MSI Wind U120 hits the review bench, short on thrills

Those obsessives over at Laptop Mag wrangled up a new MSI Wind U120 and did the review thing, and while there's plenty of good here, the wide availability of similarly specced, strongly designed netbooks throws the Wind's flaws into sharper relief. With the same internals and battery of the original, and yet oddly less battery life, the main improvement here is the more "professional" chassis design. Not a ton to get excited about, but at least the $379 pricetag has a decent edge on other higher-end (in looks, anyways) laptops of this ilk.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 12:20PM]

windows xp...

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:48PM]

That's it? Windows XP.....for first post? WOW! simply amazing point you made there! J/K I don't care seriously....I'd run Win7 on it...I think....:-)

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 7:23PM]

I would totally buy a wind if they came with linux. :(

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 1st 2009 1:54AM]

@bboston7 --> Why do I keep hearing this, "If it only came with linux..."?

If you have the brain power to install and use linux, why can't you people just partition the drive? It's not difficult and there are a thousand walkthroughs online! While you're at it, why not install Moblin and OS X?

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 3rd 2009 8:29AM]

you can forget this U120 new wind. it dont have memory expansion slot like U100. So you will stuck with 1Gb even when Windows 7 come out. (not to mention USB 3.0) hehehe

[x Prime x Posted Jan 31st 2009 12:23PM]

That baby scares me

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 12:48PM]

Mty thoughts exactely

[gp Posted Jan 31st 2009 12:50PM]

I hate to be the one to point it out, but your avatar looks like that baby grown-up.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:01PM]

That chassis is enough for me to get one of those babies

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:22PM]

em, your sick!

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 12:36PM]

Awesome.. another flawless OSX netbook from our friends at MSI.

[Professor Kaos Posted Jan 31st 2009 11:04PM]

what the heck you talking about OSX, unless you plan to use a OS x86 project/hacked .iso, what are you babbling about? :P

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 12:38PM]

the glowing touchpad is nice..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWe8glWDar0&feature=related

[JeanLuc Posted Jan 31st 2009 12:58PM]

Well, it might help explain the less battery life issue!

[nicklar Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:03PM]

I received my U120 on Thursday. Loaded Windows 7 on it, and the battery life is pretty great, using wifi for over 5 hours now, and it says 1:24h remaining. Streamed a two hour Netflix movie last night, with 66% battery left afterwards. So, I'm pretty happy. It's not supposed to be a gaming rig, afterall.

Anybody getting one of these.. update the BIOS and all the drivers from MSI's site. I made a huge difference on wifi reception and smoothness of video playback.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:13PM]

Nice, and yes, it doesn't need to play Cry....well you get it....

Sounds like a decent Netbook performance wise. I couldn't imagine gaming on a small screen anyway, but for movies, email, web maybe office etc. not bad I feel!

[Fanfoot Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:05PM]

No upgradability--they couldn't get the bottom off to upgrade the disk.

Worse battery life.

1.3 inches thick? Sorry, fail.

No multitouch. Same crappy trackpad.

Sorry, nothing to distinguish this one. Next!

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:13PM]

Is that Norton 360 icon on the desktop??? Gawd I hope not....chug, chug, chug.....also, the baby is obviously high on Cilicybin (acid, shrooms etc). look at those pupils!!!! Not that I'd know anything about that...I tripped on it, er tripped over an article *about* it once I mean.

[Chris Aubeck Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:55PM]

Not impressed by the colour scheme, it reminds me of the rubbery sports shoes I wore aged 13.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 1:58PM]

Just bought one and I love it.

[Skorpius Posted Jan 31st 2009 2:12PM]

Pretty incomprehensible that you can't upgrade the RAM past the 1 gig on board. With that and the fact that you can't get one in all black, I'm thinking the U100 is the better deal.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 2:15PM]

Wow. I personally like the classmate pc.

p.s. I'm typing this on one right now!!!

GO TOUCH SCREEN!!!

[sjdurfey Posted Jan 31st 2009 3:01PM]

ewww, those things are fugly to all hell.

[Inzain Posted Jan 31st 2009 2:54PM]

RAM limit of a gig? WTF?

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 3:56PM]

What are some better netbooks at that price point?

[Skorpius Posted Jan 31st 2009 4:51PM]

The previous model, the U100, and the Asus EEE 1000HA.

[Fanfoot Posted Jan 31st 2009 4:57PM]

Well the HP 2140 10" might be nice, but its $499, so not exactly that price point. And the new models with the higher rez screens won't be available for a month or two.

The Samsung NC10 is also over $400, probably best price is in the $440 range. Much better battery life and upgradability, but its still clearly more expensive.

The Lenovo S10 can be found for $349, and has an express card slot. Its also a nice size, and available in other colors. And I *think* its more upgradable. I'm not that impressed with it in general though--the keyboard is kinda messed up.

If you want a 10" for this price point, e.g. $350-$400 its probably a reasonable choice. I'd personally pay more to either get better battery life or a thinner unit.

[chinster Posted Feb 11th 2009 11:26AM]

Just found this deal for $330 free shipping on zipzoomfly. If you use the Live.com cash back you can get an extra 2% off:

http://todaysepicdeal.wordpress.com/2009/02/11/msi-wind-u120-10-160gb-hdd-1gb-32999/

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 6:03PM]

Wait: the RAM can't be upgraded on the U120? This is a deal killer for me as I have the U100 and love it with 2GB of RAM. Sure this wasn't something that a typical user could do, but having the option. The these days, having the option for the high cost of mobile broadband. It will be a waste to offer that anytime soon.

[(Unverified) Posted Jan 31st 2009 7:15PM]

it looks exactly like a toshiba tablet computer that got sent to my dad to review... 3 years ago.

[Professor Kaos Posted Jan 31st 2009 11:05PM]

Haha wow, they release a NEW model with LESS of an attractive list of features, no upgradable ram on a new model? What were they thinking?

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 1st 2009 2:26AM]

Samsung's NC10 has been available on J&R (through live.com) for $418 shipped, for two weeks. It EASILY bests this netbook.
What a disappointment :(

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 2nd 2009 3:40AM]

because no one wants to pay the microsoft tax

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 20th 2009 8:23AM]

I'm typing on an MSI WIND U120 i found on amazon for 350 bones! hey, you can't beat a netbook that can play the best RPG that ever was conceived by mankind, Final Fantasy 7.

I have NO COMPLAINTS about the U120. dual boot osx86, xp.... thinking of adding a 250GB SSD and using the old and slow 160Gb HDD that came with the wind for my PS3.