Notice anything new about the site? That’s right, Liliputing has a shiny new logo. And if it looks vaguely, but not entirely familar, there’s a good reason for that. After much thought, I decided that I just couldn’t choose between the top two entries (which also took places one and two in the reader poll), and so I decided to declare a tie and ask Linsday Prescott and Tommy Yoo if they’d work together to combine their logo concepts. As a result, each will received $100 in prize money.

Henry Gretzinger takes second place for his elegant design. I really loved this design, but just couldn’t figure out how to make it work properly with the site template.

Thanks again to everyone who submitted entries and everyone who voted in the poll. This was a really difficult decision to make, but I’m very happy with the way things worked out!

The great Liliputing Logo design competition of 2008 has drawn to a close. And now I have to go and pick some winners. This is going to be tough, because a lot of great entries came in. Rather than make the decision all by my lonesome, I thought I’d ask y’all for some help.

Below you can find my favorite entries. I need to whittle the list down to the top three so I can award some prize money. And of course, I’d like to pick one to use as the new logo for Liliputing. I can’t promise that the crowd favorite will be the winner, but if you’d like to weigh in, know that your opinion matters to me.

Thanks to the limitations of online polling services, this poll includes thumbnails of the images. But if you click on any image, you can see a larger version. Keep in mind, the logo will almost definitely be going in the same spot on the site as the existing logo. A few designs would look better above the navbar, but I don’t want to push the actual content too far down the page, and I can’t afford to get rid of the ad atop the site (at least not yet).

So, who do you like? Feel free to discuss in the comments. I’ll be out of town and offline for much of the weekend, but I hope to make a decision early next week.

Update: I’ve added some numbers to the poll to make it easier to see who’s ahead. This is my first time using Polldaddy and I didn’t realize how difficult this would be without numbering.

A few months ago I put together a “comprehensive” list of low cost ultraportable laptops. But a funny thing happens to comprehensive lists. They go out of date. Quickly. Rather than try to keep updating a static web page, I’ve decided to launch something new, and hopefully more useful: a liliputer database.

You can always find the Liliputer database/comparison chart by clicking the Liliputers link in the navbar. It’s sandwiched between the Forums and Store links, which I also hope you’ll take the time to check out.

I’m not going to pretend the database contains every single tiny laptop on the market or coming soon. But as of today, it holds 42 such laptops, only a dozen of which are Asus Eee PC models. And the list is growing every day.

Best of all, since I’ve replaced the old list with a database, you can organize the list by category. The implementation isn’t perfect. Since columns are arranged in numerical or alphabetical order, for example, if you arrange the computers by CPU speed, the 1.6GHz models will be listed before the 300MHz models. But the database is a work in progress. I’ll do my best to keep it up to date and usable. I hope you find it a valuable resource. And if you see errors or omissions, please let me know!

There’s two more days to get your entries in for the Liliputing logo design contest. And something Daron said the other day got me thinking. $50 really isn’t much money for a logo. While I can’t afford $1000 for a professional design, I can certainly afford a bit more than $50.

So I’m upping the pot. The grand prize winner will now get a $100 Amazon gift certificate or $100 via PayPal (minus PayPal fees). So if you’ve on the sidelines, you’ve got until Friday at noon to enter a submission. If you’ve already submitted an entry, you’re free to send in another one. But you certainly don’t have to.

The 2nd and 3rd place entries will receive $25 gift certificates to Amazon or $25 in cash via PayPal (minus PayPal fees).

I just noticed that the link in the featured posts section to the Liliputing logo design contest was dead. I’ve fixed the link, but I figured now was as good a time as any to give you a gentle reminder: If you have an idea for a new logo for this site, you have until Friday to enter your submission.You could win a $50 or $25 gift certificate or cash.

I’ve received a few great ideas so far, but I’d love to see some more. Make sure to read the complete contest rules before submitting an entry.

I’ve received a few notes letting me know that readers are having problem with this site’s RSS feed. It looks like the problem is probably with Feedburner. This morning the RSS syndication service reports that I have 0 subscribers on all of my blogs, and while I can easily read the feed using Firefox, it won’t load at all in Internet Explorer at the moment.

Duncan Riley at The Inquisitr and Zoli Erdos are reporting similar problems. And based on your comments, it looks like the problem isn’t just that Feedburner is underreporting my number of subscribers, but that it seems to be doing a crappy job of publishing my feed at the moment.

There may be an explanation for this. Google bought Feedburner a while back, and this week the company announced that some publishers can start to transition their feeds from Feedburner to Google. I’m still not entirely certain what this means, since Google hasn’t publicly announced a new RSS syndication service or landing page. But the company has added an option to allow publishers to place AdSense in RSS feeds — which can only be done once a feed is transitioned from Feedburner.

All of which is to say, I’m hoping that the issue will be resolved in the next day or two. If it’s not, I may have to consider dropping Feedburner in favor of another service.

You may have noticed that I’ve tweaked the site design a bit in the last few days. But let’s be honest, I’m a content nerd, not a design geek. So I’ve decided to outsource the most important part of the new site design by turning to you for help: Liliputing could really use a new logo.

Right now the logo for this site is basically just the site name in Courier New font. I’m sure we can do better. So here’s the deal. If you can help me come up with a design that truly captures the spirit of Liliputing, I’ll give you a $50 $100 gift certificate to Amazon.com. But wait, there’s more!

While I can only pick one design, I’m feeling generous, so I’ll give out $25 gift certificates to the 2nd and 3rd runners up. If I decide not to use any of the submissions as the new site logo, I’ll award $25 gift certificates to the three best entries.

How will entries be judged? Well, I’ll take a look at them and decide which ones I like best. That’s pretty much it.

Here are a few more things you should know:

1. Send all entries to lili…@bradlinder.net (hit the … to find the actual email address).
2. Submit as many entries as you like.
3. Entries can include text, graphics, or a combination of both. They should not include copyrighted images such as promotional pictures of specific laptop computers. Any artwork that violates copyright laws will be disqualified, no matter how cool it looks.
4. Pay attention to the site. The logo will likely stay in approximately the same position, so think about designs that would work well on this web page. The logo may also be used on business cards or other promotional materials.
5. The deadline for entries is currently set at 12:00pm EST on Friday, August 22nd, 2008. Depending on the number of submissions received by that date I will either select a winner or extend the contest for a brief period.
6. The winner and runners up will be notified as soon as the selection has been made, which should be within 48 hours of the end of the contest. If your selection is not chosen, you may not receive any response at all. It doesn’t mean I don’t like you or your artwork. It just means I’m busy.
7. Entrants should understand that are granting Liliputing the right to use their artwork free of charge forever.
8. This contest is open to anybody, anywhere in the world. But I’m not sure how easy it will be to send gift certificates for non-US versions of Amazon. If the winner or runners up would prefer payment via PayPal, we can probably work something out, but a small amount may be deducted to cover PayPal fees.

I’ll be traveling for most of today so don’t expect much in the way of updates. But to tide you over, check out jkOnTheRun’s video unboxing of the Acer Aspire One laptop.

While you may think you know everything there is to know about the Aspire One by now, if you’ve got 26 minutes on your hands you should definitely check out the video. Mobile experts Kevin Tofel and James Kendrick discuss the computer which is now available at Circuit City stores at length.

In relates news, tnkgrl recently picked one up as well. And while Acer doesn’t make it easy to upgrade the RAM (no access panel), she’s discovered that if you take the case apart you can easily upgrade the RAM and perform all sorts of other hacks. Next up, she plans to swap out the 8GB SSD for a 60GB HDD.

If you’ve been visiting Liliputing for a while, you might remember that I used to post a weekly poll. I decided to eliminate this feature a month or two ago after deciding that I had too many third party plugins on the page and they were slowing down page load speeds. I’m still working to improve the page loads, but I do kind of miss the polls. Fortunately, it’s easy to create polls using the forum software that’s powering the new Liliputing Forums.

In fact, anybody can create a poll of their own, and that’s just what jair2k4 has already done. He’s posted a poll asking whether you plan to replace your UMPC, buy a new one, or get a different type of device. But almost nobody’s participating yet. So if you’ve got a minute, hop on over to the forums and let us know. Or create your own poll. Want to know whether people name their computers, or if they have more laptops than automobiles? Let’s find out together!

Oh yeah, and while you can post polls anywhere in the forums, I’ve created a new board dedicated to polls. To kick things off, I posted the question: Eee PC 1000H or MSI Wind? Now that the two laptops are about the same price, which do you think is a better bargain?

If anyone’s curious about the process of moving from Blogger to Wordpress, that’s exactly what I did last weekend. I wrote up a brief article explaining the steps over at my personal blog.

Basically, I made the switch after deciding to launch the Liliputing Forums. Up until recently, this site had been hosted by Google’s Blogger. And while the blog client was easy to use and I’d experienced very little downtime, it would have been pretty difficult to build a forums using the same domain name as the blog without purchasing a hosting plan and moving the blog to a new platform.

As an added benefit, I now have much more control over the look and feel of the blog, and access to hundreds, maybe thousands of useful plugins. I’ve just started to play with these plugins, but you’ll notice that I’ve already replaced the long list of tags in the right column with an easier to use tag cloud. I’d been trying for ages to do that with a Blogger hack, but it turns out the process is as simple as pressing a button or two with Wordpress.

Anyway, the transition was a bit more complicated than I’d hoped, because I really wanted to make sure I could preserve the URL/permalink structure. Otherwise any links on other websites to older Liliputing posts would be dead. And since I use Disqus for comments, I would have lost all of the site’s comment history if I changed the URL structure. But while it took me about 14 hours to get everything figured out, now I’ve gathered all of the most useful resources I’ve found for switching from Blogger to Wordpress in one place. So if you’re thinking of making the same jump, I hope that my little article can save you 10 or 12 hours.

Last weekend I transitioned the site from Blogger to a self-hosted Wordpress installation. While there were many reasons for making the switch, the primary reason was that I wanted to be able to expand Liliputing so that it’s not just a blog, but also a community. Many of you have been quite vocal in the comments, and today I want to announce a new opportunity to join the discussion: the Liliputing Forums.

There are already a number of excellent user forums for low cost ultraportable computers. My goal is not to compete with other communities but rather to present a place where people can share their thoughts and ideas about all things related to low cost mobile computing. The new forums feature subtopics for each major class of tiny computer, but also forums for discussing hardware, software, operating systems and other news. I’m also open to questions or suggestions. let me know if you have any ideas for new categories or if you think I should remove some.

I want to acknowledge some of the other fantastic user communities out there. I hope that members of our new forums will continue to collaborate with them.

• EeeUser Forums
• MiniNote User Forums
• Acer Aspire One User Forum

You can find a link to the forums in the site navigation menu just above the Liliputing logo.

I’m working on the site this evening. Liliputing may be unavailable for a while, and when it’s back there may be some issues with comments and other parts of the site. Please let me know if you experience any problems.

Update: I think everything should be working properly now.

For anyone who’s curious, I switched the site from Blogger.com to a hosted WordPress installation today. Blogger has served me well, but some of the features I’d like to roll out soon require a bit more control than Google could give me.

Again, if anyone notices any major problems, please let me know. The theme, URLs, and comments should all have carried over. But I’m sure I probably missed something.

This site is now featured in the gadget section of Alltop, a popular news aggregator. We’re all the way down toward the bottom of the page, but we’re there!

In order to celebrate this achievement, I’d like to place an Alltop badge on this site. But it’s just too tough to choose the right badge. The options range from “Alltop: confirmation that I kick ass” to “Alltop: I don’t know how I got there either.”

If you have a moment, check out the page of badges and let me know which you think would be most appropriate for this site.

Defining characteristics of a liliputer:

• Low cost (typically under $600)
• Tiny (10.2 inch or smaller display)
• Unlike many UMPCs (Ultra Mobile PCs), all liliputers have keyboards
• Most liliputers feature cheaper, slower components than contemporary laptops. But with the introduction of the Intel Atom and VIA Nano CPUs, this is changing.

Introduction to Liliputing:

Over the past year or so, one of the hottest growing segments in the PC market has been low-cost ultraportable PCs. There’s no common naming convention at the moment. Some people call them netbooks, while others call them mini-notebooks, Ultra Mobile PCs or Ultra Low-Cost PCs. I call them Liliputers, because they’re lillipution.

But where did these low-cost ultraportables come from? And what good are they? Liliputers are designed for two different types of users: People who have never really used computers before, and people who want a second or third computer.

A tiny laptop computer with a low-powered CPU isn’t really going to replace your gaming rig or your home theater PC anytime soon. But if you’ve already got a primary computer that you use for work and just want a light weight one that you can carry around in your bag for checking your email, web surfing, or updating your novel on the go, a Liliputer might fit the bill.You may have heard of the OLPC project. MIT’s Nicholas Negroponte started the One Laptop Per Child program to find a way to bring the cost of computers down and manufacture a “$100 laptop” that could be sold in bulk to governments and educational institutions in developing nations to help bridge the digital divide. The project has been quite successful — but not necessarily in the way Negroponte intended.

While adoption of the OLPC’s XO Laptop has been a bit slower than expectations, and the price has risen well above $100 (but still below $200), Negroponte and his group demonstrated that you could make a low-cost laptop that is capable of performing many of the most common computing tasks. It could be portable, light weight, durable, and low-power, yet still surf the web, handle Office documents, and even let you write your own programs. Intel and Microsoft didn’t like the fact that the OLPC didn’t use an Intel CPU or the Windows operating system, so the two companies developed the Classmate PC which costs a bit more than an XO Laptop, but runs Windows XP.

In 2007, Asustek took the idea and ran with it. The company asked, why develop low-cost computers just for developing markets? The Eee PC 701 was designed as a sub-$400 computer for third world nations and developed markets alike. While Asus overpromised (the original plan was to release a $200 computer), the company delivered on pretty much everything but the price.

The Asus Eee PC 701 4G took outdated components, crammed them into a tiny case, and established a new class of machine: the low-cost ultraportable. Up until later 2007, if you wanted a subnotebook that weighed less than 3 pounds, you’d have to spend at least $1500. By using a pokey 900MHz Intel Celeron processor, an 800 x 480 pixel display and 512MB of RAM, Asus brought the price way down.

Sure, you wouldn’t want to use an Eee PC 701 to do serious video editing or other CPU intensive tasks. But for web browsing, video chatting, or other basic internet-centric applications, it did the trick. Asus also took another cue from the OLPC project and stuck a solid state disk in the Eee PC instead of a hard drive. That means the $400 model had just 4GB of storage space. But because there are no moving parts, the computer is less likely to break and some operations actually run more quickly. And Asus included a custom version of the Xandros Linux operating system, which also helped keep the price down since there was no need to pay Windows licensing fees.

The Asus Eee PC 701 4G was a huge hit for Asus, and the company quickly followed up with additional models, includign the 4G Surf, which costs a few bucks less and comes with a lower capacity battery and the 2G Surf, which has the smaller battery, no webcam, and just 2GB of storage capacity.

The Eee PC also developed a loyal group of enthusiasts who formed communities like EeeUser. If you read through the extraordinarily active EeeUser wiki and forums you’ll find a huge list of suggestions for optimizing, hacking, or changing the operating system on an Eee PC.

With Asus leading the way, a number of other companies jumped in. One of the first to get a lot of press was Everex, a company best known for making a Linux-based laptop that Wal-Mart briefly sold for under $200. The Everex Cloudbook looked good on paper. It was about the same size as the tiny Eee PC 701 and sported a similar screen. But it came with a 30GB hard drive and a VIA C7-M CPU.

It also ran gOS, which is a custom version of Ubuntu Linux. Ubuntu is much more popular than Xandros, and so a lot of people were probably excited to see a computer that came with gOS out of the box. But the Cloudbook was kind of a miss. The comany didn’t bother customizing the operating system for the device’s small screen. Some early adopters got their computers home and couldn’t figure out how to get past the startup screen because the Next buttons didn’t fit on the display.The VIA C7-M CPU is also a bit less powerful than the Intel Celeron CPU. So even though the Everex Cloudbook had a 1.2GHz chip, it takes longer to perform many basic tasks than an Eee PC with a 900MHz Celeron chip underclocked to 630MHz.

During the first few months of 2008, a number of companies announced plans to release new or upgraded versions of tiny computers. Dell, MSI, Gigabyte, HP, and Acer all announced plans to get in on the action.

The first of these companies to get a computer to market was HP. The HP Mini-Note PC is without a doubt, one of the most attractive Liliputers. It has a sturdy aluminum case instead of the cheap plastic of its peers. And it has an astonishingly crisp 1280 x 768 pixel 8.9 inch display. It also packs the same pokey VIA C7-M CPU as the Everex Cloudbook, which means the Mini-Note isn’t going to win any awards for speed.

The HP Mini-Note also ships with Windows Vista or SUSE Enterprise Linux, and costs between $499 and $849, which sort of stretches the definition of low-cost. Still, you’d have been hard pressed to find a computer with these specs in this small a case for twice the price a year or two ago.In an effort to keep up, Asus released the Eee PC 900, which has the same basic specs as the Eee PC 701, but packs additional storage capacity and a larger 8.9 inch 1024 x 600 display. It’s not quite as sharp as the HP Mini-Note display, but honestly, on an 8.9 inch screen, 1280 x 768 pixels might be a little too sharp. You have to squint to read the text on many web pages if you don’t adjust the fonts on Mini-Note.

At Computex 2008, the floodgates opened as dozens of PC makers announced their entries into the market. Acer, Gigabyte, MSI, ECS, Everex, Asus, and many others all announced new products that will be hitting the streets starting in 2008. What sets these devices apart from traditional laptops is that most have 10-inch or smaller displays, relatively cheap components, and cost less than $700. Some have starting prices as low as $300, making them far more affordable than computers of the past.

Here are the specs on a few of the more popular models:

Eee PC 701

• Processor: Intel Celeron 800 or 900MHz, underclocked to 571MHz or 630MHz
• RAM: 512MB to 1GB
• Storage: 2GB, 4GB, or 8GB solid state flash memory
• Display: 7 inch 800 x 480 pixel screen
• Expansion: 3 USB ports, 1 VGA output, 1 SDHC card slot
• Operating System: Xandros Linux or Windows XP
• Connectivity: Ethernet, 802.11b/g
• Webcam: 0.3 megapixels
• Weight: .92kilograms / 2 pounds
• Dimensions: 225 x 165 x 21-35mm
• Battery: 4 cell 4400mAh or 5200mAh battery for between 2 and 3 hours of battery life (with a claimed battery life of up to 3.5 hours)
• Price: $299 to $499
• Official Product Page
• Cheap, refurbished units now available on Amazon

Eee PC 901

• Processor: 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor
• RAM: 1GB
• Storage: 12GB or 20GB flash memory
• Display: 8.9 inch 1024 x 600 pixel screen
• Expansion:VGA output, 3 USB ports, SDHC card slot
• Operating System: Windows XP or Xandros Linux
• Connectivity: Ethernet, 802.11b/g
• Webcam: 1.3 megapixels
• Weight: 1.1 kilograms / 2.4 pounds
• Battery: 6-cell battery
• Price: $599
• Official Product Page
• More information

Eee PC 1000/H

• 

  Processor: 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor

• RAM: 1GB
• Storage: 40GB SSD or or 80GB HDD
• Display: 10.2 inch 1024 x 600 pixel screen
• Expansion:VGA output, 3 USB ports, SDHC card slot
• Operating System: Windows XP or Xandros Linux
• Connectivity: Ethernet, 802.11b/g
• Webcam: 1.3 megapixels
• Weight: 1.33/1.45 kilograms or 2.9/3.2 pounds
• Battery: 6-cell battery
• Price: $649/$699
• Official Product Page - Eee PC 1000
• Official Product Page - Eee PC 1000H
• More information - Eee PC 1000
• More information - Eee PC 1000H

HP Mini-Note

• Processor: 1GHz - 1.6GHz VIA C7 Mobile Processor
• RAM: 512MB to 2GB
• Storage: 4GB solid state flash memory or 120GB/160GB hard drive
• Display: 8.9 inch 1280 x 768 pixel screen
• Expansion: VGA output, 2 USB ports, Express Card slot, SD card slot
• Operating System: Windows Vista Home Basic, Windows Vista Business, or OpenSUSE Linux
• Connectivity: Ethernet, 802.11b/g, Bluetooth on some models
• Webcam: VGA
• Weight: 2.8 pounds
• Battery: 3 cells or 6 cells
• Price: $499 through $849
• Official Product Page
• More Information

MSI Wind

• RAM: 1GB
• Storage: 80GB hard drive
• Display: 10.2 inch 1024 x 600 pixel screen
• Expansion: 3 USB ports, VGA output, SD card reader
• Operating System: Windows XP Home
• Connectivity: WiFi, Bluetooth
• Webcam: 1.3 megapixels
• Battery: 3 cells
• Weight: 1.2 kilograms / 2.6 pounds
• Dimensions: 10.23″(L) X7.08″(D) X 0.748″~1.24″(H)
• Price: $479 - $499
• Official Product Page
• More Information

Acer Aspire One

• CPU: 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor
• RAM: 512MB, upgradeable to 1.5GB
• Storage: 4GB or 8GB SSD or 80GB hard drive
• Display: 8.9 inch 1024 x 600 pixel LED-backlit screen
• Operating System: Windows XP or Linpus Linux Lite
• Keyboard: 95% full size
• Webcam: Yes
• Ports: 3 USB 2.0, 5-in-1 card reader (SD/MMC/MS/MS Pro/xD), VGA output
• Communications: Ethernet, 802.11b/g
• Battery: 3 cell battery with estimated 3 hours battery life, optional 6 cell battery
• Dimensions: 9.8″ x 6.7″ x 1.14″
• Weight: 2.17 pounds
• Price: $379
• Official Product Page
• More Information

I’m moving from New York to Philadelphia tomorrow, so my internet access will be sporadic at best. Fortunately, Sascha Pallenberg has agreed to step in and write a few breaking news posts. Sascha runs Eee PC News and several other German language sites including HP2133.de and MSI-Wind.de. If you read German, or even if you don’t you should definitely check out Sascha’s blogs. They’re excellent and choc full of information and snazzy pictures.

I’ve also queued up a few other posts to run over the next few days, so keep checking back. And hopefully things will be back to normal within a few days.