Netbook On A Budget

[reganlives]

is it one of those microfibre mitts that they got in the pound section? lol I been meaning to get one of those for ages. will pop down to asda 2moro and stock up on bits maybe

[aido]

is it one of those microfibre mitts that they got in the pound section? lol I been meaning to get one of those for ages. will pop down to asda 2moro and stock up on bits maybe

microfibre on one side mate and the other is like microfibre tentacles - well strange looking thing but works great for cleaning the interior - even I'll start doing mine more often now as it makes light work of it :D

[reganlives]

cool. how would it be for washing the car tho mate? i'm sure loads of people recommend them these days.

[aido]

I just have the Meguiars mitt for washing the car, that's always been bang on!

http://www.cleanyourcar.co.uk/washing-dryi...t/prod_305.html

Think the green one with the tentacles and microfibre pad is more for cleaning insides mate :)

[MacRS200]

Think the green one with the tentacles and microfibre pad is more for cleaning insides mate :)

Wouldn't expand too much on that subject Aido

On a serious note, if it is good may be worth a thread on it's own mate.

[aido]

Did you get one of these in the end?

Just saw this software which may come in useful if you did for backing up and restoring to a USB disk:

http://macles.blogspot.com/2008/12/acer-as...-aa1backup.html

:)

[Yeldarb]

This one is cheap as chips:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/module.aspx?module...mp;T=fplink#Faq

Worth getting just for web browsing on the move!!

[Rob's Lexx]

just popped into asda in thurmaston (near leicester/loughborough) and they STILL HAVE THIS OFFER ON!!!

question for u guys, how powerful are these things?? only 512 ram is pretty low is it not, especially for XP?? can it be expanded??

i wanna get one for the missus, but she needs to write large documents in word and put powerpoint presentations together.

also will need it for wireless net browsing (which i see it can do). will this be good enough for the job, or are they more aimed at making notes on the move kinda thing??

cheers

rob

[aido]

These are designed for browsing the internet mate, but should be fine for Word and Powerpoint!

Just gaming and video encoding they're not suitable for although you can play some games I read as it's only a small resolution so they should actually be ok.

Read somewhere that it'll take up to 1.5GB RAM but to upgrade you have to take a few bits apart to get to the expansion slot?

[Rob's Lexx]

soi worth it in ur opinion mate?? i just read 1 GB of 1DIMMM ram can be added. i know someone who takes laptops apart quite often so adding the memory shouldnt be a problem.

[aido]

For £150 you can't really go wrong mate - plus if she's a bird she'll like the smaller form factor (why aren't women like that with everything - they like iPod nano, small laptops - but if something else isn't massive they're whinging )

[Rob's Lexx]

For £150 you can't really go wrong mate - plus if she's a bird she'll like the smaller form factor (why aren't women like that with everything - they like iPod nano, small laptops - but if something else isn't massive they're whinging )

PMSL!!!!

women huh!!!

[aido]

For anyone who has or gets a netbook then it's probably definitely worth keeping an eye on what Jolicloud produce this year - http://www.jolicloud.com

They're doing another custom Linux build for Netbooks that looks really good actually - pretty much icon driven like a lot of phones coming out now - see some screenshots here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jolicloud/3218231449/

[Rob's Lexx]

nice find aido.

very nice looking interface. very tempted - i'd better get a big thankyou from her if i get her one!!! lol!!!

[reganlives]

Just thought I'd give everyone an update, over the weekend I decided to install windows on my gf's Acer Aspire One and what a success!! I used the walkthru on that website earlier in this thread in order to make a USB Flash disk bootable installation of windows and it worked like a charm. Finished off installing all the updates including SP3 etc and for having only 512mb ram it copes really well. Personally I'd have at least a gig of ram in there but I cant complain with this netbook at all and keep getting tempted to get one myself. If anyone is after one of these I seriously recommend one but the only thing is that get a wireless mouse as the touchpad isnt the easiest to get used to. Will be installing office on it sometime this week so will give everyone another update then but overall I'm happy with it and its impressed me on how well its handled windows. Bootup was incredibly quick as well!

[MacRS200]

Well end result was that he bought one from Comet as our local Asda had run out, came with 1GB of RAM.

I installed XP Pro SP2 on it yesterday using the USB_MultiBoot_10 utility to make a bootable flashdrive with XP on it, worked with no problems. Only slight issue is when you boot up now you get an option screen to run XP or repair from the USB, not major and I am sure that I read somewhere how to get rid of that.

Anyway had the usual problems with drivers not working but they are all available on the Acer website to download (Drivers Here), once I got the wireless one installed it went like a dream. He went back off home with a brief on installing all the drivers and up-dating windows etc. Heard nothing since so assume all is going OK.

@ reganlives - how did you get on with the MS Office install?

[aido]

How much was it in the end fella?

Do they seem ok then?

[MacRS200]

How much was it in the end fella?

Do they seem ok then?

He paid £229 for it and I would say that it seems OK, build quality is good as I would expect from Acer. Screen res was a bit pants with XP till we got the proper driver installed and that sorted that out.

He tried a rally game on it and it was a bit slow but it was running off a USB flash drive so may be better if he moved it onto the internal drive. Will see how he gets on and get back.

If you want it for work I am sure that Office apps will be just fine and it is really compact and is 10/10 for looks IMHO.

[lexol]

I got the one from Asda for £150... only had to wait about an hour at customer services for them to bring it from the "warehouse".

I would love to install Windows on it.... always wanted to try Linux but it isn't as user friendly as windows at all.

How much would I be looking at to get XP and do the usb thingymabob? Bearing in min my only interweb connection is through a Vodafone wireless broadband connection.

Cheers guys.

[MacRS200]

I got the one from Asda for £150... only had to wait about an hour at customer services for them to bring it from the "warehouse".

I would love to install Windows on it.... always wanted to try Linux but it isn't as user friendly as windows at all.

How much would I be looking at to get XP and do the usb thingymabob? Bearing in min my only interweb connection is through a Vodafone wireless broadband connection.

Cheers guys.

You can pick up a copy of XP Pro SP2 on e-bay for about £40, if you have never done a Widows install before I would not really recommend trying it for the first time by the method talked about on here. You do need a bit of knowledge on computers to set the whole thing up. You will also find that most of the peripherals on the netbook won't work after you install XP so you need to download all the drivers, if you only have 1 PC do that first. Perhaps I am misjudging your experience, if I am then I apologise.

Also if you only have 3G internet the security updates after install will kill your connection :-(

[lexol]

Balls :(

Thanks for the reply.... you've probably over estimated my ability to be honest. :D ;)

[reganlives]

@ macrs200

hi mate, I havent had a chance to install office on the other halfs netbook yet after the windows install but will try and get round to it sometime today. I can confirm though that its still running really well and really quick for only having 512mb ram. since installing xp on hers, I installed xp onto her bro's Asus EeePC which went well as well. I'll defo be keeping my USB install of windows to hand. As for the option about the USB recover mate, if you right click on my computer and go to properties, then to the advanced tab, then click on settings under startup and recovery, a new window will open and in the top section show the startup options. I wouldnt uncheck the "time to display startup options" or the recovery options bit but if you want you could reduce the time of the display startup options which will then reduce the countdown timer.