<p>I had a 15 inch was perfectly happy with it for daily notetaking in each class. Something smaller might be nice if you are using it SOLELY for notetaking, but I didn’t go to college with two computers and it would have gotten old very quickly typing papers on a computer any smaller than that. If I’d had the money I might have had a 15"+ for my dorm and a netbook for class, but that seemed excessive and carrying the 15" was no problem. It was usually the only thing in my backpack, maybe with one book-- not very heavy at all, high school was much worse. Using anything but a netbook on the tiny flip-out desks is scary and I just let my laptop sit on my lap anyway, no problem.</p>