The keys are small, but just the perfect amount of small—you'll only have a problem if you have fingers the size of fried carnival pastries. It took me about 15-30 seconds of mistyping to adjust and type just about perfectly, though your hands won't feel as loose as they are on a full size keyboard by means. They're really punchy, though shallow, too. Overall, good. The trackball is a little oversensitive, but adjustable too. What I do hate are the mouse buttons. They're too small and not distinguished enough, so easy to miss. Oh, and it's a smudge magnet.

Measuring 245mm wide, 120mm high (with the screen open), and 20mm thick, it's small and light enough to fit into a large pocket. Ports include a couple of USB2.0, a special dual-purpose display/LAN connector, headphone jack, and multi-card reader. Now if only it was $499 instead of $899; that would really be something. Throw in a touchscreen, too, while you're at it, Sony. Oders are being taken as of tomorrow and the first shipment will likely arrive in February.

HP in its pre-CES run-up introduced its first major update to its Mini 2100 netbook. The Mini 2140 replaces the Mini-Note 2133 and abandons VIA's C7-M processor in favor of a 1.6GHz Intel Atom that HP claims should extend its battery life and cool it down compared to the hot-running older model. It also switches from the original 8.9-inch screen to a 10-inch model and now has the pick of both the original, extra-sharp 1366x768 display to a lesser 1024x576 panel which is both lower-priced and less demanding on the graphics chipset.

Going back a bit, remember the HP Mini 2133? It looked like an excellent netbook on the outside, but was compromised by the VIA C7-M processor that lived inside. HP has now unveiled the Mini 2140, a netbook that now uses Intel's Atom N270 CPU as the base, sat on top of an Intel 945GSE chipset. There's a choice of hard drives, ranging from 160GB 5,400rpm, 7200rpm, and an 80GB SSD, which is nice.