Looking to buy a Netbook

[ThePlague]

I'm looking into buying a netbook for College. I was thinking of getting this, (http://www.walmart.com/ip/eMachines-eMachines-eM350-2074/14660223) but I know there are way better things out there for around the same price. All i'm looking for is something Windows (hopefully 7), with a big hard drive, and with a camera on it. My max price is around 300.

I want a netbook, because right now I have a huge laptop that's kinda old and really heavy to carry around, including my books.

e: This (http://www.frys.com/product/6143549?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG) seems better than the other one, because of W7. But it only has a 0.3 mp camera :\

[Amit]

Acer Netbooks are nice and they seem more well built than most Acer laptops. The thing is that I have W7 on my Acer netbook and it is considerably slower than XP. A netbook is decent for college, but use XP on it.

[ThePlague]

So go with the eMachine then? Or get the Acer and put XP on it?

[SnaFuBAR]

don't EVER get an emachine.
fucking ever.
EVER.

[InnerGoat]

Just buy whatever they're all slow as fuck. Seriously they're all the same until you get over 400 or so dollars, then you get AMD's stuff which is much much faster

[Amit]

Yeah. I generally don't recommend a netbook for anything except running torrents, mobile presentations, and watching videos. Other than, there aren't many practical uses for a netbook.

[ThePlague]

I have a desktop computer that does everything fast, all i'm looking for is something that does basic stuff, and beats others for the amount of price. I'm not an on campus student so after classes I just come home. It'll only be used for typing notes, browsing the internet, doing classwork, and other shit that I happen to do in class. I'm not trying to use it as any form of gaming machine.

[InnerGoat]

Would you survive with a mere 4 hours (max) of battery? If so get the eMachines. :shrug:

[ThePlague]

Is there any specific brand to be looking for? I used to have a IBM (Lenovo now), laptop, and that thing went through hell fine. I also got 1800 back from the Pellgrant I earned, so maybe $400 max limit.

[SnaFuBAR]

just get an acer and slap on a 6 or 9 cell battery.

[ThePlague]

This (http://www.walmart.com/ip/Asus-1001P-PU17-WT/14235389) looks like it'd be amazing, especially with (what it says) of 11 hours of battery life.

[Amit]

I have a desktop computer that does everything fast, all i'm looking for is something that does basic stuff, and beats others for the amount of price. I'm not an on campus student so after classes I just come home. It'll only be used for typing notes, browsing the internet, doing classwork, and other shit that I happen to do in class. I'm not trying to use it as any form of gaming machine.

That's the same shit as me except my school makes us pay for the Lenevo T510 i7 edition. Same purposes as you, but they add a bunch of extra software on it that is used for various courses. It has an nVidia Quaddro NVS 3100 so it's good enough to run most games at high settings. I haven't tried Crysis, but it tears through any other game at 1600x900.


This (http://www.walmart.com/ip/Asus-1001P-PU17-WT/14235389) looks like it'd be amazing, especially with (what it says) of 11 hours of battery life.

hahaha, wait till it only lasts 4.5 hours. No 6-cell will last 11 hours unless in standby the whole time.

[ThePlague]

Well I think i'm going to get it anyway. At max right now i'll need it charged for 4 hours. Plus it looks sexy as hell :p

[InnerGoat]

hahaha, wait till it only lasts 4.5 hours. No 6-cell will last 11 hours unless in standby the whole time.
Gets more like 8 hours of web surfing lol

[Amit]

Mostly an exaggeration on my part. Still, 8 Hours is pushing it if the brightness is set at half.

[Mr Buckshot]

Asus EEE ftw. Also, if you want to take notes, save up $99 and buy the Hantech Tablo attachment, it basically simulates a tablet PC (up to a maximum screen size of 15.4"). You clip on a sensor to the top and use a special pen to literally write on the screen like a tablet. This is only good on netbooks where the screen can be pushed back sufficiently far enough for your hand to rest on it, otherwise it'll be uncomfortable. A netbook + Tablo combo is cheaper than most brand new tablet PCs, and is just as good.

[ThePlague]

Bumpdate:

Ended up buying this (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220681). I did next day shipping, plus rush processing, for the lulz.

Thanks for all your help guys. +rep :/

[Warsaw]

Eh, could've done a lot worse. Not bad.

[ThePlague]

Yeah. One thing i'm never going to do again is pay for next day shipping on a thursday, because it's not going to get here till monday. Even though I did rush processing and bought it at 3 pm.

e: Sneaky basterds:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_6nqRQcX5D7o/TKZckQavNEI/AAAAAAAAABE/YZTMrropi0o/s1600/derpeggz.png

I got that e-mail after I bought it last night.

[Amit]

That sucks. Oh well, at least it didn't cost that much to "rush" it. You'll still get it faster than people without rush shipping.

[ThePlague]

Yeah. I have a question though, am I able to put another OS on it, such as Windows 7 Pro?

[p0lar_bear]

Yeah. I have a question though, am I able to put another OS on it, such as Windows 7 Pro?

In theory, yeah. There's tools and tutorials on making a flash drive bootable and unpacking an ISO to it. Like here. (http://www.intowindows.com/how-to-install-windows-7vista-from-usb-drive-detailed-100-working-guide/)

[ThePlague]

I also have an external cd drive.

But what I meant is will it slow the computer down any more?

[p0lar_bear]

It shouldn't. Win7 would probably run slower than XP, but while it's sitting inactive on a secondary partition of your hard disk, why would it slow down XP?

[ThePlague]

The netbook I got actually comes with Windows 7 Starter.

[Dwood]

The netbook I got actually comes with Windows 7 Starter.

You should be fine then. There's *usually* not a significant difference performance wise.

[ThePlague]

So I got it last night, and so far the bloatware is immense in this thing. But the biggest thing that pisses me off is that I can't change my damn background on this without downloading some external programs. I also found out that I left my external cd drive in NY.

How much do you think the computer will slow down if I install Windows 7 Ultimate? Right now Windows 7 Starter is turning out to be a complete PoS.

Oh, and how big of a flash drive do I need for Windows 7?

e: found out I can change my background, there is already an external application for it.

[Dwood]

You should be fine then. There's *usually* not a significant difference performance wise.

Between the different OS versions. Just different features.

[Amit]

So I got it last night, and so far the bloatware is immense in this thing. But the biggest thing that pisses me off is that I can't change my damn background on this without downloading some external programs. I also found out that I left my external cd drive in NY.

How much do you think the computer will slow down if I install Windows 7 Ultimate? Right now Windows 7 Starter is turning out to be a complete PoS.

Oh, and how big of a flash drive do I need for Windows 7?

e: found out I can change my background, there is already an external application for it.

I installed Ultimate on my Acer N270 Netbook using a USB stick. It's slower than XP, but I still like it better than XP.

You will need a 4GB stick, at least. Use Microsoft's official Windows 7 USB/DVD Download tool. Put the disc in another computer and point it to the Windows 7 ISO or the DVD drive. It'll automatically make the USB drive bootable and copy the windows 7 install files to it.

Just plug that into the netbook and choose it from the boot menu. Installation should continue as normal. Make sure it's 32-Bit Windows since most netbook CPUs don't support 64-Bit.