Hewlett Packard is one of the largest IT companies in the world. Its history goes back to 1939 when William Hewlett and David Packard used a coin to decide if the company would be named Hewlett Packard or Packard Hewlett. Packard won, but for some reason decided to name the electronics division "Hewlett-Packard Company”. It's been a long time since then and the company has grown to be one of the largest technology companies in the world.



The rules of it say that you can only keep being the best if you follow upon your customer's demands. And as the trend goes these days, people like netbooks. Not an original HP idea, but if people want it and HP wants to stay in the headlights, they have no choice but to provide their own solution. Especially since rebranding would be really shameful in this case.



So they came up with the Mini 1000. Going over things step by step we find an 10.3” (L) x 6.56” (W) x 0.99” (H) black netbook served with a coat of Windows XP (home edition) with SP3. The screen comes with a choice; users can opt for the 8.9” model or the 10.2” model, both with 1024x600 resolution.



As far as performance goes we find that the Mini 1000 is powered by the already standard Intel Atom N270 processor, while the graphics are handled by an Intel GMA 950 chip. This is a standard for almost any netbook, so there's no point in talking about it.



HP offers 3 storage solutions which cater to the light Internet browsing user, who can choose between a 8GB or a 16GB SDD, or the storage addicted user who can choose the 60GB PATA drive.



As most netbooks are built for portability and communications, the Mini 1000 also integrates a HP mini webcam for on the fly video conferencing. It's rather disappointing to learn that Bluetooth is optional with the Mini and HP only considers WiFi capabilities a priority. At least we have that.



The really disappointing fact about the HP Mini is the 3 cell battery which does nothing for autonomy. It's a shame considering notebooks are preferred for portability and battery life. The idea is to always have a portable computer at your side and be able to use anytime of the day without worrying about battery life. Users can just plug it in a power socket at the end of the day and have it ready in a few hours. HP says they will provide a more powerful battery sometime in January 2008.



There's also a choice (unlike the OS) for memory capacity and users can opt for 510 of DDR2 memory or 1GB of DDR2 memory.



The price for the fully featured Mini is $549.99.