Oh come on, like you don't pay a tax with a Thinkpad.

The 10v raters must be using a mouse or something...

That's cuz the 'raters' the Hackintoshers...

Netbooks have their place, and they're certainly *cool*.

But I can't imagine anyone actually using one as a "primary" computer. They are powerful enough, and one can adapt to the smaller keyboard if your hands are small. But the big problem that you can't really adapt to is screen size. On the 9" netbooks I've used, even surfing sites like CNN or this board were an exercise in scrolling patience.

I would think that trying to compose any sort of decently-sized Word or Excel document would be maddening after a short time.

I added a link for you.

DOH!

I agree, I wouldn't use a netbook as a primary computer. But as my secondary one, it's great, especially for travel.

Thanks, guys! Tons of great info. I would like to have a Mac, but deals are tough to find. Same with Lenovo's. Toshiba deals tend to be everywhere - I'll have to look a little closer at those.

I have had no problems whatsoever with the dell inspiron laptop. I bought one for my wife last Christmas and it has performed perfectly.

Dell is running some pretty good deals on their laptops over the next several days.

Dell has an Inspiron 15for only $499 through tomorrow only, and can be customized with extra features if you want. This is what I did for my wife last year, but upgraded it to a faster processor, added a bit of ram and up graded the screen to glossy 1440x900

link to dells deal page here:
http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/days_of_deals?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

They did re-design their inspiron laptops last year.

We had a Dell plant here in Winston-Salem. The local city government paved the way several years ago with incentives to Dell Corporate in exchange for increasing the number of Jobs. Now, with the economy the way it is, Dell has closed down the plant and an ugly battle ensues over payback of the incentives. The local atmosphere is anti-Dell.

On a positive note, my youngest daughter got a Macbook Pro 13" as her college laptop this past summer. We were so impressed with it that I ordered one for my wife on Black Friday. Apple had a special one day deal where the Pro was $101 cheaper and the Windows Office Suite was only $99 installed. It shipped from Shanghai on Monday and was in our driveway on Thursday. Merry Christmas. When our Gateway desktop dies, it will most likely be replaced with another Apple product.

Having said all that, has anyone replaced Vista with Windows 7? Is it difficult to do?

It's very easy to upgrade from Vista to 7--just about as easy as going from MacOS X 10.5 to 10.6. But seriously, MS did a bang up job on the upgrade process. It checks for incompatible programs, asks you to uninstall them, and then does its thing. It's pretty quick, as far as Windows installs go--or at least compared to the eternal XP install.

I've been looking for a personal notebook to replace the heavy, corporate security laden, Compaq nc6400 I normally drag around so I've been doing a lot of research and doing 'hands on' with everyone I see who has a newer model. I'm pretty convinced that you can't go wrong with an Asus if you take the time to get the model that suits you. in fact, that might be their only problem, they have sooo many models it gets very confusing. Luckily or unluckily, I'm limited in my choices in Canada. As pointed out by the reliability matrix, they have an excellent maintenance record but one should still note that just like every other company, the return rate increases as you drop down into the cheaper models like netbooks. In short, they are tops in their respective classes but you still get what you pay for.

Right now, I need a little more power than a cheap Atom powered netbook but I desire the portability. For just a bit more, you can get one with a much more robust chipset. Since I'm not in a hurry, I'm holding off until the first of next year to see see if the new Atom processors are truly more powerful or just more power efficient.

In another plug for Asus, the new "seashell" designed models are truly thin and the most elegant looking I have seen up close so far, if that is a factor for you.