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Quite true, for now. SsD's are still relatively new, as compared to standard magnetic hard drives. The more widespread they become, the more the price will drop. You couldn't always get an 80 gb, 7200 RPM hard drive for $60 USD, I remember when a 6.5 gb would run $120 USD easy, and that wasn't even a fast drive by today's standards. However, there's no telling when high quality SSDs will come down in price, and it probably won't happen for another couple of years yet, at least. This hybrid approach looks interesting for the interim.

I paid $229 for my first hard drive. It was a 20MB Seagate ST-225.

Except price. "
Sure but
1) note the size of the SSD shipped with the netbook: 16GB.
And I would say that this is enough, as you have the HDD for all the multimedia files.

2) One of the reason of the price of fast SSD is that the controler must be complex as it's 'hiding' the Flash behind a 'disk-like' behaviour.
A less transparent interface would probably have better random write performance with a simpler (cheaper) Flash controler, though I don't expect that this'll happen (for the same reason that we're stuck with x86 and Windows instead of Alpha and BeOS: compatibility trump technical performance).

It would be nice if you could change the mode of the SSD from HDD compatiblity to RAW mode so a specialized filesystem could take advantage of direct access to the disk. This would work in the interim so systems like Linux could take better advantage of SSD disks. Unfortunately we live in a Windows world and I don't think they have a vested interest in creating another filesystem.

Surely I cannot be the only one for whom size and weight is the main selling point of a netbook, not price. What I want is a small, 1 kg laptop, and I'd happily pay $500-800 for one with great performance and battery life.

To me netbooks and full size laptops are two different product ranges. If I'm in the market for a netbook I'm not going to get something large and heavy instead just because it's a bit cheaper.

kragil pointed out...

phoenix blustered back...


I see you're one of those people who are unable to see something with the size, portability, and price--yes price-- of these devices as anything other than a toy.

Too bad for you, you're going to be missing out on a lot of fun and useful stuff by persisting in this error.

For the first time in my life I have true computing portability with my ASUS EeePC 901. I can write, surf the net, play games, listen to music, play videos, compile code...

Anything I could do on my desktop I can do on my ASUS EeePC, but with the bonus of being able to take my EeePC with me anywhere. Without going frantic over whether or not the 6-8hr battery will last long enough to complete my work until I can get to a power outlet.

Why would I (or anybody else) want to spend more money on a "real" laptop whose size makes a complete mockery out its supposed portability when there are finally affordable options that deliver on their promises?

While I'm not exactly thrilled at the options game the various netbook companies are playing right now, if I have to pay more I'll do so to enhance the truly portable device, not to get the overheated behemoth with its two hour (if I'm lucky) battery life.

--bornagainpenguin

I see you're one of those people who are unable to see something with the size, portability, and price--yes price-- of these devices as anything other than a toy.

Too bad for you, you're going to be missing out on a lot of fun and useful stuff by persisting in this error. "

Nice try. See, I have an Asus eeePC 701, and use it just about everyday. It's quite a useful little thing. But there's no way I'd pay over $500 CDN for one, no matter how fast the CPU/SSD was.