It is important to note that the KDE netbook desktop is included in every KDE 4 installation — but it is not the default, so you have to activate it if you want it. It works brilliantly on every netbook I have tested, with complete support out of the box for all the hardware including Intel Atom, AMD C-50, C-60, E-350 and E-450 CPUs, Intel and AMD/ATI graphics, Intel, Broadcom, Atheros and Ralink network and Wi-Fi adapters, and as little as 1GB to as much as 4GB of memory.

Although I have chosen openSuSE 12.1 for the screenshots here, I could have done the same thing on Mint 13 KDE, Mageia, or any other current KDE 4 distribution.

To activate the KDE netbook desktop, go to the KDE menus and select Configure Desktop to get to the control screen where you can choose the netbook desktop.