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The very first hit led me to these two devices which seem to fit the bill exactly.

Alphasmart
Quickpad

I haven't used mine as much as I expected -- I don't know if they've got newer models, but mine has audible keyboard clicks, and I find I don't write LaTeX as fast by keyboard as I can write math, so plain paper is better for me for taking notes. Nonetheless, I've never had a serious problem with it, when I talked to their tech support (about a minor memory thing -- it acted like it had less than it did) they were outrageously helpful and actually solved the problem over the phone.

Light, convenient, don't have to worry about software incompatibilities (it "uploads" by pretending you're typing now, rather than when you did)...worth looking at.

"The closest I found was the Clio Vadem PC-1000 but it has a color screen and is rather big.. :("

You want a 10" screen but think the PC-1000 is big! I have to say that I've been looking for that kind of thing too. I guess marketing depts worldwide that B/W won't sell, even with higher res and better battery life than the colour alternatives.

The Vadem, its twin the "TriPad" and the Psion Series 7 were the closest I could find to what I wanted.

Taking the cue from the grandparent to look for word processors I also found some other options - mainly aimed at the educational market.

Of the links above, the two cheaper quickpads seem the most viable - it works as a wireless or USB keyboard at your pc, then just walk away with some text files (and apparently spreadsheets too?). At 11" its a bit large but it makes sense if you see it as a keyboard replacement. Interesting note on how it works in a review I found:

"When a user returns to the office, the QuickPAD allows the files in the Text Editor to be uploaded into any favorite word-processing program. This trick is accomplished by having the keyboard "replay" all the keystrokes of the text editor's file."

Interesting. So if you combine a Happy Hacking keyboad, a keylogger and a display, you'd have the same thing?

I've been waiting for a Palm-based sub-laptop form typing device for a long time. But this thing is kind of a kludge. For one thing, it's expensive. For another, it's kind of ugly.

Since the screen is touch sensitive (I'm assuming, since it is a Palm device), that means some sort of resistive touchscreen (again, I'm assuming.) This means glass, which means increased weight, and if there isn't a cover for it, it means a broken screen if I try tossing it in my backpack like you can do with the other Alphasmarts.

My main complaint is the cost. I'd wish someone would hack a LCD screen driver for a cheap, low-power monochrome screen, so I could recycle my old Pilot into a portable writing slate. As it is, I think the best portable writing slate on the market is a QuickPad Pro. It's cheap, has CF support (I have a spare 16MB CF card that I have lying around since I got a 160MB card for my camera), has a serial port, runs off of AA batts, and uses a stripped-down version of DOS for an OS, which they hint can allow you to write code to run on it.

Of course, the Dana has the Palm codebase to work off of (and a couple of nifty apps - a MS word compatible word processor and a widescreen book reader), so maybe my first impressions are a bit harsh. But $399 for a damn keyboard, no serial port, and no CF support... I am NOT buying a new computer (to get a USB port) just to use a writing slate!

What's the matter, you afraid of getting sued by BT? ;)

Here's some links, folks:

brainium.com
quickpad.com
calcuscribe.com
alphasmart.com

...about that battery life requirement, you might try hacking on a QuickPad Pro. Of course, it meets almost none of your other requirements.

So, what are everyone's preferences as far as laptops go?

I am also currently looking at buying a laptop, and I'm going for one of the 3-3.5 lb. ultralights. Such as a Sony z505 or a Gateway Solo 3450. The only thing they don't have is a built in CD-ROM (the Gateway has it on an expansion slice), but they usually have built in 10/100 ethernet.

What kind of features are most important?

For me: XGA resolution, long battery life, as light as possible, built in ethernet. I want something that is very thin and light. I don't need a "road warrior" config.

How does price enter the equation?

Some half decent laptops are into the $1500 range, but anything with enough RAM and ethernet is around $2200-$3000.

Which one is best for the money?

An Etch-a-Sketch. ;) It really depends on your choices for the above questions. How about something like this instead?

And especially, can you get a decent machine for under $1000?"

Ahhh, the Holy Grail(TM). eBay has some pretty good deals, but I've heard you need to be even more careful about who you buy from than normal. If you find this one, review it and post it here for us to check out.

Cheers!

Once upon a time, Radio Shack tried to replace the Model 100/102/200 line with a dedicated word processor called the WP-2. In theory, it had all the necessary ingredients to be a successful replacement for the M10x line. In practice, it never sold well and was discontinued after about a year and a half of lackluster sales.

It had a full-size typewriter style keyboard that was actually better than the M10x line had, featuring comfortable sculpted keycaps. It had an 80-column by 8 line display. It had excellent runtime on AA batteries. It had a parallel printer port (something the M10x family never had), it had a real serial port that could go faster than 19,200 bps. It just never sold well.

Why? Well, I think the problem was the display. The 80-column width made the characters too small to see easily. If the machine had a higher-contrast display, the battery life would have suffered, but I think the display was too hard to read and that doomed the machine.

Anything that's going to successfully carry on the Model 100's legacy needs to have a readable display above all else.

Oh, by the way. For people who'd rather just click on a link than copy'n'paste URLs, here are the websites mentioned in the post to which I'm replying:

www.alphasmart.com
www.quickpad.com
www.perfectsolutions.com
www.dreamwriter.com
www.calcuscribe.com
Alphasmart review
Quickpad review

The form would be like this, but with real CPU and memory:

http://www.quickpad.com/

But what we are describing isn't really a "Palm Top", but just an ordinary laptop finally done right.