i *think* that's an external hump alla lenovo(nee IBM)- kinda tough to see from that pic

here's a picture of a typical ibm battery:


here's the extended battery for the same model:


see how it's fatter- when you put it in a thinkpad it extends the the rear sort of like you stuck a couple rolls of quarters accross the back and then smothed it all out with some black electrical tape.

I don't know what the 3 cell battery looks like and I'm glad that I didn't spend time to find out. What was more important to me was the extended life of using a 6 cell battery than the potential difference in size between the two.

It's a 1 KG (2.2 lbs) netbook. I haven't thought twice about the size of the battery. Personally, for a NETBOOK, I think you're overthinking things.

It comes down to this: What do you value more? Extended battery time or the size of a battery for a NETBOOK. I'll take the extended battery every time. When a 3 cell battery dies in 2-3 hours, you'll wish you had the 6 cell battery providing 5-6 hours of life.

_________________
Richard

My gadget blog: http://www.gadgetinsane.com

oh- I'd buy the bigger battery. No worries there. (nevermind 6 cell I'd be looking for the aftermarket 7 cell- laughing). I've got both a 3 and 7 cell for my current laptop and I think I used the 3 cell all of twice. In the immortal words of Tim Taylor- "more power- ug ug"

I'm just curious how it fit's and was designed.

Older laptops they seemed to make the space for the bigger batter and then add in some filler if you wanted the smaller battery. Newer ones they seem to size for the small size battery and then give you a lump for those of us who like the big size.

What's interesting to me is the cell phone aftermarket there's all sorts of company's that figure out how to increase the density and jam more power into the OEM battery space- sometimes they add like 30-40%. Dont seem to see that much with the laptops just yet. Maybe soon. I might think about that- getting 40% more time in the same sized package- get a little bit of size and duration (although myself I'd probably still lean towards the biggest I could find)

Well after having the netbook for several days, I decided to return it. This is not a reflection of the netbook itself but the fact that I have my existing work notebook which I use predominantly during the day (and night). Work wouldn't have paid for my netbook to replace my standard issue notebook and it didn't make sense to have both devices for the frequency I travel which is not often these days (thank goodness).

My only gripe about the Acer Aspire One was the placement of the "Enter" and "Shift" keys. I'm a touch typist and these keys were placed too far from my pinky finger. Probably over time I would have gotten used to it but it's rather academic now.

Other than that, I was indeed pleased with the battery life and the size and convenience that having a little netbook brings for everyday tasks such as web browsing, office productivity tools, and light media viewing/listening.

I would rate the model netbook I had a 7/10.

_________________
Richard

My gadget blog: http://www.gadgetinsane.com

Acer has another netbook with 120GB HDD (not a SSD) with WinXP home for 350 bucks. No one comes close to that price in a netbook with WinXP on it. Acer is a big manufacturer (bigger outside the US) so they must be getting great volume discounts on hardware. I've bought two Acers now - both times because they offered better hardware than equivalent offerings from other manufacturers in the same price range.