I'd really like to hear some feedback here on this too. This is mainly what I want to do on my future netbook. The smaller footprint of a netbook just fits what I need, but I need it to be able to run at least one other OS in VM, 2 if I have to. Suggestions?
Well, you will be in luck. The Atom-based netbooks should only get better as far as performance goes. However, Intel's Atom Z5xx series includes VT support, which is hard-ware assisted virtualization. A few virtualization solutions, including some high assurance military systems, are built on that technology. So, it should help with the VM's. While VMWare's stuff runs faster than VT on fast processors, a VT-based solution might be quicker on Atom's. Again, though, I don't know the chip-level latencies involved during a switch. There could be some dark corners to watch out for.
