The Samsung NC10 doesn't exactly break the mould when it comes to design. It's a standard 10.2-inch Netbook that in terms of design sits squarely between the Asus Eee PC 1000 and the MSI Wind. This isn't a bad thing, as Samsung has clearly looked at what works and put its own spin on it.

The result is clearly the best Netbook so far. It's certainly one the most aggressively priced, as along with the Advent 4211, which is a rebadged MSI Wind, it's the first 10-inch Netbook to break the sub-£300 barrier.

The design is compact and the look crisp. Available in three colours - black, blue and white - the matt finish of our white review sample is typical. In the hand it feels solid and robust

Well specified

The white plastic casing feels good in the hand, while the silver trim around the edge, and also on the hinges, gives it a smart look. Our one concern with the design is with the hinges, which on our sample held the screen in place but felt as thought they would soon weaken.

The hinges open the screen to a maximum 45-degree angle, so be careful not to try and force it back any further.

Weighing 1.3kg, with the six-cell battery fitted, it measures 260 x 170 x 30mm at its mid point. Sure, the battery sticks out of the bottom but this only adds an extra 5mm to the overall depth.

Slightly more annoying is the balance of the machine, as the battery means there is more weight at the back than at the front, so feels back heavy when perched on your knee.

When it comes to specification, you'll find the NC10 is very much a Netbook, packing in an Intel Atom N270 processor and 1024MB of memory. The 160GB hard drive is a welcome addition (Samsung has no plans to offer an SSD drive at the moment), which is partitioned into two equally sized portions.

Pre-installed with Windows XP, we found it loaded smoothly and quickly, booting in just 29 seconds. Performance was more than acceptable, running basic office tasks with relative ease.

You won't want to run anything too taxing on this kind of machine but as a second machine for use out and about, or around the house, it proved great for word processing and surfing the internet.

We've grown accustomed to manufacturers simply loading the basic install of Windows onto their Netbooks but Samsung has gone the extra mile and added its standard array of applications, such as Samsung Battery Manager and Recovery Solution III.

The first time you launch the NC10 you'll be forced to create a backup image and then you'll be able to set up user profiles. We found setting up the wireless connection, it uses an Atheros chipset, easy and we were on the internet within minutes.

You'll also find McAfee Internet Security has also been bundled with it, which is something we've not seen with other Netbooks. It's inclusion may not sway your buying decision but if you're going to use it for web browsing it'll certainly come in useful.

The two most important aspects of any Netbook are the screen and keyboard and we can safely say, the NC10 excels in both departments. The 10.2-inch screen may have the standard 1024 x 600-pixel resolution, so images are a good size. As a result, as with all Netbooks, you'll still need to scroll sideways to view most web pages.