The MacBook Air is pretty.
![](https://i0.wp.com/www.vomitron.com/wp-content/uploads/oldsiteimages/080124-1.jpg?resize=300%2C188&ssl=1)
Pretty EXPENSIVE, amirite?
Anyway it got me thinking. In the world of laptops, is it better to be thin or better to be small?
I say small!
Sony’s kind of had the small laptop market to itself for the past few years. But with prices for a Vaio TZ starting at two grand, subnotebooks have been a pretty unpopular product category.
All that changed in October when Asus released the Eee PC, a weakly-equipped Windows and OSX-compatible ultraportable for just $399.
![](https://i0.wp.com/www.vomitron.com/wp-content/uploads/oldsiteimages/080124-2.jpg?resize=300%2C202&ssl=1)
It’s got half-gig of ram, 4 gigs of solid-state storage, and a sad 800×480 resolution, but at 6.5×9″ it’s not much bigger than a paperback book. It’s definitely not a desktop replacement, but at just 2 pounds it’s the perfect size and weight to throw in a bag for a plane ride or whatever.
Everex’s Cloudbook goes on sale tomorrow for the same price as the Eee, but with a 30GB hard drive (and a strangely off-center LCD screen.)
![](https://i0.wp.com/www.vomitron.com/wp-content/uploads/oldsiteimages/080124-3.jpg?resize=300%2C218&ssl=1)
I think 2008 will be the year of the small footprint notebook. Steve Jobs got it so wrong!
![](https://i0.wp.com/www.vomitron.com/wp-content/uploads/oldsiteimages/080124-4.jpg?resize=300%2C209&ssl=1)
Once these hit 1024×768 I might consider picking one up. Maybe.