Digital Gadgets has announced an 8.9-inch netbook computer that will sell under the Sylvania brand name. Offered in four different colors, the Linux-compatible "g netbook MESO" includes a 1.6GHz Atom processor, 80GB hard drive, four-cell battery, webcam, and 802.11b/g wireless networking, according to the company.

About two months ago, Intel and Nokia announced a strategic partnership without mentioning any concrete products. The first product announcement followed today: With the Booklet 3G, Nokia will offer a 10-inch netbook (and its first netbook altogether) – equipped, of course, with an Atom processor.

Since some months we have Lemote Yeeloong, the first fully free software laptop but what about gNewSense, our fully free software favourite distribution?

System76 has updated its Linux-based netbook to the Atom N455 processor as well as making it thinner and lighter. The Ubuntu 10.04 version of the 10.1-inch Starling NetBook offers more memory (2GB), a larger standard hard drive (250GB), faster Wi-Fi (802.11b/g/n), and is available in a school-focused "EduBook" version.

The project will realize the intention of The Free Software Foundation to port the gNewSense distribution (http://www.gnewsense.org/static/homepage/ ) on the Yeelong laptop (http://www.lemote.com/english/yeeloong.html ) manufactured by Lemote Tech (http://www.lemote.com/ ).

China-based HiVision is readying an Android-based "PWS700CA" netbook with a 600MHz Rockchip ARM9 processor and a 7-inch, WVGA touchscreen, and according to one preview, it's likely to sell for under $100. HiVision also recently introduced a Linux-based "PWS700B" netbook, as well as an "EB-0600S" e-reader, says the company.

The port of gNewSense to MIPS for the Lemote Yeeloong laptop, 100% supported by free software, is almost complete. Buy the Yeeloong and help test it so the Yeeloong + gNewSense can be recommended as the ultimate free software laptop.

Many tech-news websites spent the past couple of weeks betting on AMD introducing a new processor line aimed at the currently red-hot netbook market. For those unfamiliar with the term, a netbook is a class of laptop computer inspired by the OLPC project. In short, a netbook is a laptop computer with a sub 10inch viewing LCD, a solid state hard-drive, limited memory, and a low-end processor.

It seems that each and every week there are new netbooks that are introduced, but there are not many differences between most models. Some netbooks will have a slightly longer battery life, a different exterior, or a solid-state drive, but there are more similarities than differences.