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HP Mini 100e is HP’s approach to high tech but low cost education

HP recently announced a new low-cost netbook: Targeting schools and education institutes, the “clamshell” shaped (it literally looks like a clamshell!) HP Mini 100e will be available for order (at least for those folks) in July, sporting various configuration options but none of which exceed the $300 mark. And speaking of configuration, there will be various color schemes and custom logo/patterns available for the Mini 100e’s screen bezel, lid and keyboard (ie a school can put their logo to ‘brand’ the netbooks).

HP doesn’t mention if the Mini 100e will be available through retailers to consumers in general, though I wouldn’t lose any sleep about that – the market is already full of (or shall I say, flooded with) netbooks with similar or better features, with various brands and designs, and with prices ranging from ‘super affordable’ (ie the old, discontinued Asus Eee 800 or 900 series) to ‘premium’ (ie HP’s own Mini 5102).

The HP Mini 100e features the typical netbook affair – An Intel Atom N450 series processor with integrated graphics, a 10.1 inch LED-backlit display (1024 x 600) and a single DDR3 RAM slot that supports either one or two gigabytes of memory. HP is also giving schools, and whichever other clients it chooses to sell this Mini to, a choice of a 3 or 6 cell battery (no word about battery life though). The Mini 100e has a chiclet keyboard which looks a whole lot like the one found on HP’s Touchsmart tm2 and 2010 Pavilion dv3 (it’s a brilliant keyboard to type on; see my review of the Pavilion dv3 here)

Acting as one of HP’s most basic of netbooks, the Mini 100e has several cut-down features (compared to its ‘regular’ Mini siblings and other netbooks), such as its two USB 2.0 ports (as opposed to 3 USB ports being the norm on majority of today’s netbooks) and choice of 160 GB HDD or 16 flash-based storage (netbooks nowadays are pushing hard disks upwards of 250 or 320 GB, depending on manufacturer).

Alert: HP Envy 17, Envy 14, Elitebook 2540p and 2740p in the pipeline

Screenshot from search results: Elitebook 2540p and 2740p, etc listed on HP's website

Spotlight: One of our readers, Dana, has tipped us off about Elitebook 2540p and Elitebook 2740p in the works after spotting a new 9-cell battery available for a “2540p” model on a HP Korea website (Update: I can’t seem to access the page Dana posted, but HP has updated thier list of “notebooks supporting Windows 7″ to include the new Elitebook 2540p and 2740p models).

16:9 displays on Elitebooks: It is currently known that HP’s smaller Elitebook models: the ultra-portable 12 inch Elitebook 2540p, 12 inch tablet PC Elitebook 2740p and medium-sized 14 inch Elitebook 8440p/8440w, will all sport 16:9 widescreen displays which may put a little crinkle on foreheads of people hoping for 16:10 displays. However, thank goodness it seems that HP will maintain 16:10 displays for their larger Elitebooks. If you think of it this way, 16:9 displays with a resolution of 1366 x 768 is slightly wider than current 16:10, 1280 x 800 displays, while sacrificing a mere 32 pixels of vertical reading space. For people frequently opening two programs side by side, this is great news. For those fretting about “scrolling and reading” web pages and documents, well, I can’t change HP’s minds. But you can always look for the “Go fullscreen” option in your browser or program (F11 for Firefox).

Elitebook 8740w news: We have also received confirmation that the HP Elitebook 8740w (17 inch Mobile Workstation) will sport a 16:10 LCD display just like its predecessor, the current 8730w. This comes after Dana found a 16:10 privacy filter (but 15.4 inch? Probably a typo by someone there) with product number AJ358AA for a certain 8740w model. Joy to the world! Looks like potential desktop replacement/mobile workstation buyers WILL get their 1680 x 1050 and 1920 x 1200 extra large displays after all (what did I tell you?! Told you HP won’t do away with 16:10 displays on their 8740w, not when they’ve spent so much effort developing the 17 inch DreamColor panel for 2008′s 8730w).

Envy 14 and Envy 17 listed in document found on HP Korea

Envy 14 and Envy 17: If you liked the Envy 15 notebook but crave for a bigger display, more graphics power and bigger everything, then good news, this document located on HP Korea’s website (don’t worry, the title is Korean but oddly, the text and content of the Excel file is in English; scroll to the very right side to view the new models) reveals that they’re planning for an Envy 14 and Envy 17. Not much is known about the two models now other than their screen sizes: 14 inches and 17 inches respectively. I can, however, make an intelligent/educated guess that the Envy 17 will have a 1080p full HD 1920 x 1080 display while the Envy 14 is likely to “recycle” and share the Elitebook 8440w’s 1600 x 900 panel.

HP Compaq CQ42, CQ62, G42 and G62; Mini 210: The same document listing the Envy 14 and Envy 17 above also show that HP has new stuff for those with smaller wallets and lower budgets for their next notebook. Introducing the new Compaq Presario CQ42/G42 and CQ62/G62 models. As far as I know, the two different names (G and CQ) are just used in different regions/parts of the world, but the notebooks themselves *should* be the same. The HP Mini 210 also makes its appearance in the document, confirming the info posted before Christmas about the Mini 200 series debut from a trusted source.

Probook 6440b and Probook 6540b: Here’s something that most people would overlook. Don’t assume these are the same as the existing Probook 6445b and Probook 6545b on HP’s Probook page. They’re not! I been observing HP’s naming conventions with their notebooks and the last digit indicates the processor used in their business notebooks. “0 (Zero)” used as the last digit equates to an Intel processor, while “5″ points to AMD processor.  The 6440b and 6540b are likely to be the same as their “6x45b” siblings except they will sport Intel’s processors, most likely Core i3.