Physical aspects | HP mini Vivienne Tam Edition - A radiant netbook | Subnotes

HP mini Vivienne Tam Edition - A radiant netbook - Physical aspects

Saturday, 09 May 2009 12:26 Mathias Wedelholm

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Article Index
HP mini Vivienne Tam Edition - A radiant netbook
Specifications
Package contents
Physical aspects
Physical aspects continued
Benchmark
Benchmark continued
Conclusion
All Pages

Page 4 of 8

Physical aspects

First impression

As is always the case with netbooks, the size really impresses. This one is exceptional though, in more ways than one. It has an incredibly low weight even with battery, which might be comparable to that of a heavy book. Carrying it around is no problem at all. Additionally, its width and depth are lower than those of an A4 sheet of paper, and the charger is actually thicker than the computer. Impressive.

The design is smooth and decorated with flowers. It's definitely aimed at female users, mostly because of the colours and design; otherwise it's practically made for student use and such is not limited to women. It can easily fit in a shoulder bag and the like, and if you keep it in the sleeve you won't have to worry about scratches. On the other hand, a design with such a rich floral pattern is less likely to show any scratches.

The keyboard appears to be of good size and the touchpad has been given more than enough space. It's easy to navigate around the keyboard and the display has a fine size. It's incredible that 10.1 inches feels so much larger than 8.9...it really makes a difference to the user in my opinion.

The speakers appear once you open the lid and are located right beneath the display. They look very slick in a silvery colour, a fine contrast to the otherwise red look. Again the focus is on appearance.

The lid:

The lid is fairly thin and the hinges are tight whether the lid is open or closed or anywhere in between. At the last 4cm before it closes, it feels like it gets a bit looser and closes off with a comforting "slam" feeling, yet without making a sound.

It's primarily the lid which sports the unique design, and the display is surprisingly clear compared to the surroundings. You can't see that it is, in fact, a designer netbook when you're using it (save for the red colour), but everyone else can. Show off? Regardless, it looks quite elegant. HP have imprinted their logo on the lid but rather discreetly compared to the floral patterns.

The front:

It took me quite a while to figure out, but the front has two buttons. Both have discreet icons to indicate what they are used for, but looking at those icons is much too easy. After a couple of minutes of eager examination, I found that the button to the left is the power button. However, it looks exactly like the other button, which is for (de)activating WiFi. The two differ also in the colour of their diode; where the WiFi diode is blue/red, the power button is white. Both are in reality switches so you won't turn off the computer by accident, and the fact that they are so discreet is not annoying in the slightest...you just have to figure it out first. There are also battery and HDD status indicators.

The rear:

Nothing much of interest here, because the lid slides behind the rear when you open it. A part of it is in a metallic colour so the computer doesn't get too red.