THE LATEST CONSUMER REPORTS compares the Asus 1000HE and the Sony 8″ Vaio P Series. As they note, the tradeoffs are different, and they don’t offer a firm recommendation, but as an owner of the Asus I’d pick it over the Sony. It’s less than half the price, it’s still pretty small, it offers very good performance (and probably better than the Sony, since the Asus comes with XP and the Sony has Vista), and longer battery life. On the other hand, the Sony will impress women at bars more.