Comments on: A Little Netbook Experiment

By: Netbook Experiment Report #1 — Global Nerdy

Netbook Experiment Report #1 — Global Nerdy — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 18:53:43 +0000

[...] case you hadn’t read my article from Friday, I’m conducting a little experiment this week – I’m seeing what it’s like to use a [...]

By: Jeff Atwood

Jeff Atwood — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 02:22:39 +0000

I can guarantee you’ll be unhappy with the Atom CPU. It’s OK for light web browsing, but that’s it. That’s all. No mas.

I was disappointed, but not surprised, that Intel shows zero interest in making the next-gen Atom faster. Pineview is much better power wise but nil improvement in performance.

The good news is that the CULV Pentiums — like the dual core model in the Acer Aspire 4100 I wrote about — are about 2x faster than the Atom and surprisingly power efficient. Totally acceptable for medium duty laptop stuff.

The key to being satisfied with a netbook is to get out of the Intel Atom ghetto that Intel wants to keep them in…

By: Lucas Berger

Lucas Berger — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 20:34:29 +0000

Great response!

I follow both of your blogs and was hoping you would.

I bet Jeff won’t take you up on trying it himself, because at the end of the day, the productivity loss is so substantial that working on one of those is painful. Even when only “browsing” the web, none the less using VS or Fireworks.

By: Dilip andrade

Dilip andrade — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 18:10:09 +0000

Carry on in Canada hasn’t really changed.

Make sure your carry on has a change of clothes etc. My brother came to Montreal from Toronto 10 or so days ago. His luggage still hasn’t surfaced.

By: Andrew Burke

Andrew Burke — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 15:39:23 +0000

As far as I know, there are no changes to carry-on limits or anything else in domestic flights within Canada – there certainly weren’t any when I flew back from Edmonton to Halifax after Christmas.

By the way, my favourite ‘netbook’ is a vintage IBM ThinkPad X30 – it’s a bit bigger, with a 12″ screen, but that means it has a nice keyboard and more space to work with. It’s 1.2GHz, dual-boots to Ubuntu and XP, doesn’t have an internal CD drive, and the WiFi card doesn’t work in Linux – I mostly use it in full-screen terminal mode when I want to do some distraction-free coding. It’s also built like a *TANK*.

By: Ryan Covert

Ryan Covert — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 15:25:36 +0000

I’m really looking forward to hearing about your experiences with this, as I have been debating on picking up a netbook for coding on when I don’t want to be strapped to my desk. I already have a powerhouse Dell 1720 laptop for that very same thing, but it’s too big (17″ widescreen display) and heavy to really tote around a lot.

Again, really looking forward to your report! :)