1.66GHz Intel Atom N280
1GB RAM
160GB hard drive
None
10.1 inches (1,024x600)
Integrated Intel GMA 950
2.6 pounds
0.9x10.3x7.1 inches
Windows XP Home
1GB RAM
160GB hard drive
None
10.1 inches (1,024x600)
Integrated Intel GMA 950
2.6 pounds
0.9x10.3x7.1 inches
Windows XP Home
In the continuing evolution of the netbook, each successive generation has rapidly improved the shortcomings of the last. The HP Mini 5101 leapfrogs to the front of the line thanks to a roomier keyboard, very good battery life, and improved performance (compared with other netbooks, at least). HP has also designed in durability and connectivity features that make the Mini 5101 more suitable for business users than most other netbooks, while holding the line on price: The Mini 5101 starts at $399, and our tested configuration is priced at a reasonable $425.
The Mini 5101 is wrapped in a subdued-yet-attractive aluminum and magnesium-alloy chassis.
The first thing you’ll notice about the 2.6-pound Mini 5101 is that it’s less noticeable than other netbooks. Instead of a glossy plastic candy-colored shell, the Mini 5101 is housed in an all-metal case: magnesium alloy for the base and anodized aluminum for the lid. The two materials are lightweight and much stronger than plastic, and the black finish gives the machine a classy (as opposed to flashy) look.
Continuing the durability theme, HP included a spill-resistant keyboard with DuraKeys coating (which the company claims makes the printed characters 50 times more resistant to visible wear than keyboards without it) as well as a hard drive with HP 3D DriveGuard technology, which employs an accelerometer to sense sudden movements and park the drive heads to prevent platter damage and possible data loss. And for bulletproof reliability, you can opt for the 80GB solid-state drive (SSD).
Flip the lid and you’ll find another welcome improvement: The keyboard is 95 percent the size of a full-size laptop keyboard. That one-ups HP’s other 10-inch netbooks, which have heretofore class-leading 92 percent keyboards. The black keys are of the Chiclet variety, meaning the flat keys jut out from individual squares and rectangles cut into a solid backplane (a look pioneered on the MacBook), which gives less of a refuge to crumbs and dust. The roominess of the keyboard makes it enjoyable to type on though the keys don’t have the travel or tactile feel of a high-quality traditional keyboard. But all the keys are in the right places—not a given with netbooks—and the right-hand Enter and Shift keys are downright huge.
The HP Mini 5101 features a roomy keyboard with downright huge Enter and Shift keys.
Another plus: While most netbooks do without dedicated volume buttons because of space constraints, the Mini 5101 gets around this by making tasks such as volume, mute, and display brightness the primary purpose of the traditional Function keys. So to change the volume or brightness, simply hit the key marked by the desired icon. If you want to activate F1 through F10, you hold down the Fn key and hit the desired key—just as you would on nearly every regular-size notebook on the market.
The other attraction under the lid is the 10.1-inch LED-backlit screen. It is bright and crisp, and delivers rich, well-saturated colors. The 1,024x600 resolution is par for the course, and HP will offer a 1,366x768 panel as a $25 upgrade, which would make it a direct competitor to Sony’s $499 VAIO W, with the same resolution. Audio from the front-firing stereo speakers isn’t bad for a netbook. The sound is expectedly thin and lacking in bass punch, but it doesn’t sound as much like a transistor radio as others we’ve heard, and there’s plenty of volume.
On the performance front, the Mini 5101 employs a 1.66GHz Intel Atom N280 processor, 1GB of RAM (configurations with 2GB are available for $525 and $599, but other factors contribute to those preconfigured SKUs as well) and Intel GMA 950 integrated graphics. That CPU is marginally faster than the N270 chip in most Intel-based netbooks to date and gives the Mini 5101 a slight performance advantage. As with other netbooks, however, you won’t want to edit video or play 3D games with the system. While the Mini 5101 managed the best score yet on 3DMark06 (for a netbook with integrated graphics, which includes all of them except the Asus N10Jc) at its native resolution (125), it’s still a long ways from being able to do anything graphically useful.
On the right you’ll find an Ethernet jack, USB port, mic and headphone jacks, and an SD/MMC card slot.
Nonetheless, the Mini 5101’s times of 25 minutes and 40 seconds on our Windows Media Encoder 9 trial and 21 minutes and 16 seconds on our iTunes test—both of which measure CPU performance—are faster than the average of netbooks tested to date. Similarly, the Mini 5101’s score of 870 on Cinebench 10 is above average for the class. More importantly, the 6-cell battery that came standard with our configuration lasted a very good 6 hours and 21 minutes on our harsh video-streaming test. That’s among the best runtimes we’ve seen to date—not as long as the MSI Wind U123, which lasted longer than 7 hours, but a good 40 minutes longer than the recently released Toshiba Mini NB205; with judicious use, you should expect to see the 8 hours HP claims.
The Mini 5101 also does better than other netbooks when it comes to connectivity. You get 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi (some models make do with b/g to shave cost) and Bluetooth. You can also configure it with an optional EV-DO/HSPA mobile broadband module for 3G mobile broadband service via your choice of carriers. Other features are fairly typical for a netbook, and include a 160GB hard drive (250GB and 320GB units are also available, along with the 80GB SSD), a 2-megapixel Webcam, VGA port, LAN jack, three USB ports and an SD/MMC card slot. HP makes the Mini 5101 complete by offering a host of matching accessories: a USB-/AC-powered portable optical drive ($149.99), a port replicator ($69), a USB docking station ($139), USB-powered portable speakers ($39.99), a 250GB USB-powered external hard drive ($99.99), and a wireless travel mouse ($39.99)
Two more USB ports (for a total of three) and a VGA out port are on the left edge of the machine.
The Webcam delivered a usable image with accurate colors even in low light, though in all lighting conditions we noticed quite a bit of motion blur when subjects moved. There is no Webcam utility preinstalled (you’ll have to download Skype or another third-party tool), but we have no complaints about the preloaded Corel Home Office suite (a $69 value). This full-featured productivity suite includes word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation applications. They all have the look of Microsoft Office 2007 but with the choice of using Microsoft’s Ribbon interface or the earlier, more user-friendly menu interface. With Corel Home Office, you can open (and save files to) a range of popular file formats, including Microsoft Office (older versions and Office 2007) and PDF. HP also includes PDF Create Special Edition for working with PDF files. The Mini 5101 is backed by a 1-year warranty.
While cheaper netbooks are out there, the roomy keyboard, durability features, long battery life, and other niceties of the Mini 5101 make it worth the extra $50 to $75. And if you want a netbook for business use, the Mini 5101 has no equal.
*Editors' Note: We updated this review on July 29, 2009. The original text included the sentence: "We did notice some fan noise with our late preproduction machine." After this review posted, HP sent a final-production unit, and the fan noise was no longer present. This did not affect the rating.
Price (at time of review): $425 (direct, as tested)
