THIS ONE!! But only cos I like the colour.

I love my aspire one (but not the linux that came with it). I have the 8GB SSD version and picked up a 6cell battery for it which gives a battery life of about 6 hours doing web surfing / streaming / whatever.

For me, the key concern in purchasing a netbook was the keyboard, and the A1's is non-crippling and has properly laid out arrow keys.

At the moment, I'm trying a new OS on it every week or so, trying to find what works best.

A couple of people at work have just bought Eee 901s, and seem to love them. They have excellent battery life (7h?), without buying an extra battery which can sometimes be big and clunky.

I would go for a 8.9in netbook rather than 10in; you wouldn't think an inch would make such a difference ha but in fact 10in ones look not nearly as portable as the 8.9ins.

I just got an acer aspire one, and I like it very much. Lightweight (about 2.5 pounds), good battery life (my model came with a 6 cell, which I recommend), nice screen and keyboard. Mine has the 160 GB hard drive, 1 GB ram, and comes with XP, too. For $379 at Buy.com. Not bad. Wireless Internet reception's not bad, either. It'll pick up about any hot spot.

My runner up, when I was doing my own research, was the MSI Wind. It has the 10" screen, a really comfortable looking keyboard, and even better wireless internet, but it's a little heavier (around 3 pounds), with somewhat less battery life (3-4 hours). It's also a little more expensive, at about $400. It depends what's most important to you. I went for less weight/longer battery life myself, over slightly bigger screen/keyboard and better WiFi, everything else being equal.

Now, my dream machine's the soon-to-be-released Sony Vaio P... 1.5 pounds, gorgeous design, up to 128 GB Solid State Drive and 2 GB ram, even clearer screen, screaming WiFi. Only problem is it starts at $900 (on up to about $1500 for top end specs). But if money was no option, that's surely what I'd get.

PIPS. you should not have shown me that P. Now I need to save up and get that. the size is perfect, i want to be able to live type notes in meetings but not distract folks with my laptop !

I know, I know... I'm almost tempted to send back my acer. Here's a more official link, at Sony. Seems to come in different colors now, too. *salivates*