Due to my impulsive site redesign this weekend, I cut this week’s poll short by a day. But it looks like the majority of readers are interested in the Intel Atom CPU.
I can’t say I blame you. The processor is designed specifically for low-cost, light weight computers. While it’s not going to win any awards in the speed department, a 1.6GHz Atom CPU seems to perform as well or better than the 900MHz Celeron processor included in the original Asus Eee PC. And it does this while consuming significantly less power, which means longer battery life. And as we proved last week, long battery life is one of the most sought-after features in an ultraportable laptop. After all, what’s the point of having a 2-3 pound laptop if you have to carry around a power cable and/or several spare batteries just to use the thing for more than an hour at a time?
The VIA Nano came in a strong second, while a fair number of readers said they’d be happy to stick with a Celeron CPU, which offers respectable performance at a low price. The VIA C7-M CPU, which powers the Everex Cloudbook and HP Mini-Note, among other existing computers, was a far less popular choice. While I love my Mini-Note’s build quality and excellent screen, the 1.2GHz VIA C7-M CPU is pretty sluggish. Multitasking is pretty difficult, and watching web video from sites like Hulu is a bit of a chore.
Now that Computex is over, and pretty much every company that we expect to announce a cheap laptop has done so (with the exception of Dell, who will be making an official announcement any day now), I’m curious how many of you plan to rush out and buy a new computer soon. So be sure to vote in this week’s poll!
