SERIOUSLY, given the size and price of these oh-so-small laptops, you know something's got to give.
In favour of compactness, these tote-arounds have sacrificed performance, power and battery life.
Asus, for one, admits that the ultra- mobile PCs - or UMPCs - are good for about three hours on a full battery charge. Most regular laptops - the better ones, at least - last five hours.
As most of these gizmos rely on flash memory, their 4GB storage space is also much smaller compared to the average 80GB found in laptops.
Which means that computing performance may take a beating. For instance, it may not be able to handle several applications at the same time. The machines might overheat too.
But hang on, say UMPC makers, their handbag darlings are not meant to be notebook PC replacements.
Rather, says Fujitsu, these tiny tots are an "extra choice" for those who want to compute on the move.
The spokesman added: "While you wouldn't hear of someone using the UMPC to do artwork on Photoshop, with features like a built-in webcam and 3.5G connectivity, the amount of work that can be accomplished using an UMPC is substantial."
HTC agreed, adding that UMPCs have "enough" processing power to support basic usage of Office applications and Internet browsing.
Whatever it is, they are popular.
Fujitsu, for instance, has sold more than 1,400 units of their popular UMPC laptops since they were launched last year. This propelled them to the position of market leader in the UMPCs sector with over 50 per cent market share.
Computer maker Asus declined to reveal sales figures. The company has, however, predicted that it will sell five million units of its tiny Eee PC worldwide in 2008.
