Hewlett Packard seems to have updated their HP Mini note to the new model HP Mini 1000.
Whilst the HP Mininote seemed to get rave reviews for an excellent typing keyboard and build quality, concerns were raised over the performance of the VIA processor that was apparently inferior to the Atom.
In the web advertisement that leapt up in front of me earlier it appears that this product has been revised with the new model using the Intel Atom 1.6 like it’s obvious competitor the MSI Wind. This new model also has the option of a 10″ screen in addition to the existing 8.9″ so with interest I was wondering if this machine would muscle out the MSI Wind with similar specs to match the formidable typing ability.
Unfortunately I can see a chink in the armour of this new machine even before reading further. Having access only to a smaller SSD drive or a 4200RPM hard drive it becomes obvious that the machine must be using the 1.8″ ipod-style drive as opposed to the 2.5″ standard laptop drive used in the Wind.
Obviously there is probably a battery performance reasoning behind using the smaller drive plus it would make heat and internal packaging much easier for the designers it does greatly limit opportunities for I/O performance and storage upgrading. Currently it’s not hard to put a 7200rpm drive in a Wind or even a 500GB 5400rpm drive if storage space is more important than speed.
I will be attempting to get my hands on a review Mini 1000 so I can do a side by side comparison vs the Wind and I will compare it to other similar models such as the Apple Macbook Air and Dell mini 9.
This is an increasingly full and competitive corner of the computer market. How far off are we from reaching full market saturation, or will people keep purchasing ever new models because of the low entry price?
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