ribminster

This is exactly the type of pedantic tripe that tech bloggers get all uppity about when commenters write in about it.

Not useful for TJ Luoma != not useful.

This sounds a lot like a guy who is trying to rationalize why his game—which he hailed as "one of the most innovative games on the 360, period" (so innovative they have "put some people off")—performed so poorly at retail. Instead of, you know, admitting his game is derivative and kind of terrible.

How can a company survive if its product announcements leak early? There's no way anyone can sell products based on just quality and value proposition—it's just not possible.

Transformers was an Oscar contender with nominations in 3 categories.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0418279/awards

@JKT I hope that is an extreme example of sarcasm. If so, bravo.

If Mr. Sande has indeed been touch-typing for 40 years, then he had to make adjustments to all sorts of technology, like, say, the invention of personal computers, laptops, mice, trackpads, the internet...

"What good is a keyboard that's hardly any easier to use than my iPhone"

I hope this is not the basis of anyone's dislike/disdain for the concept of a netbook, as it is incredibly ignorant.

Yes, the EEE 700/701's keyboard is tiny. I thought this may be common sense, but as it is not, let me state it here for the record: NETBOOK KEYBOARDS ARE NOT ALL THE SAME. I can state with 100% certainty that there are people out there who are perfectly content with their netbook keyboard. Some might even _like_ it.

There is a huge intellectual gap between stating that a product can be useful to some people (but not necessarily everyone), as do the so-called "netbook defenders", and making a statement like this on a respected(?) technology site: "Even if you delude yourself into thinking that since you're only going to use it for email it will be a worthwhile investment, you're wrong." This is doubly true when, instead of what a reader should reasonably expect (well-researched and informed analysis/opinion), we get the above article.

It's not enough to say "well this is my opinion and I am entitled to it". If you want to write this sort of baseless opinion piece, write it on stevensande.com, where there are no expectations. I can only assume your employers here expect you to have put some time and effort research and analyzing your pieces before submitting them.

As for JD's question: If the only time you ever use a computer is when you are working, then chances are you won't find a use for a netbook. But if you are the type of person who uses a computer casually throughout the course of a day, separately from your work, then you may find that it is incredibly convenient. Another excellent use-case: traveling. Yes, some people might not be able to live without their 17" displays, but there are also other people who put a premium on portability. I myself find it much nicer to carry around ~2.5lbs of computer instead of 5+. I don't need to do much beyond email, a few websites, Google Reader, maybe Google Maps, a few other travel sites and maybe ordering tickets or something. Yes, I could theoretically do all of those things from my iPhone, but to state that the user experience of doing so on my iPhone is as good as or _better_ than from a netbook is delusional. It's just not, no matter how many times you ignorantly claim so in the comments section of a blog.

I guess "Why a netbook is not a good primary computer" wouldn't bring in a lot of pageviews.

"1) I didn't say that Mac OS X didn't run well on the Dell mini 9. On the contrary, I thought it ran very well! It is the fastest booting Mac I have. There's a difference, though, between being able to run an OS on a computer and having that machine be usable as a primary computer if needed."

Why are you reviewing it as a primary computer if that is clearly not its intended purpose? Did it fail at its stated purpose, or just at your misguided idea of what it should do?

"3) How many of you are taking the cost of buying a legal copy of Mac OS X into the total price of your "inexpensive" netbooks? That's $130, and I bought a copy when I made my hackb00k. Did I say $499? The actual price is now $639. Oh, I'm an idiot for having bought the mini with only 1 GB of RAM? Sure, I'll add on another gig for $40. Wow, now that cheap device is $679. Take out the 16GB SSD and put in a 32GB? Cha-ching! That's another $80 for a total of $759. I'm getting close to the price of a refurb MacBook now! You can even get a refurb MacBook Air for $999."

OR... You could inform yourself before buying your netbook and get one with a full hard drive for $300-349, and upgrade the RAM for the going rate instead of 2x-4x the price. (And in the case of the Aspire One, you'd have to spend $10-15 to get a Dell WiFi card on eBay)

http://www.google.com/products?q=aspire+one
http://www.google.com/products?q=1gb+sodimm

Of course that would make it difficult to write a blog post to live up to that sensationalist headline.

megarain, OSX actually runs perfectly fine on a netbook, given enough RAM (1.5GB). Provided you are not trying to run something it is clearly not designed for, ie: Photoshop, Final Cut, Crysis in VMware (not that VMware runs on the current-gen Atoms)

And hey, if you find running MS Word too sluggish, use something like Google Apps (which is the intention with netbooks).

When my MBP died, I used an Aspire One for a few days and it served me well. You have to maximize everything, but this is standard with the netbook Linux distributions I've tried too.

As for apps that don't fit the resolution, the only one I've had a problem with so far was the additional row of preferences in System Preferences (third-party prefpanes) and if memory serves the Skype setup wizard was tricky. Obviously I would not be crippling my system by not installing extra preferences. I have Skype working now so clearly that was not a huge issue.