Brian Swale wrote:
> I won't be buying a new computer any time soon, for a variety of reasons
> including the many programs I have so painstakingly installed on the present
> machine.
>
> The sole reason I need more GB is for image storage; not least due to having
> bought an E-510. And if I take this to the extreme and start shooting RAW,
> I'll need even more storage ... <snip more cool stuff about recycling cars
> and photo equipment>
>
I wasn't going to write about this until I'd done it - but there's
nothing to do until some parts arrive - and I want to get on with it...
I'm not in the recycle camp for my primary computer. I now have 5 1/2TB
of HD storage for it, inside and outside, active, secondary and tertiary
back-up. Man, that sounds ridiculous.
Anyway ... One of my sons brought by the new netbook his girlfriend
bought him, an Acer Aspire One. What a cute little gadget! I started to
think about having something small and light enough to carry around,
capable enough to do pretty much everything I need on a trip and handy
for writing away from the desk. My larger Sony is a fine machine, but a
great deal bigger and heavier, so it doesn't go with me much.
Then I looked more closely. These things have8.9" or 10" screens, which
doesn't sound bad at first glance. But they are HD form factor screens,
1280x600. 600? That's pretty limiting for viewing web sites,
reading/writing email, writing other things, etc.
I wonder why everybody has gone on the 16:9 bandwagon? On a 22"+ size
desktop screen, it's fine, leaving room for overlapping windows,
bookmark lists, tool menus, and so on. I've still got 1050 vertical
pixels. By the time you subtract all the label and menu bars on most
apps, there's precious little actual image space in 600 pixels. I think
4:3 would make a lot more sense on a netbook, but I suppose it's like
the megapixel race.
Then I got to thinking about my old notebook. I upgraded to a smallish
laptop a few years ago when the little one before stopped having enough
horsepower for some uses I needed. But now the old one was sitting in
the basement in the box my brother had returned it in from loan.
I put a few numbers together. The old Sony 505 has a 10.4 inch screen.
May not sound like much, but that's a 4:3 screen, 1024x768. In area,
it's 142 sq.in., vs. 69 for the Acer and 87 for the 10" netbooks. Funny
thing, it's also no larger than the netbooks, either, and hardly heavier:
Computers Three cell battery
------------------------------------------------------
W H D Wt. Vol.
PCG-505 9.9 8.1 0.85 2.7 68
MSI Wind 10.2 7.1 1.24 2.3 90
Acer Aspire One 9.8 6.7 1.14 2.2 75
So - I pulled it out and hooked it up - nothing - I mean nada, dead. A
bit of research, hands on and web, led to a flat rechargeable CMOS
battery. Leave it with charger power connected for a while and - it
starts. But doesn't find the HD. More fussing, booting DOS utilities
from floppy, etc. Finally, I take it out and spin it in my hand a few
times, in case it's stuck rotationally. Whether that or simply resetting
the socket did it, now it boots into Windows.
Now, what about function and performance? I know I used this thing a lot
back from maybe 10-4 years ago. I did a lot of traveling and used it to
work "from the office" by dialing into my desktop that was hooked into
the intranet and running it by remote control. If IT knew, they'da hadda
cow!. I also did the web, email, etc. So it had to be good for
something. How much had my standards changed?
I started playing with it. For Word, Excel and such, with the size
things I do nowadays, it's more than fine. For the web, page content has
gone way up, and there's a lot of thrashing of the HD and delay for most
web sites as the image content is cached. So the first usability issue
is not 233Khz vs. 1.6Mhz processor, but memory and HD speed.
After much searching, a second 64mb of memory is on its way from Europe
for quite a bit less than from the US, $37.70 delivered. The problems
are that the memory is mounted on proprietary boards and the max.
capacity is 128mb. Still that's double what it has now.
The HD is an interesting experiment. An 8gb SDHC card is on its way from
Amazon and an SDHC=>44pin IDE laptop HD header adapter is on the way
from China. I'm guessing this will probably be faster than the bus/IDE
interface stuff in the box. Certainly it should be faster (as well as
lighter and cooler running) than the 12 year old design 6gb, 2.5" HD in
there.
If I'm right, these two upgrades should relieve the web performance problem.
Of course, these netbooks have built-in WiFi, three USB 2.0 ports,
Ethernet port and flash card readers, but not CF card. But then, I
already have PCMCIA cards for 10/100 Ethernet, 802.11b/g WiFi and CF
card, all of which work fine. Then there's that "17 in 1" flash card to
CF adapter I bought for the FlashTrax. Never did work for SD or SDHC on
the portable drive. BUT, it works fine plugged into the PCMCIA CF
adapter on the Sony. It's flash card capability is slower than the
netbooks, but includes CF cards, which is good for me. Speed would be
nice, but backing up flash cards on a trip can run all night, for all I
care.
Of course, the netbooks have 120-160GB drives, and I'll have 8GB. But
that's more than enough for anything but image backup on trips. CF loads
directly into the FlashTrax XT. Hmmm. I find there is a WIN98SE driver
for it. And guess what? The Sony happily copies files directly from any
sort of flash card in the PCMCIA slot out through the USB 1 port onto
the FlashTrax. Cool! The 40GB on the FlashTrax has been more than enough
for any trip so far, and is user upgradable - well, this user, anyway.
What about USB support for other devices? Well, my Memorex CD/DVD drive
and Oly xD card thumb drive have a Win98SE driver too. A bit of internet
searching finds a generic mass storage device driver. Install that and a
generic 4GB Thumb drive works fine too. I tried a USB hub with three
things attached, and all were recognized and worked.
My battery died ages ago, but when I find it, :-) I have
instructions for putting in new cells in. In the meantime, I've ordered
a new one. Ignoring all the sunk cost stuff I had pretty much given up
on, I'm in for $97.02. Not bad for what I think will be a really usable
netbook with much better screen that the new ones. If it all goes as
planned, I'll be in for a bit more for LiIon cells and maybe a USB
powered hub.
The netbooks come with either 3 or 6 cell batteries. All the above is
for 3-cell. The Sony also has a 6 cell option, but it's speced at 4400
mah from third parties, same as the old OEM part. the newer 3 cell
batteries are 2600 mah for much less than half a 6 cell. The 6 cell is a
cute design that lays flat or twists to form an 'ell' that raises the
rear of the computer for typing. But too pricey.
Moose
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