My netbook problem is not with the keyboard but with my eyes. I need more then 9" screen space to be able to use a PC of any kind in 1024x600 mode. 11.6" to 13" at 1366x768 or 1280x800 is the sweet spot for me - I need the screen real estate, and I am willing to pay for the low weight. Right now for this weight and screen real estate the competition costs more (NC20, Sony).
NetBook for me is (1) low weight, less then 3Lb if possible and no more then 4Lb with battery and charger; (2) reasonable price, (3) enough pixels to make it usable (1024x600 is the absolute minimum, with 1280x800 or more strongly preferred), (4) big enough screen so I do not need a magnifier glass to read it (1366x786 on a 9" screen is useless for me), and (5) usable performance for web surfing, movie / flash playback, and light use of normal office applications (tried out an Asus PC900 with 16GB SSD and was too slow for any use - shipped it back due to unacceptable performance; SSD light continuously on was likely the main culprit, unacceptable slow writes to SSD killed its performance even for looking at my.yahoo). Battery life is not a big issue for me - I have an outlet where ever I am likely to spend more then a couple of hours at a time - but I will take what I can get, given the other restrictions from above. Dual core / hyprethreading is kind of required so the system keeps on responding while one thread is locked in by an errant program.
A third mouse / tablet button (like I have on my Compaq 8510W laptop) comes in really handy for opening new tabs in Firefox / new IE; as it does not take a lot of $$$ to put it in, and it is quite useful, I am amazed so few models have it (pressing both buttons at once simply does not work properly, tried it out in more laptops and netbooks then I can mention here).
Other deal killer for me are the shiny surfaces, specially shiny screen which are common in new laptops - I will not buy at any price a laptop or notebook with a mirror instead of a normal, old style, glare-free LCD. I need to be able to read it with no reflections - no "Crystal Clear" screens I have seen so far come with a lifetime free supply of Windex for the mirror-like surfaces. I would really appreciate if reviewers mention which notebooks / netbooks have such screens, or worse, shiny fingerprint magnet keyboards and cases so I can avoid them....