Windows 7 HP Mini 5102 - reviews - Notebooks - Ult

Bottom Line:
HP's Mini 5102 is pretty much precisely the same since the Mini 5101, but it has a lot far better battery existence. You are able to pretty much obtain a total day of use out of its 6-cell battery (so long as you close the lid whenever you aren't actively using it) as well as the significant tough drive indicates it is possible to have close to a significant library of music and video clips. We enjoy the unit's construct top quality, its large resolution display and its keyboard, but loathe how long it will require to get up and running.
Review by
Elias Plastiras Computer World Australia (on the web) 06 / 04 / ten Request a Question HP Mini 5102 seems to be and feels just like Mini 5101, nevertheless it has superior battery existence and is also less costly
The HP Mini 5102 can be a netbook created with enterprise end users in brain. It's got an anodised aluminium lid and its durable design and style locations it a rung higher than most other netbooks on the market. Additionally, it seems to be excellent and, contrary to well-liked belief, enterprise end users apparently do appreciate a little of flair — so HP has introduced the Mini 5102 not only in black, but also in red and blue.
The HP Mini 5102 along with the HP Mini 5101
Physically, the Mini 5102 seems exactly like the HP Mini 5101, which isn’t a bad thing — we loved the 5101. The HP Mini 5102 is small and has a tapered body, getting thinner from the rear to the front. Its significant battery gives it a nice slope when resting on a table, and it’s comfortable to type on. We like the fact that the RAM slot can be accessed without making use of tools, but the keyboard has to be removed in order to acquire to the tough generate bay. Nevertheless, it’s easy enough to pop off the keyboard and if the generate ever needs replacing.
The HP Mini 5102 with its keyboard removed.
HP Mini 5102 specs and speed
The Mini 5102 is also similar to the Mini 5101 around the inside, with the main difference being a newer Intel Atom CPU. It’s still better than the majority of consumer netbooks around the market place, mainly because you get 2GB of DDR2 SDRAM (most netbooks ship with 1GB),Office 2007 Professional Plus Key, a 1366x768-resolution screen rather than 1024x576 or 1024x600, and a 7200rpm difficult push instead of a 5400rpm generate. The challenging drive is 320GB — which signifies that you absolutely must transfer all your new music and movies onto it if you want to obtain the most from it! The netbook's battery has a long 66 Watt-hour rating, which will let you watch at least two movies without requiring a recharge.
The HP Mini 5102 runs an Intel Atom N450 CPU that runs at the identical clock speed as the Intel Atom N280 CPU it replaces (1.66GHz), but it has an integrated graphics chipset, which implies there are only two main chips in the Mini 5102: the CPU along with the I/O controller. This helps to keep the Mini 5102 a smidgin cooler than the Mini 5101 and is the main difference the two netbooks. You still get 802.11 draft-n Wi-Fi (it even uses precisely the same Broadcom 43224AG chip that was in the Mini 5101), as well as Bluetooth and Gigabit Ethernet. There can be a built-in webcam that can be used for face recognition security as well as conferencing, and you get a VGA port, an SD card slot, microphone and headphone ports, and three USB 2.0 ports. It’s definitely a well stocked netbook.
Apart from the upgraded processor, one of the other differences between the Mini 5102 and its predecessor is that the newer netbook runs Windows 7 Pro 32-bit instead of Windows XP, and it runs it very well. There is an option to install Linux (SUSE Enterprise 11) or you can still choose Windows XP if your enterprise hasn’t migrated to Windows 7 yet.
In our tests, the Mini 5102 produced slower times than the Mini 5101, which we put down mainly to the operating system difference. In the iTunes MP3 encoding test, the Mini 5102 took 8min 47sec to encode 53min worth of WAV files to 192Kbps MP3s, which is one minute slower than the Mini 5101. In Blender 3D, it took 7min 39sec to render an image employing two CPU threads, and this is 42sec slower than the Mini 5101. It was also slower in the hard generate test. The Mini 5102’s Western Digital Scorpio Blue (WD3200BEKT-60V5T1) recorded 26.17 megabytes per second in our transfer tests. This is about 6.1MBps faster than a typical netbook, but over 2MBps slower than the Mini 5101, which used a Fujitsu drive.
But while the performance tests show the Mini 5102 to be slower than the model it replaces, it actually feels reasonably zippy during everyday operation. It is possible to easily use it to browse the Web while you work on documents and listen to music, and standard-definition movies will play just fine. Because the display screen is wider than a typical netbook screen, you can even use Windows 7’s Aero Snap feature to line up two windows side by side.
HP Mini 5102 battery life
The battery life of the Mini 5102 is stellar. The 66 Watt-hour battery lasted 5hr 3min in our rundown test, in which we disable power management, maximise brightness, enable Wi-Fi and loop an Xvid-encoded video. If you use the netbook for Web browsing and document creation, and you near the lid once you aren’t actively making use of it, then it is possible to go a complete day without having to plug in to an outlet.
With such a long battery life, it’s a shame that a Sleep-and-Charge style USB port hasn’t been implemented so that you could charge your iPhone in your backpack while around the go, for example. For that sort of functionality, you have to turn to Toshiba’s NB300.
The HP Mini 5102’s battery has a physical indicator to let you know if you need to charge before you hit the road.
HP Mini 5102 setup
We deplore the setup procedure of the Mini 5102. Whenever you first pull it out of the box and boot it up, you have to put up with a setup process that will take well over an hour. This installs all of HP’s utilities and trialware (such as Microsoft Office) and there are some registration screens that require your attention. It’s not a pleasant experience and a busy admin looking to quickly deploy the Mini 5102 will rapidly lose patience.
That said, once it’s up and operating you are able to get rid of all the preinstalled software, or put it to use. There can be a credentials manager, file synchronisation software, troubleshooting and maintenance software (whose pop-up reminders can drive you crazy) and Corel Home Office Suite just to name a few. You also get 3D hard generate protection and also the ability to encrypt your data. A pre-Windows 7 environment is available, called HP QuickLook; it lets you check calendar entries and contacts. This feature is aimed at consumers who want quick access to this information when their laptop is switched off. However, if you already have a smartphone then there is no need to use this software. In addition, it has QuickWeb, which as its name suggests, is for browsing the Web. We think that an implantation of Splashtop similar to the one on the HP Mini 210 would be much more useful.
Conclusion
In terms of speed and seems to be, the HP Mini 5102 is not an upgrade over the HP Mini 5101. In fact, all you’re getting with this model is really a revision of the same netbook that was released ten months ago, but with significantly longer battery life and a significantly lower retail price. Whether you’re a business user or not, we think it’s worth going for the Mini 5102 over many other netbooks to the market, especially because of its excellent battery life, very good develop good quality, larger screen resolution, faster networking and larger memory capacity. However, we do wish HP would give us a break from all the preinstalled utilities and a very lengthy setup procedure.
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