Since the MSI Wind's initial release seven months ago, the middle of the netbook market, roughly defined here as the $350-$500 range, has become very crowded. It seems like everyone and their subsidiary is getting into the netbook game and there are now dozens of models and submodels vying for your money, with even more product launches right around the corner. In this suddenly crowded niche market, is the MSI Wind still a good choice, or has it fallen behind the competition?

Don't get us wrong. We're not saying that MSI has been standing still this whole time. On the contrary, the folks at MSI have been cooking up a number of new netbook products, as we'll certainly see at CES this week. MSI has also released a cheaper 8.9" version of the Wind, the U90, which is currently available in parts of Europe, Australia and Canada. However, at least for the time being, the original MSI Wind, now dubbed the Wind U100, is still the only MSI netbook officially sold in the US.

Today we're going to pit it head-to-head with a couple of its younger competitors to see if can keep up with the mass of new competition.