Laptop Thoughts: Archos Getting Into the Netbook Game

Archos, better known to the world for making small to medium-sized media playing slates, is getting into the netbook game. The attractively-designed product features a dual-core Atom D510, Windows 7 Home Premium, 1 GB of DDR2 RAM, a 13.3 inch screen at 1366 x 768, a 160 GB hard drive, 10/100 Ethernet, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 2.0, three USB 2.0 ports, one VGA port, a memory card reader (SDHC, MMC), a 1.3 megapixel webcam, and a 6-cell battery powering the whole thing. It weighs in at 1.6 KG, and is 1.06 inches thick when closed. Two more pictures after the break.

I think this is an interesting move from Archos - I've always admired their hardware design, but the user interface on their media player operating system can only be described as baffling. By applying their hardware design skills with the excellent UI of Windows 7, Archos could see some success here - although in the "me too" world of netbooks, there's not much about the 133 PC that makes it stand out.