Lost in the hoopla of ASUS releasing the 12.1-inch Eee PC 1215N, as well as other netbooks that were recently released with dual-core Intel Atom CPUs, earlier this month HP updated it the 10.1-inch HP Mini 5103 netbook with a dual-core option and a new color option for its metal case (Espresso). I believe the Bluetooth 3.0 HS option is new. The dual-core information actually leaked out right before HP announced it.
I find the 5103 very nice looking and with the dual-core Atom option, and it’s definitely worth considering, especially with the 720p HD option. It doesn’t fall under HP’s Home and Home Office division, but under the business/enterprise division instead, and that could be why it doesn’t have an HDMI port. Yet it comes with a Broadcom HD video decoder Card that supports 720p video (which the HD 1366×768 display supports) or 1080p (which the VGA port does not support – 1680×1050). It’s an odd thing, but it already has the slot that can accept the video decoder – it also accepts a mobile broadband card internally in place of the video decoder.
At the beginning of the month, James Kendrick at jkOnTheRun published a review of not only the dual-core Intel Atom option, but with the capacitive touchscreen option as well. He views the touchscreen option the same way I do – on a non-convertible laptop or netbook, it’s not very useful since it’s a bit awkward to take your hands off the keyboard to use. He was able to get around 7.5 hours with the 6-cell battery option in real-world use and was impressed with the performance.
Read: jkOnTheRun