Americans support the notion of a government administered health insurance plan by a margin of 65% to 26%. According to the same poll, people who identify themselves as Democrats favor the public option by a margin of 81% to 12%. That’s nearly 7 to 1 in favor of, yet the representatives of the Democrat party in the Senate Finance Committee only voted for the public option at a ratio of 8 to 5. Perhaps the most interesting number revealed by this poll is that Republican voters favor the public option 47% to 42%.

So why can’t the people’s representatives in Washington get behind the public option? Specifically, why can’t these five Democrats get behind it when 81% of people in their party want the option?

Look at the amount of money the health industry has pumped into these five Democrat’s coffers:

- Max Baucus got $7,734,102,

- Blanche Lincoln received $4,190,592,

- Ken Conrad took in $3,287,891,

- Bill Nelson was given $2,414,895

- Tom Carper accepted $1,592,380 from health industry interests.

If money is the reason these five Democrats rejected the public option, then it only took a little over 19 million dollars over 20 years to buy the five votes the health insurance industry needed to kill any meaningful reform to their industry.

intershame.com

The MSI Wind U100.

I bought an MSI Wind U100 exactly one month ago. I paid $350 at Best Buy for the following configuration:

• 120 GB hard drive
• 10" screen
• 3-cell battery
• 1 GB of RAM
• 1.3 megapixel video camera (above screen)
• Ports: (Left of keyboard) 2 USB 2.0 ports. (Right of keyboard) ethernet port, VGA port, headphone and mic ports, SD card slot, 1 USB 2.0 port. No BlueTooth.
• Operating System = Windows XP Home

The short review? I LOVE my Wind.

I've broken down the review by topic, rated each category from 1 (lowest) to 10 (highest), and have also noted a little about myself, to (hopefully) help you decide if the Wind is right for you. If you have any questions, please feel free to hit me up in the comments.

First, some background.

Why is this computer so cheap?

The Wind is only $375 out the door(!) because a new model is due out in the next couple months. A netbook, the Wind does not have a DVD/CD drive.

I don't need the upgrades and wanted to avoid the $600 price tag on the newer version, so the discounted U100 was perfect for me.

Who is MSI?

Most people probably haven't heard of MSI. I know I hadn't until I started researching the Wind. It turns out that MSI (Micro-Star International) is an OEM manufacturing company specializing in motherboards and based in Taiwan and China. The Wind is their only retail computer I know of that has been widely sold in the United States.

About Me

I'm in my early 30's and have been using a computer for most of my life. I've done some IT support for both Windows computers and for Macs, and I worked for years as a web developer. I've built a couple computers from scratch with my younger brother, but haven't done anything of the sort in at least five years. That said, I'm not an engineer and don't have any sort of technical training.

I recently completed law school, and have been using Apple laptops daily for the last 6+ years. I'm now using my Wind as my sole/primary computer, and have been doing so for the last month. I'm a web surfing junkie (working to reform my information-soaked ways) and spend more than five hours per day on this little laptop. I'm also working on an academic paper, so have been writing a lot, too. I'd been using a black MacBook, but decided to switch to the Wind because (a) the MacBook was more machine than I needed, and (b) I'd hoped that the Wind's smaller screen would keep me from surfing so much (moderate success there).

What else... oh, as this is a review of a netbook, my physical characteristics are relevant. I'm 5'10" tall, 185 pounds. I'd say my hands are average-sized for my height.

On to the review...

Weight | 10/10

The version I own was 2.3 lbs with the 3-cell battery, 2.6 lbs with the 6-cell battery. As comparison, the new MacBook weighs 4.5 lbs, the MacBook Air weighs 3 lbs, the Dell Inspiron weighs 5 lbs, and the Lenovo ThinkPad X61s weighs 3.3 lbs.

C, thinking that only a book was in it, once tossed my bag to me from around 10 feet away. While a book was, indeed, in the bag, so was my laptop. Just as MacBook Airs have been tossed out with the Sunday Times because they're so small, C didn't even realize the Wind was in my bag until I caught it and told her.

Keyboard | 10/10

The Wind's keyboard is nearly full-size. I say "nearly" because some of the keys on the bottom-right part of the keyboard (the comma, period and forward-slash keys) are reduced to half-size.

When I tried the keyboard out in-store, I was concerned that this would be a problem. It is not a problem.

In fact, the keyboard is one of my favorite aspects of the Wind. I adjusted to it within an hour, and now don't even notice the minor difference between this keyboard and a full-size keyboard.

As for the "feel" of the keyboard, again, I love it. It reminds me a bit of my old 12" PowerBook's keyboard... only with a slightly better response. It just feels great to type on this keyboard. It's better than my better-half's Dell, and I also like it more than my MacBook's keyboard.

Trackpad | 7/10

I've never been a fan of trackpads. They take up too much space and require that you move one hand away from your typing to get anything done. Plus, you can accidentally hit them with your thumb if you're a sloppy typist. Eraser/nib mice or externals should be the only real options. Bummer for me that I'm in the minority.

As trackpads go, this one is pretty-good. Responsive and smooth. It lacks the ability to recognize gestures, so you can't use two fingers to scroll or anything like that.

Also, there is only one mouse button. Coming from a Mac, this felt natural, but I could see it bugging PC users. That said, MSI has maintained right-click functionality -- click on the left side of the mouse button and you left-click. Push the right-side of the mouse button, and you right-click.

It works very well and is perfectly functional for email, web browsing and the like. That said, when I'm doing a great deal of large-document editing, or when I'm working on mouse-intensive tasks, I prefer to use an external mouse. Wireless USB is the way to go.

Screen & Video Performance | 8/10

The screen is a matte (as opposed to glossy) 10" display, running at a native resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels. This is a perfect width for web browsing, though the 600 pixel vertical resolution is a bit thin. I do find myself scrolling a bit more than I'd like, but hey, it's a 10" screen. A little extra scrolling is a tradeoff I'm more than willing to make, in exchange for the tiny form factor.

The screen quality is excellent, providing a bright, beautiful picture. On-board video won't let you play Mirror's Edge, but it's great for watching Hulu, Joost, YouTube or other online video. If you're curious, this video shows World of Warcraft running on Wind.

Battery | 3/10 (3-cell) or 8/10 (6-cell)

The 3-cell battery stinks. No other way around it. With my screen brightness set to 33%, I topped out at around 1.5 hours of web browsing and word processing on a full charge. Yikes.

So my options were really to bring the cord with me and find cafes with outlets or buy a 6-cell battery. I opted for the latter (see below), and now get just under four hours per charge, which is fantastic. The 6-cell battery weighs a little more and also sticks out a little bit on the bottom of the machine, acting as a little keyboard stand. It actually looks natural and places the Wind at a better angle for typing, so no real negative there. 

Processor (CPU) & Windows XP Home | 9/10

The CPU is an Intel Atom 1.6 GHz processor. This line of processors was released by Intel in 2008. The innovations with the Atom center around power consumption. While not as powerful as the latest Xeon processors, the Atom is much more efficient. The Atom is small, using less power while emitting less heat than other equivalent CPUs. As such, it's perfect for a small, light-weight laptop. The Atom is the key innovation that allows the Wind to do so much while still being so little.  

Even better, MSI went out of their way to get the most out of this little chip. Says a Gizmodo commenter:

With 1 GB of RAM and the Wind off, XP booted in under a minute. From Sleep, right around 10 seconds. The OS ran smoothly, and I had no problems using multiple applications and multiple, large Word docs.

I upgraded to 2 GB of RAM (see below), and now XP boots up in less than 10 seconds from Sleep and in ~30 seconds when previously turned-off.

Hard Drive | 8/10

The HD is 120GB. It comes partitioned, with the Windows install separate as a 40GB partition (to secure the OS  and allow for easier backups/restores). It's nice and snappy and hasn't given me any problems. If left on for long periods it will make a light, occassional click as it spins, but that's it.

The HD can be upgraded, if you're willing to do the job yourself. The modification looks pretty easy. Sure, I'd like more space... but we're talking $350 here. I'm good with 120 GB so far.

Heat & Noise | 10/10

The Wind runs cold and silent, outside of the occassional click from the HD (see above). I had an aluminum 12" PowerBook for three years, and it was both louder and hotter than I wanted. The fan would kick on for long stretches, but the bottom of the machine would still be hot to the touch. Not so with the Wind. I couldn't be happier.

Camera | N/A

I haven't used it, so cannot comment.

Overall Look & Feel | 9/10

I have the black Wind, and I love how it looks. The outside casing is a glossy black, reminiscent of the black MacBooks. The keyboard and screen-frame are matte black. Daily handling leaves fingerprint smudges on the outside plastic, but these are easily wiped off. It's just like a tiny black MacBook... and it makes even my girlfriends 15" Dell look ridiculously large by comparison.

My only gripe is with MSI's decision to limit access to the guts of the Wind. To get inside the case, you must remove nine small screws. One of these screws is below a sticker saying that if the sticker is damaged, the warranty is void... so if you crack open the case, you'll be voiding the warranty. This is a non-issue if you don't want to add RAM or upgrade the hard drive. I accepted MSI's poor decision and chose to upgrade my RAM, but still, this is an unnecessary hassle.

Additions & Modifications

• The big extra expense was a 6-cell battery, which ran me $80 after shipping. Totally worth it, but still rather pricey. (Note: mAh denotes the battery's maximum capacity. The bigger the better. With 6-cell batteries, this will be 4400 or 5200.)
• I doubled my RAM to 2 GB by buying a 1 GB DIMM of RAM from crucial.com for $16 ($21 after shipping). It took me 15 minutes to install, following these instructions.
• I purchased an extra plug for my cord for $3 here ($11 after shipping). This allows me to leave the extension cord at home, cutting the travel weight and size of the plug in half.

Total Cost: $375 (out the door) + $80 + $21 +$11 = $487

Other Purchases

• I already had an external, wireless USB mouse. I've been using it most of the time. This is a great mouse -- I highly recommend it.
• A trial version of Microsoft Office comes installed. I didn't have a license for the full version, but because I was taking a programming class I qualified forthis great offer from Microsoft, useful for all students and educators. (I hear that all you need is a .edu email address, but I'm not 100% sure that'll work.)
• Finally, I found that the bags I'd been using were unnecessarily large, so I picked up a small, green, canvas bag from my favorite Army surplus store. It's perfect, and cost me only $17.

Well, I hope that helped. If you have any questions or would like to add any information, please leave a note in the comments.