I rarely go laptop crazy. I have a trusty Macbook (one of those first White ones) and I am quite happy with it, except for the time when I need to lag it in my bag and it is quite heavy. I have been on the look out for one of those netbooks however, I wanted one with higher capacity as I wanted to use this for work as well especially when power is out at home.

So here are the laptops that has gotten my attention this time around:

1. HP Envy

After getting a top of the line HP Pavilion work station, I am now impressed with these all in one power heavies. Everything from mouse to monitor to keyboard have this embossed and silver insigna HP which my children and I love. Eye-catching all black with silver trim, the HP Pavilion is hard core as can be. I just ordered a new Pocket Media Drive to go with it from Amazon, and I cannot wait to fix my HDD and move and clean up my HDD.

So when it comes to netbooks, I have my eye on HP Envy and HP Mini. I am more inclined to drool and dream about the Envy because of its technical features:

• 1.6GHz Intel Core2 Duo SL9300 Processor (6MB L2 Cache, 1066 MHz FSB)
• 3 GB DDR3 System Memory (1 Dimm); Expandable to 5GB
• 250GB (5400RPM) SATA Hard Drive; External SuperMulti 8X DVD±R/RW with Double Layer Support
• 13.1¿ Diagonal High Definition LED HP Radiance Infinity Widescreen Display (1366×768)
• ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4330 Graphics with up to 1757MB total graphics memory with 512 MB dedicated
• Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit; Up to 16.25 Hours of Battery Life

Not bad.  And its running on Windows 7 already.  Be still my heart!

Cost:  $1,000-  :(

2.  HP Mini

HP carries an array of Minis and I just love the fact that they are MINI!  Man, so small and almost notebook size.  Great for travels and quick internet access and use anywhere.  Almost like my Nokia E72 which I like to use at home for quick email checks and twitter and facebook updates using Gravity.

I am in love with the Vivienne Tam Edition Series.  It is several hundred more expensive than the non-special mini’s but heck, this is dreamworld, so I can dream and drool non-stop.  So, for now, I am taken with the Vivienne Tam Edition Series.  I wonder how many stores in Manila have the VT Series, cause this is not available here in Northern Mindanao.

• An Intel Atom N450 processor for reliable performance
• Simplified daily PC activities with genuine Windows 7 Home Premium
• 2GB of system memory and a 250GB⁴ hard drive
• Three ports for transferring data to/from other devices
• A 10.1″ (diagonal) antiglare display
• A VGA port for connecting a monitor
• Integrated wireless-G for access within range of a hotspot² (Wireless-N and Bluetooth are optional)
• The options of a 320GB hard drive, 2.4GHz wireless mouse in the same design, and external multi-format CD/DVD drive for installing software (the Mini has no internal optical drive)
• ENERGY STAR^® qualification

Cost:  $599-700

3. iPad

Isn’t iPad a portable laptop?  Sort of.  (shrugs)  Despite the fact that I am veering away from Apple products now because of their cost, I am still quite taken with the iPad.  I think all Apple products are great except the fact that they are just too damn expensive and the applications for Mac are NOT free.  :(

Cost:  $499

Anyway, anyone can dream even me.  I have no plans of getting another laptop, but I do have some extra, I would not mind having the Mini or the Envy.

Today my daughters Alis and Freida received their ribbons.  Pascalis is 5th in her class.  I am so happy that she managed to get a ribbon since she really worked hard this year and struggled with Filipino.  Freida made it to 4th in her class as well as Most Behave Award.  Naks…

Anyway, to make it worse, I took the digital camera with me without the batteries… DUH…

I also took the opportunity to drop by digitalhub to seek the help of an Apple Technician.  Well, it was confirmed that my adapter was indeed fried and I needed to replace it.

It cost me

I panicked the other day when I woke up to rush to my Macbook to work and discovered it failed to charge overnight.  I was surprised to see the battery life at 22%.  I tried wiggling the adapter and noticed that the green indicator was off.  I went to Mac website to search “battery” at support and went nowhere.  To make it worse, one of my clients went online and asked me to help with the research for an article he was doing an I almost died…

This was perhaps the worst day of my life as a webworker.  I panicked and turn off the dying Macbook and rushed to my daughter’s PC and when I go there, I realized that all my important data were in the Macbook…  In short, I did my work in the PC and proceeded with the search for answer.  I dreaded that something worse must have happened to my Macbook.  Dang, how much would a new battery cost?  A quick check at the Philippines Apple Store gave me the figure of P6,990 for the battery…

What???  I almost cried…

I checked philmug.ph for help and I got immediate response and the advise that I got was that the problem was probably the adapter or the battery.  Since my children and I were scheduled to head for town the next day, I used their PC for my webwork and I was simply lost.  The bookmarks in the other PC was not updated, not to mention that my passwords were all in my Macbook.

I was lost… and to make it worse, my children kept hounding me if I was done with work because my daughters wanted to use the computer and play online games at y8.com.  Ayay!!!  My head started to beat and I felt like dying, so I decided to…