Shootout: What’s The Best Ion Netbook?

December 23rd, 2009 by K. T. Bradford  

Round 6: Battery Life

Systems that have hefty graphics cards often don’t last very long on a charge. When you’re talking a 17-inch, 10+ pound gaming rig, that’s not a big problem. However, long battery life is one of the key selling points of netboos. Take that away and consumers may balk.

On the LAPTOP Battery Test (continuous surfing over Wi-Fi), the Samsung N510 outlasted every other Ion netbook with a runtime of 4 hours and 57 minutes. Right behind it was the Mini 311, lasting just 5 minutes less at 4:52. Both the IdeaPad S12 and the Eee PC 1201N are an hour behind, lasting only 3:56 and 3:53, respectively. This isn’t too surprising for the Eee PC 1201N considering its unique dual-core CPU.

BatteryTest

WINNER: Samsung N510. The N510 outlasts them all, though the HP Mini 311 isn’t behind by a significant margin.

Round 7: Value

Now we come to the big question: price. Ion technology, along with bigger display sizes and Windows 7 Premium adds cost to these netbooks. The Windows XP version of the HP Mini 311 has the lowest starting price–$399–but once you configure it with similar specs to the competition the price goes up to $584. The IdeaPad S12 costs the most ($649) and the Samsung N510 isn’t far behind ($599). The most powerful of them all is also the least expensive of them all. The Eee PC 1201N costs just $499.

WINNER — TIE: ASUS Eee PC 1201N and HP Mini 311. The 1201N clearly offers the most bang for your buck, so long as you can live with less than four hours of endurance. But if you can live with the older Windows XP, the Mini 311 is an equally compelling value at $399.

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Comments (3 Responses) 

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3 Responses to “Shootout: What’s The Best Ion Netbook?”

  1. Rogue Says:
    May 7th, 2010 at 1:25 pm

    After reading the article, I don’t agree with that the Mini-311 is all it’s cracked up to be.Yeah I know it didn’t win, clearly it was the 2nd place champion. But I just wanna say, it’s the FPS that is the proof in the pudding for an ion netbook. Usability of the tool chosen for the job. When you’re watching a 1080p video, the fps will matter, not the keyboard or the ergonomics. When you’re gaming in WoW, even my 10″ ASUS 1005HA-PU17 has enough keyoard to be comfortable enough with a usb mouse attached.. The ASUS battery life is 1 hr less than the 311, not worthy of making a point. You won’t be raiding an instance for hours on a plane..you’ll do it in an airport at the laptop tables, in the admirals club, or at the lounge..or more commonly in a hotel room..all attached to an outlet. Or even if not, running on battery, unless you’ve chosen a flight with a 6hour layover..or decided to trek the kids across BFE..4 hour life at full gaming speed is more than hefty at this performance level. The ASUS EeePC 1201n is the blowout winner.

  2. Edwin Doherty Says:
    July 16th, 2010 at 7:27 pm

    I have had the Samsung Rogue since Jan 7th, it previously worked good until about a couple of months ago. my phone doesn’t receive texts messages until about 20-30 mins after the other person sent them. almost all of the time i will get multiple messages at once, when i do get them. whenever i send a image message occasionally it will send just fine and other occasions it may take a few minutes, hours, or a day to get to the other person. i have heard of others having issues with their phone randomly turning off, mine does that too. my first samsung rogue got so bad i had to get a replacement, that was almost 2 weeks ago. I am still having the same problems with my new one! I am so disappointed, i just want to get a new type of phone. i payed retail for the rogue and am so mad that it turned out to be a crappy phone :/ just my rant…

  3. Andrew Says:
    August 22nd, 2010 at 4:44 am

    Disagree with Rogue on the simple fact that the Mini 311 has an incredible community at MyHPMini which have developed a software Overclock that allows overclocks to ~2.0Ghz and an Unlocked BIOS that gives you access to all of the ION Chipset options and Allows (thanks to lowering the memory multiplier) overclocks to 2.2Ghz+ If you get an ION LE you can also unlock it to an ION as well as overclock the ION Chip, a lot. It can take 3Gb of RAM and you can adjust how much DDR3 VRAM you give it in the unlocked BIOS. My 311 is running at 2.23Ghz with the ION VRam set to 512Mb with the Chip itself overclocked. I have 3GB of ram a and a 320Gb 7200RPM HDD. I have also now upgraded to the new 9 cell battery which weighs the same as the standard (less excess plastic) but has 60% greater Capacity. Yes 60%. It is without a doubt the Best ION Netbook On the Market and the fact that you can pick one up for about £230 from Amazon makes it an absolute steal.

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