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A few weeks ago I wrote about an alternative to netbooks in the search for a low cost computer. In fact, I even specifically called out the ThinkPad X41 as a great option (yes, I’m quoting myself):
The folks over at OSNews have a review up on a ThinkPad X41 purchased from Geeks.com for a good price, and with Linux preloaded! It is of course a refurbished box and only comes with 512MB RAM, but you can bring it up to 1.5GB. The slooowwww 1.8″ 4200rpm drive will hold it back in outright performance, but you could always drop in a 1.8″ SSD if you find a good bargain. Regardless of your intentions, this Geeks.com-edition ThinkPad X41 is a good bargain at only $239, although it appears to be out of stock at the time of writing.
The folks over at I4U took an aging ThinkPad X40, with its bottlenecking 1.8-inch mechanical drive, and dropped in a KingSpec 1.8-inch SSD that also brought capacity up to 32GB from 20GB. They were very happy with the result, as there is no more HDD churning noise and performance is strongly improved. The downside is of course the price, with their 32GB model running $170. That is almost as much as the X41 I cited above, but for a hair over $400 you could have a machine that rivals netbooks in usability and likely performance as well.
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As I understand it, Netbooks were originally designed as an “extra” computer, or in addition to what one already has. The concept was something very small, light, inexpensive and with just enough resources to surf the net, to handle ones email and to do some other light net-centric work.
I bought an IdeaPad S10 shortly after they were released and I really enjoy it. I just happened to have an extra 2GB of ram that was the correct specs, so I added that. That really added some speed compared to the 512MB that it shipped with. Other than that, I’ve had no reason to upgrade mine as it works perfect for what it was designed to do.
That said, I do see how those who may not have a laptop would buy a Netbook for it’s low price, then upgrade it so that they may use it more like ones full fledged notebook. It’s amazing what I’ve seen thus far, with 320GB drives being added along with lots of software apps. In retrospect based on what I’ve read about the booming sales, I can see where the computer manufacturers are losing sales of more expensive models to these high value, low cost machines. It will be interesting to follow this category to see where it leads. Already with the advent of the Dell Mini 12 and other larger format Netbooks, the prices are climbing and the capabilities are increasing to the point where the line between a Notebook and a Netbook is blurring rapidly. Time will tell just what these little machines lead to.
Cheers…
So we have netbooks getting bigger until they’re … notebooks with lame CPUs.
Why not improve the screen and keyboard and keep the small size and low weight?