, and I don't think that was wasted money.

Small != Netbook

I don't think many people consider the Thinkpad X series to be netbooks either.

I really wish windows had a really good trackpad with similar gestures to a macbook. I think that's one of the main features that's holding me off from buying windows netbooks. It really annoys me when I'm using the trackpad. It's hard to scroll around and navigate around in windows (without a mouse).

Don't get me wrong - I use windows all the time. It's just the lack of an easy to use trackpad irritates me a bit..

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