I’ve gone ahead and joined the netbook revolution. After originally trying to get onboard a couple of months ago with Lenovo’s 10″ Ideapad (~$400), repeated shipping delays led me to cancel that order. The MSI Wind is consistently rated as one of the top models in this category, so when Best Buy dropped the price to $350 earlier this week it was a pretty easy purchase to make… and a $50 gift card sweetened the deal.
This isn’t my first foray into lilliputers. However my last unit was referred to as a sub-notebook, had to be imported from Japan, and easily cost more than a traditional sized laptop. So it’s nice to see these diminutive, yet computationally capable, laptops growing in popularity here in the US. And at reasonable prices.
My Wind is clearly not a desktop replacement and will serve two primary purposes: Mobile blogging platform and portable video player. The Intel Atom processor and 1GB of memory running XP has performed well streaming Netflix and a Slingbox SOLO (tip: use headphones), while this post is being composed in Windows Live Writer. So far, so good! Although, I suspect at some point, I’ll be upgrading the battery to 6 cells (4+ hours) and OS X - once those Mac Xohm drivers are available.
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