First look at HP 2133 Mini-Note

By Alex Villafania
INQUIRER.net

THE BATTLE for the sub-notebook market is heating up as HP enters the fray. It may not be the first to introduce a laptop in the below-12″ inch segment but it is the first branded, non-Taiwanese vendor to do so in the Philippines.

The HP 2133 Mini-Note PC has the unmistakable HP design all over it: curved corners and tapering edges and a semi-shiny aluminum finish. It could be mistaken for a metal folder if its top half isn’t pulled up.

When it is opened up, the very first thing you notice is the keyboard; unlike most notebooks with the same form factor, the Mini-Note’s key buttons are full-size. Instead of being extended, the keyboard takes up the entire length of the unit’s lower portion, leaving barely 5 millimeters of space between the edge of the keys and the edge of the lower portion of the Mini-Note. It is also the first one to have a full-size Shift key, the most undersized key among sub-notebooks and even full-size laptops. An aluminum track pad is in the middle, just below the keyboard. It is quite small, barely 50 millimeters across. The left and right mouse buttons are literally on its left and right sides.

There is also an integrated webcam on the Mini-Note, which can be handy when talking to someone on instant messenger applications such as Yahoo! Messenger and Google Talk. The Mini-Note can connect to the Internet via a LAN cable or wifi. It also has Bluetooth connectivity.

The Mini-Note only has two USB connections, one on the left and another on the right side of its body, whereas other notebooks in the same category would have at least three. However, take note that sub-notebooks are not normally used as full notebooks and are primarily used for quick desktop editing work and web browsing. USB attachments could only include an extra mouse and an external hard drive.

Other connections are one microphone/earphone jack on the left side, an external VGA monitor also on the left side, and a RJ-45 LAN slot. It also has a SD card reader and, surprisingly, an Express Card slot, which is rarely seen on sub-notebooks.

The screen is also one of the proud features of the Mini-Note as it could render at 1280×768 pixels, just a bit better than that of the Asus Eee PC 900, currently the most popular sub-notebook in the market. The screen may not look stunning enough when using an optional Suse Linux operating system, but it does look good when the Mini-Note is installed with Windows Vista Home Basic, also optional. This will also be the first sub-notebook to have the system-hogging Vista installed.

Surprisingly, the Mini-Note uses the low-power Via C7-M processor, which runs up to 1.6 Gigahertz. Previous tests showed that this particular chip could do some basic processing at faster rates than using even the Intel Celeron. This is because the Via chip is designed to run only basic functions, not multi-tasking. The graphics is also the Via chip Chrome9, which apparently can run the graphics requirements of Vista OS.

For such a small form factor, the Mini-Note can be integrated with a 2.5″ notebook hard drive, ranging from 120 Gigabytes to 160 Gigabytes. If the user prefers to use Linux, the Mini-Note can be integrated with a 4 Gb solid state drive. It would still be a treat if it had an 8 Gb or higher solid state drive.

The Mini-Note competes directly with the Asus Eee PC 900 series even at price point. While the Eee PC 900 costs P24,950, the HP Mini-Note’s basic package also costs the same while the higher models cost from P29,950 to P34,950.

Here’s a video I took when I interviewed HP Philippines Personal Systems Group general manager Bernadette Nacario.

Editor’s note: Videos taken by INQUIRER.net community evangelist Alex Villafania.

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