Netbook

Microsofts Windows 7 will run on netbooks, and very well!

Microsoft have written to beta testers asking them to test there new operating system on there low powered notebooks. We can confirm it does run, and uses a lot less system resources and HDD space than vista. Windows have said “Budget machines running full OS with Aero become a reality”. I think this is great for us. The new Windows 7 has less overheads than Vista and also has less of the pre installed drivers that we needed to nlite when installing XP onto the eeepc in the early days of net-booking.

An Asus Eee PC 1000H powered by the 1.6GHz Atom processor with 1GB of RAM with Windows 7, on its own, claimed just 485MB of RAM, as well as booting in slightly less time than it took Windows XP on the same machine.

I personally cant wait for the release of windows 7 so we can test to the full its capabilities and performance on the eeepc.

Netbook games – halflife.

Just a quick post, now I’m getting more into my PC on the go lifestyle, i have taken to doing a bit more casual gaming. I can tell you nothing is more fun than fragging your friends on halflife, on the move, wireless’ly.

The original half life is a perfect netbook game. My eeepc runs the game with no issues. I have a 2GB memory upgrade, with the graphics on 1024*768 compressed and in super performance mode, the game runs flawlessly!

A well recommended lunch time filling netbook PC game!

I have just thought i would let all you netbookers out there know about the latest product release from Asus. The tablet Eee PC.
The Asus Eee PC T91 will be the slimest tablet PC to date. The monitor flips up like normal for normal laptop type operations, but can then swivel and fold back on its self for full tablet mode. The screen is 1,024 x 600 native resolution which is attached to the rest of the machine via a 180-degree hinge. Asus has decided to shy away from the Atom N270 CPU we are used to and has chosen the Atom Z520 ‘Silverthorne’ processor. This is clocked at a lower clock speed of 1.33GHz (vs 1.66GHz of the N270). But will use less power at idle and also less thermal output, making for a more efficient netbook. The rest of the specs are pretty standard for the current netbook market.

• 8.9″ glossy LED-backlit WSVGA (1,024 x 600) screen
• Intel Atom Z520 processor
• Intel 945GME/ICH7 chipset
• 1GB DDR2 memory
• 10/100 Ethernet
• 802.11 b/g wireless (n not confirmed)
• Bluetooth
• 32GB SSD
• Windows XP Home Service Pack 3
• Optional 3G data connectivity, GPS and DVB-T TV Tuner
• Integrated webcam (resolution not confirmed)

Im sure there will be lots of modders looking forward to getting there hands on this. I will be looking into the possibility of upgrading my Eee PC with the GPS and DVB-T TV tuner as well as a touch screen transplant!

The price given by ASUS is between £360 and £420 here in the UK, but only time will tell. The UK avalability date is aroun April time, so get saving, as with current exchange rates the price will probably end up at the higher end of the scale.

Here is a video of it in action!

Its been about a week since i first got my hands on my first ever netbook. An EeePC 901 XP in black.

I thought that windows was a bit sluggish, and as i wanted to start testing games out, i decided to shell out about £20 on 2Gb or RAM for the little black beast.

As I thought others mite want to do the same, but be less techy than me i decided to write a guide for you.

Let me start by saying its not a very hard job at all. You will need:

1* 2Gb Stick of Laptop 200pin RAM (I chose some from Corsair, as I like the brand and have always used them for memory with no issues)
1* Cross head screwdriver
1* EeePC
1*Worktop
1* Radiator, or other earthing point

Enought of that.. lets begin! (I will let the pics do most of the talking and at the end i will talk about which RAM you should choose).

Shiney new Corsair RAM for my EeePC from Amazon

The underside of my Eee PC, note the 2 screws we need to remove (1 is under the white EeePC sticker).

remove the battery pack, just to be on the safe side, as we are opening her up.

This is the inside of the EeePC, under the black plastic, you need to lift this up to get at the memory, its very thin.

This is how the 2 ram modules compare

Move the clips left and right of the modual outwoods, the ram should then hinge up, then slide out.

Insert the new ram push it all the way in then hinge it down, it should click into place

Put the battery back back in and tun it on.

Here are the results, 2Gb of ram in the EeePC!

It makes the PC feel a lot faster, especially when using GIMP.

I chose Corsair ValueSelect DDR2 667Mhz 2Gb 200pin ram, this was from amazon

Garmin have teamed up with Asus, makers of the Eeepc to produce a GPS enables smart phone, at a low cost.
The phone will be touch screen running Google’s Android platform.

The Eee Phone will be out in a few months times, but the makers Garmin-Asus mobile group has revield a pair of phones to wet your appetite.
The Garmin-Asus Nuvifone M20

And the smaller G60

I really love them and cant wait for an eee phone.

What do you think?

I have just been surfing the net and came across this…

This is the Dell Wasabi PZ310 portable printer.

It is one of the smallest printers that i have ever seen. It looks stunning and is available in a number of different colours (black, blue and blue), so should match your netbook PC very nicely!

The unit can connect via the normaly USB, but what is clever is that it will also connect to your phone and pc via bluetooth, which means neat cableless printing. The printer uses no ink, this is embedded somewere in the paper and will print out sticky backed photo sized prints for you to use how ever you wish.

There are other portable printers available. Have a look below, i found a few on amazon.

I quite like the sony one.

SD Memory has been around for a while now. Used in cameras etc. SD – HC, HC stands for High Capacity can offer drives up to two terabytes in size, but currently these are limited to 32Gb drives. They are available in a range of sizes. I found i could use a drive from my old camera and decided to test it out.

Eeepc next to my work issue Dell Latitude D510 Laptop

Pic of me downloading GIMP onto my EeePC

Here are a couple of pics of my Eeepc next to my work laptop, and a pic of me downloading GIMP which is a free image editing software available on the net, which i used to edit the pics before uploading to my blog!

It worked no issues at all. I have ordered my own drive from the net.

The basic rule of thumb is to get the biggest most expensive memory card you can, you want one with a good read/write time as we are going to be using this for more than just transferring images. I intend to use one to store my music and movies on. 8Gb SD Cards are available at around £20 which will be more than enough for me for the moment!

Installation is easy, just remove the memory card blank, supplied with the pc from the slot on the right hand site and insert you memory card. Your computer should auto detect the new memory as removable storage and allow you to start using it in a matter of seconds. To remove, just press the card in and a spring should push it out enough for you to pull it out.

Happy net-booking!

Like I was saying in my last post, the biggest issue I had with my eeepc was the lack of HDD space on the solid state hard disk, so to start with lets take a look at a few ideas we can use to cut out the crap!

My EEEpc 901 came with XP installed on it, but most of the following will apply to all netbook users, and home users looking for more space on there computer, as well as more light weight, or free programs to use.

For starters, my 901 came bundled with quite alot of software on it. I have started off by removing things!

I removed Adobe Acrobat Reader, this is used for .pdf files. It was removed and replaced with Sumatra. This is an open source, free light weight pdf viewer.

http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf/download.html

I removed MS works, as its a very bulky document processor. I installed OpenOffice in its place. This is another Open Source, so yes its free!, program which can do all that Microsoft Office can do… and more! I love the export as pdf feature. It can open anything MS can throw at it too and if its not how you want it there are thousands of plugins and mods available for it too.

http://www.openoffice.org/

I also removed STAR Office which i found in my programs list, i had a quick look at it. Its based on Open Office, but looking at the file sizes is alot bigger and has annoying features like a built in search box. I didnt stay long in it. I know OpenOffice will do the job perfectly well no need for anything else!

I also installed FileZilla, MSN Live (could have used Pidgen, but i like the games), Notepad++, Thunderbird and Lighting, and STEAM for my games!

Everything should be installed to the D: drive.

To free up space on the eeepcs C: drive, i moved the My Documents folder. Right click your My Documents in the start menu > properties > find target. Now you can make a new folder on your D: drive and your documents will be saved there!

I also reduced the ammount of space allocated to the system restore. Go:

start>accessories>system tools>system restore >system restore settings> select the C: drive and click settings, then reduce the amount allocated on the scroll bar.

Hope this helps. Will let you know what else i find as i go!

I decided to make this website, being netsavvy, becasue the netbook resources on the net were very hard to find and alot of information on these small laptops i didnt not dind very useful.

Let me start at the beginning! I have just bought an ASUS EeePC. I bought it after much research and chose the Eee PC 901 in black with XP after reading many reviews. It was exactly what i wanted… super small form factor but with the increased processing speed bought about my the Intel Atom processor.

My troubles started when i got it home and naturally started installing my own software, things like mozilla firefox, thunderbird, windows MSN Live… within a ouple of installs i saw i had no space on the C drive… so starts my need for information and my quest to make my eeepc into my perfect netbook!

The fruits of google were very thin… so this website has been born to bring the best of the web and my experiences to you, to enable you to get the most out of your super mini super mega amazing netbook.

(Just for the record..)

Thus far the only fault with my eee pc is the lack of HDD space and graphics performance when i tried installing some games, but i have yet to test many game and intend on listing games that will run etc on this site.

I hope you enjoy reading from now on, please sign up to our RSS feed, so you can automatically be kept uptodate with the latest and the greatest netbooks and small laptops news!