HP 2133 Mini-Note PC

We've been waiting patiently for a product that can defeat the Asus Eee PC's, and today I have something that does, in some ways, take the mini notebook throne. I'm Rory Reid and this is the HP mini note 2133. It's a little bigger than an Eee PC, and it's a little more grown up in its design. I really like the silver finish, and the solid feel of the magnesium alloy chassis. The only drawback is that it's quite heavy in comparison -- 1.3Kg with the standard battery. That's nothing to really worry about though, it's still very portable, and because it's a little bigger than an Eee, HP has been able to fit a keyboard that surprise surprise you can actually use. They've got rid of all the redundant space at the side of the keyboard and stretched the whole thing right to the edges, meaning all the buttons comfortable, and have a good amount of travel. I don't think I've ever been able to type at full speed on a laptop of this size, until now. Well done, HP. Unfortunately, HP's had to compromise with the mouse trackpad. There isn't a lot room left over after they've installed that massive keyboard, so the mouse trackpad is quite shallow, and the selector button don't live underneath it, they actually live on either side, which can take some getting used to. If we look around the rest of the mini note, we can see it's quite well-equipped. There's a Webcam above the screen, on the left you get a D-Sub video output, a USB port, audio jacks, at the front there's switch for the Wi-Fi, and on the right side you get expresscard, and sd card readers, another USB port, and an Ethernet port. That's all pretty good. The problem arises when you look at the core specification. The mini note uses Windows Vista, which isn't such a big deal until you realise it uses a 1.2GHz VIA C7-M cpu and 1GB of RAM, which is nowhere near quick enough to run that operating system. Movie playback is jerky and unreliable, basic multi-tasking is damn-near impossible, and it even struggles to play the Windows start-up music. It's embarrassingly slow. There is a version of the mini note that comes with Linux though, so we really recommend you go for that one instead. Is it an Eee PC killer? In some ways, yeah, but it really lets itself down with its performance. We really really like it, but you need to think long and hard before you part with your cash. I'm Rory Reid, and this is the hp mini note 2133.