Netbook or something, Calibre-capable?

[travger]

I do apologize most humbly if it's not the right place to post, but Calibre is quite important in my question.

I'm looking for a small, light laptop/netbook (with Windows), that won't choke on Calibre and Sigil. Liked Acer Aspire One looks and price, but somebody here mentioned that it has trouble running Calibre. As Calibre (and Sigil) are the ones I'll definitely want to use when away from my PC, that point is important. I don't need all my books on the road...

What should I look for? Processor?
Also, I'd like it to have at least SD-slot and several USB-s.

So, does anyone here have a good (or bad) user experience with Calibre on netbook?

TIA,
trav

[Adoby]

It depends on what you intend to do with calibre. If you intend to search, read and occasionally update metadata for single books then you should have few problems.

But if you intend to do a lot of conversions, bulk imports and bulk update of metadata, then you may need a more powerful setup, or at least a little more patience.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by travger

I do apologize most humbly if it's not the right place to post, but Calibre is quite important in my question.

I'm looking for a small, light laptop/netbook (with Windows), that won't choke on Calibre and Sigil. Liked Acer Aspire One looks and price, but somebody here mentioned that it has trouble running Calibre. As Calibre (and Sigil) are the ones I'll definitely want to use when away from my PC, that point is important. I don't need all my books on the road...

What should I look for? Processor?
Also, I'd like it to have at least SD-slot and several USB-s.

So, does anyone here have a good (or bad) user experience with Calibre on netbook?

TIA,
trav

Remember: Intel/AMD processor unless you want to seriously jump through hoops. (did not think so )

Calibre will run on a old P4, but it really likes my newer AMD Turion II based Toshiba Laptop (17" desktop replacement) for conversions (the fan seriously kicks on). Remember: If that fan is running, so is the battery consumption

[gbm]

Originally Posted by travger

I do apologize most humbly if it's not the right place to post, but Calibre is quite important in my question.

I'm looking for a small, light laptop/netbook (with Windows), that won't choke on Calibre and Sigil. Liked Acer Aspire One looks and price, but somebody here mentioned that it has trouble running Calibre. As Calibre (and Sigil) are the ones I'll definitely want to use when away from my PC, that point is important. I don't need all my books on the road...

What should I look for? Processor?
Also, I'd like it to have at least SD-slot and several USB-s.

So, does anyone here have a good (or bad) user experience with Calibre on netbook?

TIA,
trav

Remember you can always dual boot it with a lite weigh Linux, like mint with xfce.

bernie

[alanHd]

I was using calibre on my humble netbook running win 7 with no problems, when that crashed and burned I had to go back to a netbook with win xp and again I had no problems, the only thing I really noticed were really slow start up times.

[BetterRed]

I'm similar to alanHd - I had a dual boot win7/mint ASUS, it had lots of hardware problems, it ran out of warranty (2 years) in April, in May the memory failed yet again, so I gave up on it.

I've liberated a 5 year old Tosh Portege from a friends discarded gadget box. Its still working after 3 months, it runs calibre fine, DOCX to EPUB conversions of 50K word 'nothing fancy books' are not noticably slower than my quad core i7 desktop. Bulk metadata data edits are slower - but that's the USB2.0 shirt pocket drive - internally it has an 64GB SSD.

It came with MS Office 2007, Word works fine so I'm sure it could handle Sigil. Firefox configured as per my desktop was awful (too many addons), so I use Chrome on it. Weight is wonderful < 800g, (1.7lbs in imperial units). Make sure you'll be 'comfortable' with the keyboard layout, IMO some of netbooks are less than sub-optimal, i.e. they are diabolical.

BR

[travger]

I do want to make some conversions, but I do not use bulk much. Even now I'm using bulk only for importing already-converted files, so I probably won't mind if I have to convert one-by one. Update of metadata yes, but again, only one book at a time. Mostly I'm worried about searches and such that are reasonably fast on my PC.

Everything I've looked at has Intel or AMD inside (maximum screen for me is 13'', 11.6 is even better). And presently everything seems to come with Windows8.

Hm, Linux? Is the working experience the same?

Thank you so much, it's very good to know that I don't have to starve and buy some high-end gamer machine.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by travger

I do want to make some conversions, but I do not use bulk much. Even now I'm using bulk only for importing already-converted files, so I probably won't mind if I have to convert one-by one. Update of metadata yes, but again, only one book at a time. Mostly I'm worried about searches and such that are reasonably fast on my PC.

Everything I've looked at has Intel or AMD inside (maximum screen for me is 13'', 11.6 is even better). And presently everything seems to come with Windows8.

Hm, Linux? Is the working experience the same?

Thank you so much, it's very good to know that I don't have to starve and buy some high-end gamer machine.

IMHO Ubuntu has become bloated (Calibre and Sigil do work Well)
Linux Mint looks , but I have not tested the above 2 favorites on it

Open/Libre Office is the same as on Windows

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by travger

Hm, Linux? Is the working experience the same?

With regard to using Calibre? Yes.

Thank you so much, it's very good to know that I don't have to starve and buy some high-end gamer machine.

You don't. My current computer is over 5 years old (allthough it was a high-end system in its day and has had some upgrades), and it runs Calibre well enough. It actually runs every game up until late 2012.

If you're not planning on using and constantly converting a library consisting of several thousand books, I think any computer that's a bit above the absolute budget systems will do fine.

[cortman]

Originally Posted by travger

I do apologize most humbly if it's not the right place to post, but Calibre is quite important in my question.

I'm looking for a small, light laptop/netbook (with Windows), that won't choke on Calibre and Sigil. Liked Acer Aspire One looks and price, but somebody here mentioned that it has trouble running Calibre. As Calibre (and Sigil) are the ones I'll definitely want to use when away from my PC, that point is important. I don't need all my books on the road...

What should I look for? Processor?
Also, I'd like it to have at least SD-slot and several USB-s.

So, does anyone here have a good (or bad) user experience with Calibre on netbook?

TIA,
trav

I used my Acer Aspire One 722 as my main machine for quite some time, which means handling my library of 2k books in Calibre. It ran flawlessly.
Coincidentally, I'm thinking about selling it. If you're interested let me know. I have upgraded the RAM to 4 GB from 2 GB, and replaced the 320 GB HDD with a 120 GB SSD. It is blazing fast. Plus the 11.6" screen at 1366x768 is pretty high res for a laptop (more DPI than the iPad 2, actually ).
I currently have Linux Mint XFCE on it but can reinstall Windows 7 Starter.
I really like the little computer myself. I just don't use it as much anymore.
If you'd be interested send me a PM.

[fidvo]

I still run Calibre on my ASUS T-91, an old netbook that predated the iPad. WinXP, touchscreen, "tablet mode" where you fold the keyboard under the screen and use the touchscreen exclusively. Calibre works on it just fine, although as others have mentioned, starting Calibre may take a while. 30 seconds - 1 minute in my experience. Of course, once it's been loaded once, the cache takes over and it Calibre only takes about 5 seconds to load the next time.

In short, the limitations of the hardware are really only going to affect how long it takes Calibre to start. Once you're in it, any old netbook should be fine.

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by travger

I do want to make some conversions, but I do not use bulk much. Even now I'm using bulk only for importing already-converted files, so I probably won't mind if I have to convert one-by one. Update of metadata yes, but again, only one book at a time. Mostly I'm worried about searches and such that are reasonably fast on my PC.

Even bulk operations work fine, technically, on my old Aspire One. They're slow but I doubt they're slower than the same number of one-by-one operations. They just seem slower-like sitting at a light seems slower than going around the block but if you time it, it isn't.

Of course my old netbook runs Win7 Starter. I have no experience with Win8, any version. I assume it would run equally well on that but maybe not-it does seem as if every new version of Windows requires more memory than the last and that's one of the biggest limitations of netbooks-memory.

[Kai Winters]

My primary computer which runs my Calibre library and all else computer related is an inexpensive Asus laptop with an Intel core I3, 2.4ghz with 4 gb of ram and a standard hdd. It is running Windows 8/64 and is around 2 years old. It runs Calibre easily. I sometimes use its reader as well as the Kindle reader. While I only have 300/400 books in my library it handles them and all associated converting, etc. with ease.
I'd not worry too much about the device...use what you can afford and prefer to use/carry.

Good luck and keep us informed.

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by cortman

I used my Acer Aspire One 722 as my main machine for quite some time, which means handling my library of 2k books in Calibre. It ran flawlessly.
Coincidentally, I'm thinking about selling it. If you're interested let me know. I have upgraded the RAM to 4 GB from 2 GB, and replaced the 320 GB HDD with a 120 GB SSD. It is blazing fast. Plus the 11.6" screen at 1366x768 is pretty high res for a laptop (more DPI than the iPad 2, actually ).
I currently have Linux Mint XFCE on it but can reinstall Windows 7 Starter.
I really like the little computer myself. I just don't use it as much anymore.
If you'd be interested send me a PM.

Stick with Linux as you can't 'legally' reinstall Win7 Starter. I think, but am not certain, that the limitation of 2GB RAM for Starter is enforced in the software. If it is then you can't install it. If not then you can install it but doing so will violate the license. You can, of course, upgrade from Starter to one of the other versions.

[cortman]

Originally Posted by calvin-c

Stick with Linux as you can't 'legally' reinstall Win7 Starter. I think, but am not certain, that the limitation of 2GB RAM for Starter is enforced in the software. If it is then you can't install it. If not then you can install it but doing so will violate the license. You can, of course, upgrade from Starter to one of the other versions.

Whoa, didn't know about that limitation of Starter. I knew it was pathetic but didn't know it was THAT pathetic. I will have to see.
I do have to wonder what you mean by violating the license. It's the license for that computer, and it shouldn't be any different than if my hard drive crashed and I wanted to reinstall.