don't they have to power down a little as they break the sound barrier?

"The main engines are throttled down at approximately seven minutes 40 seconds into the mission to maintain 3 g's for physiological and structural constraints." Space Shuttle ref manual: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/shutref/events/2stage/

At what point do these stripped-down netbooks begin competing directly with large screen, wi-fi/wan-enabled cell phones that can be used as a 'browser in a box' with office document reading/editing, games, email, IM, plus being a cell phone?

Reaching the levels of $200 and below are right at subsidized smartphone levels. With new chips like Qualcomm's 1Ghz snapdragon now in use in a phone with a 4.1", 480x800 touchscreen, what makes a netbook at these levels competitive? Would screen size alone win out over features?

MAKE:blog has some descriptions of some DIY sun-trackers to move the panel with the sun during the day.