Moving at the Speed of Creativity by Wesley Fryer

A projector in my pocket and a Netbook in my satchel

Could this be true? A working data projector for $300? The lumens aren’t too bright, but it does work, and I’m nothing short of AMAZED.

Wes Fryer holding the $300 3M Projector

3M $300 palm-sized LED projector

See my ISTEconnects post, “The handheld $300 3M LED Projector” for more info. More photos are in this Flickr set. David Jakes was impressed too! 🙂

David Jakes holding the 3M $300 LED projector

I was also enviously holding the predecessor to the HP Mini 1000 Netbook at the CoSN conference today. The keyboard on the HP Mini is about 92% of fullsize, so unlike other netbooks I’ve briefly tried (like the Dell Inspiron Mini 9) this netbook doesn’t feel “toyish” when my fingers are on the keyboard. This doesn’t feel at all like an XO laptop. Of course it costs about three times as much as an XO does, but it is still less than $500 with the extended battery.

Wes Fryer with the HP Mini 1000 netbook

HP Mini 1000 netbook

HP Mini 1000 netbook

HP Mini 1000 netbook (sideview of LCD port)

Despite my admitted techno-lust for this netbook, if I’m able to purchase a new laptop in the next few months I’ll probably opt for the Apple Macbook which was updated this past fall. Honestly I just can’t see myself living without Mars Edit and Skitch! I’d definitely buy the netbook with a Linux operating system rather than Windows XP, however, if I was buying.

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3 responses to “A projector in my pocket and a Netbook in my satchel”

  1. Jim Avatar
    Jim

    The HP 2133 is pretty sweet – I’m using one to post this comment! The 2140 looks decent, but the high-res screen isn’t available yet.

    I paid about $350 for my 2133 last month from TigerDirect. 1GB RAM, 160GB HD, 1280×768 screen, running SuSE Enterprise – but without a license, no software updates are available, so mine is running Fedora. A 3-cell battery lasts me about 2 hours, which is my one regret – the 2140 has better battery life with the Atom processor, but the 2133 hi-res screen is sooooo beautiful…

    I’ve tried typing on an XO. My 2133 definitely has a REAL keyboard. (The system is also much more responsive than the XO, but that’s a different story.) It was basically the combination of keyboard and screen that were the major factors in my decision – the feeling of solid build quality is just an added bonus.

    You’ve got good taste. (BTW found your blog while googling for a satchel for my netbook – which your entry doesn’t recommend, but it was lovely to see someone else appreciate the HP 2133/2140.)

  2. Dave Winter Avatar

    Nice Projector! Good to see you putting a stick in the ground for a linux netbook. I would still plonk for windows espec if could get one to instant boot lol. Weren’t aware of the blog tools but have been impressed with live writer as a product from Microsoft. It certainly adds to format freedom when working with blogs.