Mini Laptop Review

- Smallest laptop display size that is okay for viewing internet?
I need to buy a portable (ultra-portable, subnotebook etc) laptop to take with me to University. The biggest thing for me is long battery life, followed by light-weight/small-size. I'm looking for lower-cost laptop options, and second-hand ones. I'll only be doing word document, power point, basic internet use/hotmail, and maybe windows media player on it. How small a screen do you recommend? My brother has a 12" display on his Thinkpad laptop which is fine to use - but could I go smaller? How small could I go before internet etc got too irritating to browse/use and before some websites refused to open? If you have ever had a mini laptop / subnotebook - which one did you get, and what was your experience with it? Thanks!

A I used some horrible mini laptop the other day with a 7" screen and it was way too small! For comfortable viewing i would say at least 11-12" maybe a 13.3" one. Those sizes are still small enough to make the laptop ultra portable and light but allow you to view the screen in comfort. I was literally squinting to read the 7" screen. XP was not designed to run on a screen size as pathetic as 7". You could probably get away with going down to 10" but i'm not sure. I hope that helped, good luck in finding one!

- I need a laptop under $50 strictly for writing in. Which of these would work decently and has a USB port?
USB port is a must have http://cgi.ebay.com/Hitachi-Notebook-C-133T-1000-Cheap_W0QQitemZ120376814691QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item120376814691&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A4|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318 http://cgi.ebay.com/TEXAS-INSTRUMENTS-610CD-EXTENSA-LAPTOP-NOTEBOOK-NICE_W0QQitemZ300286360347QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item300286360347&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A4|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318 http://cgi.ebay.com/Fujitsu-LifeBook-B-Series-10-5-Mini-Laptop-Notebook_W0QQitemZ120388027438QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item120388027438&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A4|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318 http://cgi.ebay.com/IBM-Thinkpad-365XD-laptop-notebook-Intel-CPU-LCD-10-5_W0QQitemZ200314773794QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item200314773794&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A4|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318 http://cgi.ebay.com/Acer-Extensa-710T-Laptop-Notebook-Pentium-II-12_W0QQitemZ270269432233QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item270269432233&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A4|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318 http://cgi.ebay.com/Dell-Latitude-CSx-PMP-Laptop-Notebook-PIII-500MHz_W0QQitemZ120390022000QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item120390022000&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A4|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318 http://cgi.ebay.com/Toshiba-Satellite-225CDS-Laptop-Notebook_W0QQitemZ310114647794QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item310114647794&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A4|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318

A I looked at only a couple from your list. They don't even have hard drives. They are not working laptops. If you want to make a project out of it, fine. But if you want a working laptop, look for a WORKING one. You can find one (OLD MODEL) for cheap. More than $50, but read descriptions carefully to make sure it's a working laptop with operating system at least. Of course, if you are good with computers, you can buy several broken ones of the same model and put one together.