Netbook beater for walking about and general outdoors abuse

[drmike]

Collective intelligence gathering for hardware recommendation (hint we need a hardware section on here).

Looking for a cheap beater netbook - older / used models are fine.  Should have good battery life (using in off grid environment with outdoors / dirt / sub optimal computing environment).

Requirements - good battery life (4+ hours), real screen resolution (1024x768 will suffice - smaller skewed stuff is MEH), 2GB of RAM.  Should be able to run Linux.   No Android crap.  No white pretty cased stuff (this is outdoors and things get amply dirty.

 

[KuJoe]

I wish I still had my old HP Mini 2133, that thing was a beast (all metal case) and was my primary workstation for years before I upgraded to something faster. They go for under $100 on eBay these days. Battery life with the extended battery was close to 6 hours under normal usage, they had an high res version that was 1280x768, and I was running Windows XP (came with Vista, SUSE, or XP) in the beginning then switched between ArchBang and Fedora for the remainder of it's years in service. I think that little guy marked the longest time I went without replacing my primary workstation.

 

[Coastercraze]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220850

That was the one I used. Upgraded it to 2 Gb ram and upgraded to Windows 7 Home Premium.  The Nvidia ION was actually decent considering it's a netbook. Battery life was up there - I'd say about 7 - 8  hrs moderate usage and 9+ hrs on light usage like web browsing etc.

 

[stim]

I thought netbooks were discontinued? I prefer them over tablets myself.

Still, if going second-hand I highly recommend the Toshiba NB200 or a later iteration.

I've had one for 7 years and it has been rock-solid and a great little performer. I inserted extra RAM and a SSD. I had XP installed initially, but later moved to Crunchbang. Still in use today as a server, with no signs of it dying (although the paint on the chicklets has mostly disappeared by now, and I've dropped it so many times without damage that I think it's possessed).

I also have an Asus eeepc. It's just a little too small for my liking, but can make a nice little always-on server (but Raspberry Pi does just as well).

 

[drmike]

I have a mutated Asus EEE ahh 8.9 inch model with silly graphic low resolution.... Decent machine, but it's beat at this point - melted the case in a heat related accident, wore the battery out and charger is long missing.  Thus I am looking for something to bundle with solar recharging.

Tablets are nice, but I need mouse and keyboard and Office type suite... and Gimp... and shell... and some other things... Android is too much dealing with apps that break tomorrow and make the hardware less than great.  Plus graft on keyboards and mice ends up being bigger than a netbook.  I wish tablets would step up to be netbooks - for now they are couch devices and limited "browsing" activities for me.  I can't get anything done on mine - productive wise.

Thanks for the endorsements of gear, very appreciated.  Bookmarking all the recommendations and looking for one of those