I need a netbook, my main priority is battery life, any ideas?

SmokeStacks

Title says it all. I'll be leaving in a couple of weeks for a project that will have me basically traveling throughout mid and northern California for anywhere from one to four weeks. I'll be traveling primarily by bus, which means I will likely not have a lot of AC availability during transit, so I'll need a device with good battery life as well as a couple of spare batteries. Some buses do have outlets on them, but I doubt all of them will.

Since I'll be traveling light I am looking for the smallest and lightest option available to me. None of these 10.1" "netbooks" that are actually small laptops.

I'll be using it primarily for typing, light web browsing (via wifi if available, or a 3G adaptor if not), and uploading image and text files, so CPU speed and graphical performance are not priorities. Hard drive space is not an issue either, since I will likely not be storing anything other than text files and images on it and I can always just carry along an SD card or a USB stick if that need changes.

The only caveat I have is that I can't seem to find any broadband adaptors with software that works with Linux, so the netbook will have to be capable of running some variant of Windows.

I used to have a Asus eeepc, and old 900A, and it was awesome, so basically I'm looking for the smallest, most battery efficient device that has a screen and a keyboard. If anyone could help me out with suggestions I would really appreciate it.

SniperGuy

I my 1000 HE with an additional gig of RAM. It gets insane battery life, upwards of 8-10 hours depending on what I'm doing with it. Keyboard is 92% the size of a regular one as well. An external mouse is recommended, but I just hate touchpads.

KalTorak

I've seen a couple Asus EEEs on amazon with claims of up to 14 hours. Here's one:

http://www.amazon.com/Seashell-1005PE-PU17-BU-10-1-Inch-Netbook-Battery/dp/B00322PYZY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1280757482&sr=8-1

Dehumanized

Asus' battery life estimates are made of lies and slander. Take their estimate and slash it by 40%. Still very good after doing that, of course.

Tinche

One more vote for the Eee. Be sure to go for the new Atoms, so 1005PE.

SmokeStacks

Cool. Seems like I'll have to got for a screen size a bit larger than I wanted, but it beats lugging around a full sized laptop.

Thanks guys.

moumou

Asus' battery life estimates are made of lies and slander. Take their estimate and slash it by 40%. Still very good after doing that, of course.

Irond Will

you might consider a 3G iPad for the uses you require. It sounds like it would handle all of that and has a pretty incredible battery.

Improvolone

moumou wrote: »

Asus' battery life estimates are made of lies and slander. Take their estimate and slash it by 40%. Still very good after doing that, of course.

My Eee from two years ago was accurate, but I'm not sure about the 12 hr claims.

Tinche

Here's Anandtech's review of the 1005PE. According to their tests it does 845 minutes idling at the desktop. That's just over 14 hours. Heavy flash surfing - 590 minutes (almost 10 hours), DivX - 428 minutes (over 7 hours).

Edit: from the article - "you should be able to get 12+ hours doing basic document editing (assuming you're not playing music in the background)."

SmokeStacks

Irond Will wrote: »

you might consider a 3G iPad for the uses you require. It sounds like it would handle all of that and has a pretty incredible battery.

I need something with a physical keyboard and a realistic pricetag.

I really don't see why they don't still sell 8.9" models. I'm half tempted just to track down an old 900a and a couple of replacement batteries.

The battery life on the 1005PE is pretty awesome though.

Simjanes2k

1005PE for sure. I came to this thread after reading the title specifically to recommend it. Check CNET's review as well, they gave it a 10.0 for battery life, which is basically unattainable.

Man it won't DIE