HP Mini 5101 Review Verdict: Best Business Netbook

HP was the first company to have created a netbook intended for business use, and with their latest, the Mini 5101, they’ve got the formula down pat. Check out the full review here. Unlike most netbooks, the Mini 5101 has an all-metal chassis (made of a magnesium alloy) and still manages to stay at a netbook-standard 2.8 pounds. As we note in our review of the 5101, HP has added in some other business-friendly features, such as the full version of Corel Home Office, a productivity suite designed for netbooks, 3D DriveGuard technology, which protects the hard drive in case it gets dropped, and a spill-resistant keyboard. The 5101′s 6-cell battery lasted 7 hours and 52 minutes on our LAPTOP Battery Test; that’s not as long as the Toshiba NB205 (9:24) or Eee PC 1005HA (8:57), but it’s still impressive, and the battery doesn’t protrude out the back of the system, either. Also, the 5101 notched some of the highest scores in our benchmarks for a netbook, including Wi-Fi (37.7 Mbps), PCMark05 (1626), and the LAPTOP Transfer Test, which measures the speed of the hard drive (23.1 MBps). Check out our full review for the rest of our impressions.