PC Users: Is this a good machine?

http://www.dynamism.com/cv50/index.shtml

I'm thinking about saving up for one of these in lieu of buying an iBook. I already have a 15" PowerBook, but it's more like my "desktop" machine, it's so tied down that I hate to take it out because it's such a pain. I want something more portable, and this is far smaller and lighter than the current iBook line, and it seems to fit the bill nicely. Unfortunately, it's expensive, and... I don't know how it'll perform for the money because I haven't owned a PC in so long. Any comments on the machine or anything similarly microscopic and light that I could get for the money or less is welcome.

good for what, I ask.

Well it's not very powerful... but it looks like that unit is made to be super-small, and most super small laptops sacrifice power for portability and battery life. So it's tiny, light, has good battery life, but is a bit slow, has little memory, and will suck ass for gaming. For general computing (internet browsing, work, Office apps) it would be fine. But no heavy graphics design or video work on it. It also appears not to have any type of media drives, so you'd need to lug an external CD or DVD drive around.

CD/DVD is large and is cumbersome. And external hi-capacity device with USB link would fit better for it anyway. It looks like a handsome machine for general purpose application, not for gaming on the go. Optical drives drain power fast, an external high capacity unit like an archos or something like it would work well.

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Originally Posted by Tracer

CD/DVD is large and is cumbersome. And external hi-capacity device with USB link would fit better for it anyway. It looks like a handsome machine for general purpose application, not for gaming on the go. Optical drives drain power fast, an external high capacity unit like an archos or something like it would work well.

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Yeah, I had no intention of using an external CD drive. It's more or less for doing writing/web browsing/etc on the go. I'll be living off campus next year and I want something small I can throw into my bag and use for writing, emails, etc while I'm out. Something of a comprimise between a really big PDA and a really insanely small computer. I wasn't intending to do much in the way of game playing on it, so I get the feeling it'll be okay. With an extended battery and its 20GB hard drive I think it'll be good for what I want to do.

whoa whoa whoa

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Transmeta Efficeon 1ghz processor,

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a what processor? You're seriously better off going with a Pentium/Celeron M, along with Centrino. It might cost more, but it'll be worth it when your processor doesn't just fucking die one day cause it's some no-name walmart brand. Anything with Centrino in should have builtin works-fine wifi too, so if your campus happens to have any wifi hotspots you're good to go straight outta the box. As for a laptop processor, be sure you find an [intel] M chipset (Pentium M, Celeron M, whatever) -- the M stands for mobile and they're awesome for speed scaling to keep battery life high, low heat output and yet still perform as good as a 1.xGHz desktop machine.

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Originally Posted by cka

a what processor? You're seriously better off going with a Pentium/Celeron M, along with Centrino. It might cost more, but it'll be worth it when your processor doesn't just fucking die one day cause it's some no-name walmart brand. Anything with Centrino in should have builtin works-fine wifi too, so if your campus happens to have any wifi hotspots you're good to go straight outta the box. As for a laptop processor, be sure you find an [intel] M chipset (Pentium M, Celeron M, whatever) -- the M stands for mobile and they're awesome for speed scaling to keep battery life high, low heat output and yet still perform as good as a 1.xGHz desktop machine.

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I've heard of Transmeta's processors before, mostly because the tiny computers I was interested in in the past used Crusoe processors. Sony's PictureBook did, and I think their awesome and small U series did too. I'd rather go with something more tried and true but if I have to go much bigger and heavier I'll probably just get the iBook anyway.

you can find a small lightweight pentium m machine...

http://www.averatec.com/notebooks/3300series.htm there's 1 at least

1.94 lbs, that is very impressive.

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Originally Posted by cka

whoa whoa whoa



a what processor? You're seriously better off going with a Pentium/Celeron M, along with Centrino. It might cost more, but it'll be worth it when your processor doesn't just fucking die one day cause it's some no-name walmart brand. Anything with Centrino in should have builtin works-fine wifi too, so if your campus happens to have any wifi hotspots you're good to go straight outta the box. As for a laptop processor, be sure you find an [intel] M chipset (Pentium M, Celeron M, whatever) -- the M stands for mobile and they're awesome for speed scaling to keep battery life high, low heat output and yet still perform as good as a 1.xGHz desktop machine.

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The processor is made by Sharp I think. It's made specifically for being small, low energy requirement, cooler running , basically - wholly for this kind of machine. It's not so much a Walmart brand CPU. But yeah, as far as how well they do in fact work... I don't know. I doubt any of us have used a machine with one.