Computer advice
ENGeeks:
Early May I'm doing a dirtbike ride from Mesquite, NV (NV/UT border) to the Grand Canyon and back with a large group of riders. Since IMSG is the next weekend, I plan on extending the trip a couple days and riding on my own. Gonna do hotels vs camping so I can straffe the net once per and frankly not pack a bunch of camping stuff.
Anyway, I'll looking for a netbook option but am wondering about durability regarding the hard drive. Computer would be in a camelback so no real engine vibration and stuff on your body is general subject to less vibration, bouncing, etc. I can wrap it in plastic to protect from dust. Since I'll be by myself I plan to stick to easy dirt roads, but reserve the right to hit some harder stuff of the opportunity presents itself 
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Should I have any concerns? Any recommendations? I want cheap, cheap, cheap.
Comments
I found this one Target for 239, the only problem is it only has a 3 cell battery, I have the 6 cell one and battery life is awesome. My biggest concern would be dust from the riding.
Thanks for the input. Battery life won't be a problem, as I'll be working from a hotel room or cafe, and dust isn't too bad when you're riding by yourself, in front, or widely separated. This Grand Canyon ride will have a chase truck to carry our gear, then I'll be solo for a couple days exploring but sticking to easy stuff for safety reasons. I can pack the computer in a plastic bag or something. 2-3lb on my back, in addition to water, etc, isn't too bad.
Just an FYI, I'm Computer/Software/Systems Engineer depending on which diploma or job title I want to go by. I should probably not advertise that fact as I already do a fair amount of impromptu tech support, but throwing it out there for the EN-haus all the same.
Anyway, as per your specific question, one of the predominate features of the "netbook" category of computers is lack of an actual hard drive in favor of solid state memory. This trend started in mobile devices but is extending more and more into personal computers because solid state memory offers many advantages, including power efficiency, access speed and perhaps most relevant in this case, increased tolerance to shock and vibration.
A typical hard drive consists of a series of magnetic disk platters rotating incredibly quickly with a disk head (think of it like a record needle) floating on a precariously thin cushion of air caused by the rotation of the disk platter. If anything should disrupt equilibrium, such as a sudden jolt or vibration, the disk head can go careening into the platter at up to 15,000 RPM in what is called a head crash, resulting in significant if not complete data loss.
Solid state memory on the other hand has no moving parts and as a result doesn't suffer from head crashes. Your data is simply stored in integrated circuits in an outwardly appearing much more simple process. The downside is this is still a lot more expensive than a traditional hard disk so you will end up with a lot less storage capacity for the same price.
Ok, now that my lecture on storage mediums is done for today, just make sure that you get a netbook with solid state memory and not an actual hard drive and you should be fine.
Have fun out there.
Trevor,
Thanks for the tip, I'll look into that.
Solid State=Great but also very expensive last time I looked. Great advice though if you plan on using it for these sort of trips.
A quick look found some at a similar price to what you showed me but with much less memory. This machine would have on it FireFox, WKO+, Garmin Basecamp (for managing GPS files for navigation, I use a GPS on the bike)...and that's probably it. Machine would be used for WKO. I'd probably put all of the data for the above programs on a USB drive so a drive crash would only affect the OS.
That said, trip is now in jeopardy due to difficulty sourcing a suspension part and shitty follow up with the shop that has the bike now. Pissed because this was gonna be my last moto-adventure before putting the bike away for a summer of IM training...
First you need to kick that bike place in the NUTZ, second could you post a link if you get one to what you are looking at.
Here you go, just a quick driveby on Amazon.
Yep, if the guy doesn't get back to me today, I'm jumping in the truck tomorrow to take the bike to another shop...that I probably should have gone to in the first place.
I have a Dell mini-9 which is very similiar in specs to that HP you posted. It's been great. The HD space is very tight, so you end up with all your pics/music/etc on an external drive, but the solid state HD is awesome. The only drawback with the small netbooks is that the keyboards often take getting used to, esp. if you have manly hands.