Without a doubt, 2009 is the year of netbooks, and this is clear at this year's CeBIT, where pretty much everyone has its own netbook model, built on the same Atom-based platform. For this reason, you're going to see a lot of netbooks coming your way during CeBIT 2009, starting with two models from MSI, the U115 and U110, which we've gotten relatively close and personal with.

I think that some of you have started hating this netbook trend already and frankly I can't blame you. This year's CeBIT fair is definitely overrun by netbooks. However, some of them are innovative enough to actually matter. The U 120 is the first WiMAX Ready netbook on the market, while the U115 Hybrid will have both SSD and HDD drives built in, not to mention a battery life of up to 12 hours using a 6 cell battery and under ECO mode (which means that if you're not running in ECO power saving mode, forget about those extra hours).

The U115 Hybrid offers you a choice of 8GB and 16GB SSD, together with a 120 or 160 GB 2.5'' SATA hard disk. Consider them like two partitions, one for your operating system for faster boot and performance, the other for high-storage capabilities.

The U110 ECO “features up to 9 hours of battery life when using a 6cell battery.” Not only is it eco-friendly, but also measures 26cm x 18cm and weighs just 1kg. It has 2GB supported memory, full multimedia interface, wireless networking and Bluetooth support. Perhaps these two are worth a shot even though you've seen enough netbooks for a lifetime.

The press release also promises that MSI will keep investing in this market segment and trying to bring new and inventive ideas to further enhance what we know today as the common netbook.

Live report by Alex Vochin from CeBIT 2009 in Hanover, Germany.


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