Sony Vaio M

Sony has done what we had thought it would never do. Announced a netbook. Yes, the company has made small, light computers before – and its Vaio X even sported an Intel Atom processor, but at a price of well over £1000 and a weight considerably under 1Kg it was certainly not in the netbook class.

Now, though, the Vaio M has been announced.

It will be available this month, and while Sony has not yet divulged its expectations on price, we’ve seen it at the Tesco Web site for £299.00.

Oh, Sony isn’t calling the Vaio M a netbook, choosing instead to stick with the ‘mini notebook’ description that it seems to think more appropriate.

But check out the specifications:

VAIO M11M1E Processor: Intel® Atom N450 1.66GHz< OS: Genuine Windows® 7 Starter (32-bit) Memory: 1GB DDR2 SDRAM (667 MHz) HDD: 250GB Serial ATA (5400 rpm) Screen: 25.6cm 16:10 display (1024x600) with LED backlight Graphics: Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 3150 Weight & size: 1.3kg (with supplied battery), 180 x 33 x 260 mm (D x H x W) Plus: WLAN 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, MOTION EYE® camera, stereo speakers, mono microphone, 3xUSB. Available in black and white.

If you check Tesco’s Web site you’ll see that they have no compunction about calling the Vaio M a netbook.

Sandra Vogel