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Windows 7 Starter (32-bit)

Windows 7 Starter (32-bit)Intel Atom N450 Processor 1.66GHz (667MHz FSB)1GB 800MHz DDR2 SDRAM160GB 5400rpm SATA Fujitsu HDD10.1-inch diagonal (1366×768)Intel GMA 3150 integrated graphicsBroadcom 802.11a/b/g/n and Bluetooth 2.1 +EDR4-in-1 media card slotDimensions: 10.55 in (L) x 6.9 in (W) x 0.9-1.11 in (H)Weight: 2.69 lb with 3-cell battery (not including weight of AC adapter).Power: 3-cell 28Wh batteryWarranty: One-year standard warrantyPrice: $409.99 (current price with standard, 7200RPM hard drive)

Screen and Speakers

The display on the HP Mini 210 HD is unlike most other netbooks. It has a higher WXGA (1366×768) resolution instead of the usual 1024×600 panel found on other models. This is useful in a number of ways, including properly displaying menu windows and reducing excessive horizontal or vertical scrolling. Another added benefit is being able to watch 720P video, although it also relies on you having a Broadcom CrystalHD decoder card configured with the system. Without that card the system would be unable to play the content, let alone display it on the higher resolution panel at reasonable framerates.

The panel itself is easy to read–at least with my eyes–and text doesn’t appear to be that small compared to other mobile devices. If you can read small text on a mobile phone, you should be able to view the screen without any problems. Color and contrast are very nice, although at times I felt reflections off the all-glass surface seemed to obscure part of the panel. Backlight levels were great for viewing the screen in bright office conditions, but outdoor viewing was out of the question. Viewing angles were average compared to other notebooks, with colors starting to invert or distort when the screen was tilted about 15 degrees forward or back. Horizontal viewing angles were better, but the reflections seemed to obscure the panel past 45 to 50 degrees.

The small speakers on the HP Mini 210 HD are located on the front edge of the palmrest, angled downward towards your lap. On a flat desktop they easily filled up a small room with music but once you placed the netbook in your lap they became muffled and easily blocked by clothing. Sound quality was average compared to other similarly sized netbooks, with weak bass and midrange.

Keyboard and Touchpad

The HP Mini 210 HD features a 93% fullsize Chiclet keyboard. For short term use the keyboard is comfortable to type on and feels as strong as typing on a regular notebook. The size though can feel slightly cramped depending on if you are used to typing on a larger notebook. For short term travel or light usage in the home for web browsing you probably won’t have any problem. If you intended to use this as your primary system, you might want to consider moving up to the 11.6″ ultraportable form-factor which is closer to standard full-size while still being very portable.

Function keys on the keyboard are direct access, meaning you don’t need to press the “Fn” button to adjust the screen brightness or enable Wi-Fi. Another feature is built-in indicator lights for the mute and wireless on/off buttons. While there is no performance different between this and side mounted lights, it helps in the aesthetics department.

The touchpad on the Mini 210 HD is a button-less Synaptics ClickPad with multitouch support. Compared to the twitchy variant found on the HP ProBook recently reviewed, we found no such problems on this particular version. Unlike the earlier version, if your finger was resting on a pre-defined left/right button box, any movement on the main touchpad section would activate pinch-zoom. Now those areas are dead zones, preventing a lot of frustration we previously had. The touchpad surface was very smooth and almost glossy in texture. Sensitivity was excellent without any adjustment needed and acceleration on both axes was equal. It’s hard to say if the touchpad has reached the same ease of use level of the one found on the MacBooks’, but it is getting very close.

Battery Life

The stock battery on the HP Mini 210 HD is a 3-cell 28Wh model with an indicated capacity of 23Wh. Compared to models like the ASUS Eee PC 1005PE with a 63Wh battery, this is only a fraction of the capacity of competing models. In our testing with the screen brightness reduced to 70%, wireless activate and refreshing a webpage every 60 seconds, and Windows 7 on a balanced profile the Mini 210 HD stayed on for 3 hours and 18 minutes. An extended battery is offered as an option with this model… given the results we saw with the 3-cell battery we highly recommend you opt for the larger size.