People will always remember the Asus eeepc kicking off the Netbook range but history books should show that it was the OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) project that really started the concept of a netbook – that is a small, low cost laptop affordable for all.   Asus were the first to develop such a laptop for mainstream public though so they get the credentials.

Netbooks seem to be the latest in portability solutions and most of the big companies now have a netbook range or are readily working on one.  Acer, Dell, HP, Toshiba MSI and Samsung are just a few of the companies offering netbooks all with varying specifications and varying sizes.  Some have an 8 inch screen while others offer you a 10 inch screen and are bordering on the edges of what are also known as Ultra Mobile Laptops – laptops which are higher specced and more expensive but with a small screen typically 10-12 inches.  Generally an Ultra Mobile laptop will today come with Vista pre-installed but at the moment you will expect a variation of Linux or Windows XP on a netbook.

A few weeks ago I got my hands on the new Advent 4213 Netbook.  Now Advent is not renowned for being the best company in the world and in its early days they pushed out some very flaky hardware, but the new 4213 Netbook is a delight to behold and is packed to the rafters with mobile features and is one of the most impressively packed netbook there is in the UK market today.

Advent have given us a 10 inch screen, Intel Atom 1.6 ghz processor, 1gb ram, 160gb hard drive, 3 usb ports, SD card slot, VGA out for connection to external monitor, webcam, ethernet, bluetooth, wi-fi and the big selling point – integrated HSDPA modem so you can pop in your sim card and have 3G broadband speeds depending on your local coverage.  It is also unlocked so you can use any network sim but beware a data package is important so you do not get unexpected high bills.  Sadly there is no optical drive, but as far as I know, no netbook has a DVD drive yet.

The netbook is very light and weighs 1.4Kg (although feels lighter than that) and is encased in nice glossy black plastic which has a tough feel to it.  It is actually so light I can easily lift the machine from the open lid with only two fingers although in practice this is not a recommended method of carrying the machine.  The battery life is a little shy of 4 hours which is better than many standard laptops, this may be in part to the new Atom processor which is supposed to be energy efficient.  The screen hinge is tight and stiff and gives a reassuring solid feel.  The only problem is the small keyboard.  This is not a problem unique to this netbook but a common problem with all netbooks.  Because of the small form factor, something has to give and usually this means a smaller keyboard than standard.  Because the keys are quite small you have to be more careful with typing to avoid errors.

The 4213 runs with Windows XP Home preinstalled and some may be wondering how they reinstall the Windows XP without a DVD drive.  Well what Advent have done is to do the usual “create a recovery disc” feature on the desktop however it does not run on a CD or DVD, you create it onto an SD card or USB stick which is 2gb or more in size.  The SD card or USB stick is then a bootable drive with your restore software on it.  The restore partition is still there though so if you lose your media you can restore the drive by pressing F10 on booting up the machine and restoring from there.

Most of the hardware can be switched on and off with function key hotkeys.  Bluetooth, wi-fi, HSDPA, webcam and touchpad can all be disabled with function key.  If you reboot the machine all settings will be saved and if something is disabled it will remain disabled until you enable it again.  Oddly though, the webcam is always enabled no matter what.  This is quite annoying as I do not use webcams and I do not want it using power and showing its light everytime I use the machine.  So I keep having to disable it although that is just me, there is no reason why I cannot leave it running except for saving battery life.

I have to make a mention of the “silent mode”.   This is an energy saving feature that will underclock the processor to 800mhz when powering from battery.  This works incredibly well.  Some reviews have said this makes no difference to the sound of the machine but I can state now that when silent mode is activated, the machine is truly silent, you cannot hear a single whirr from it.  Silent mode can also be activated and deactivated from a function key so it can also be used when powering from the mains.

Like all laptops/netbooks, the Advent 4213 gets warm underneath but from my experience it is lukewarm at best and never gets hot, it is never a problem to actually have it on your lap if a table is not forthcoming.

Most cheap laptops nowadays come with loads of junk preinstalled and takes an age to uninstall but thankfully Advent have included the bare minimum.  From what I can see there is only Adobe Reader, Flash, Microsoft Works 9, Cyberlink Webcam software and Avantquest Connection Manager software which you can use for your 3G/HSDPA sim card connection. There is also of course the Techguys recovery software which helps you to create your bootable media.

There is not a lot more I can say about this netbook.  As said before it is one of the most impressive netbooks available in the shops today and can be purchased from PC World and Pixmania amongst other places for approximately £329.  This does mark the price up from other netbooks available on the market but you do get a lot of bang for your buck.

How does the Advent 4213 perform using Vista as it’s operating system?  Well come back later for a further post on it’s Vista performance.