HP Mini 311-1000NR 11.6-Inch Black Netbook - Up to 6.25 Hours of Battery Life Reviews
HP Mini 311-1000NR 11.6-Inch Black Netbook - Up to 6.25 Hours of Battery Life Reviews
Other products by Hewlett Packard Ratting 4.0 Out of 5.0 Special Offer Total New 25 Total Use 2
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The Internet is at the center of modern life keeping you connected and informed through email, IMs, RSS feeds, social networking sites and Search. Keeping up often requires time shifting with companion devices like netbooks. Powered by energy-efficient Intel Atom processors, the HP Mini 311 is optimized for Web access and can handle standard productivity apps - but is light enough to carry everywhere at just 3.22 lbs. Its 16:9 11.6-Inch diagonal HD LED BrightView display makes viewing HD content and two documents side by side possible. The 92% of full-size keyboard enables much more efficient and comfortable use than texting (or typing on smartphone keyboards) for most. The touchpad has buttons at the bottom for intuitive use. The HP Mini 311 is the perfect device for staying productive, informed, in touch and entertained on the go.
Technical Details
- 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 Processor (512 KB L2 Cache, 533 MHz FSB)- 1 GB DDR2 RAM (1 Dimm), Max supported 2 GB
- 160GB (5400RPM) SATA Hard Drive
- 11.6” Diagonal HD LED BrightView Widescreen Display (1366 x 768) NVIDIA ION LE for Windows XP with up to 319MB total graphics memory
- Genuine Windows XP Home (SP3), *Up to 6.25 Hours of Battery Life
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By Fat Computer Nerd (Ninja)
What can I say, this thing rocks!
I would recommend this netbook to anyone. The 11.6 inch screen makes a nice upgrade from the 10.1 inchers, I definitely notice the difference and feel I am squinting much less.
Use firefox and install some netbook optimizations (google firefox netbook themes) to make more room on the screen.
As for unlocking the ION to full, here is a walkthrough:
[...]
-all you need is a USB jump drive and a bit of computer literacy and it's rather easy.
Once you've done that, Install the FULL Ion drivers (Verde Notebook Release 197 beta)
[...]
(note this is the XP download)
Now uninstall your adobe flash activex and plugin, and then install the activex and plugin betas for Flash 10.1.3 (easy to find on google) One you do this you will get flawless 1080p playback on youtube!
Then go here and follow step by step instructions to get full HD playback for files on your PC:
[...]
After doing all this I can play almost anything, including flash HD, 720p and even 1080p on youtube, etc.
Unfortunately a non-tech savy person might struggle with getting this thing set up to play HD properly, but with a little googling anyone should be able to figure this stuff out.
Hope my review helped a few people!"
By R. Gauldin (Anaheim, CA USA)
I selected this mini 311 after surveying many other netbooks on the market. My chief reasons for choosing this model are, relatively large keyboard with good ergonomics,a larger 11.6" hi def display, a discrete GPU with the nVidia ION with dedicated memory,and Windows XP. I did not want a Starter Edition of Windows 7 on a netbook. Besides, I did not want to learn a new OS on a netbook. My desktop is XP and I home network with the XP mini311 and the interface is identical between the two. Setup is quite easy and smooth to deal with.
Pros:
A very sharp 11.6" LED HD display.
Comfortable and good feel keyboard.
High performance nVidia ION GPU, no shared memory.
Very good speakers for a netbook.
Windows XP, not a WIN 7 starter OS.
Unit operates quietly and remains cool, no heat or hotspots.
Good battery life, 5-6hrs with normal settings and modest tasking.
Cons:
A sensitive touchpad.
Learning to navigate with the Touchpad instead of a mouse is a small challenge, the touchpad may not execute your every intention and sometimes seemingly the cursur will jump quickly and choose an action you don't want.
This situation improves with practice and I'm getting better at it everyday.
All in all, I believe the mini311 is among the best notebook offerings today.
I have no regrets.
By adam scheurer
I bought this while stationed on a small Army depot, which has nothing to do within walking distance. It will definitely do all your web surfing, document writing and other normal use you would get out of a portable PC. The charge lasts a pretty long time, considering it has a large screen for a netbook.
One big factor in my purchasing this over other netbooks was the Nvidia ION motherboard/Graphics processor, which is much more capable of graphical power than most netbooks which use Intel's shared video processor. Out of the box, it will play games such as Warcraft 3 and Unreal Tournament 2004 with graphics maxed. This wasn't enough for me, so I overclocked the CPU and GPU (I won't tell you how to void your warranty, there are plenty of forums with this info on them), and can play Age of Empires 3, Command and Conquer 3, Fable and Neverwinter Nights 2 with a great framerate at medium high graphics levels. Don't expect this little thing to be able to play Bioshock 2 or Left 4 Dead 2. (Games were downloaded via Steam, EA, Atari, Blizzard and Impulse, if you need a good idea of where to buy digital copies of games)
The only thing I dislike about this netbook is all the space taken up by HP's "what if" restoration files. About 35GB were freed up after removing system restore, hibernate, and all the install files for the programs that come pre-installed. I wouldn't get delete-happy unless you have some knowledge about computers and know or find out what you NEED and don't need. If you want to find out what parts of your hard drive are being used by large files or folders, a great free program to use is TreeSize, which will break down how your hard disk space is being used.
I use the netbook mainly for streaming music from the internet, watching downloaded movies, surfing the 'net, and playing games. If you have any sort of internet connection or a flash drive, you don't even mind that the netbook lacks a disc drive. I currently use this netbook with a laser mouse and a 17" widescreen monitor as the secondary display. The keyboard is natural to type on, and doesn't require much adjusting. There are pretty many useful keys that work with the function button, such as volume control, locking Windows, and changing the screen brightness. The mousepad is a little bit awkward until you get used to it, with the mouse buttons being right on the edge, and if I switch back to a different laptop at school I will be trying to hit buttons on the edge of the laptop! Not really an issue, even if I didn't use a mouse. I can't find any way to disable the mousepad, but when typing normally I have never had any problems with bumping the mousepad or its buttons. The speakers are pretty good for a netbook, but being located under the front where your palms rest, it sounds the best when playing music and have the netbook closed and flipped upside-down. I usually use headphones, because I currently have roommates, and enjoy turning the volume up more than some would prefer. Movies look great on it so far. I would definitely reccommend this little beast.
By T. Millard (Saint Charles, MN United States)
I bought this mini on the HP website for around $400. Right out of the box, it took several minutes to boot up. An initial run of the virus software in its first hour of life revealed a virus already on the hard drive. A 'check disk' reveals several bad areas on the hard drive. A couple days later, it would not even launch Windows, and did a repair on itself to fix the problem. After these issues were 'repaired' it still ran slowly and loaded web pages like dial-up on my high speed connection. Windows 7 used half of the RAM, and Internet explorer used another 1/4th. Any kind of programs running or websurfing at all caused the CPU to run at 100% constantly. HP gladly accepted this thing back and refunded my money immediately. Only buy this if you need a word processor and not a computer. Only 'Pro' is its cute.
By J. Stephen Hendricks (Sammamish, Wa USA)
Purchased the HP Mini311 through Verizon Wireless as part of a broadband (3G) data package. The unit came with 2gigs of memory; a 160gb hard disk, and Windows7 Home Premium. I added a usb wireless mouse, a Microsoft 6000 bluetooth mobile keyboard, ZAGG usb external speakers and an HP external DVD drive. Total outlay of less than $350. (Of course, I pay $60 per month for 3G service but I have to connect to the internet when traveling even when I don't have access to wifi so that was a necessity.)
Makes a great travel system to replace my aging Dell Inspiron laptop and I can actually use it when seated in a coach airline seat.
Now for the major complaint. The touchpad is FAR TOO SENSITIVE. I happen to HATE touchpads anyway. And I cannot imagine why HP does not enable the touchpad to be turned off. As it is, when using the keyboard, the slightest touch of the palm of one's hand on the touchpad will cause the cursor to move. In fact, even the heat of one's hand will move it.
So here is the workaround. Tape a couple of business cards (one won't suffice) over the touchpad. I resorted to an unused credit card AND a business card. In addition, turn off everything you can turn off in the settings to make the touchpad less responsive. Even then, the touchpad will respond to a determined finger, but it won't respond to a slight touch. And if all that still fails, do as I did and get a Microsoft 6000 bluetooth mobile keyboard to improve the feel and speed up typing.
Yes, I know. It's a PITA. But with the cards in place over the touchpad, the mini311 is a great little computer.
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