Notebooks, Netbooks and the blurring lines.
In October 2007 Asus started it all with the release of its Eee PC series, the first of which had a tiny 7″ screen running a 900MHz Intel Celeron processor. Since then the netbook market has been on fire with a range of manufacturers announcing and releasing devices throughout the year. Netbooks with varying processors, screen sizes, keyboard layouts and prices have filled up both real and virtual shelfs.
However the once distinct line between notebooks and netbooks which stood at 1.6GHz, 10.2″ screen size is now being blurred out. 2008 was undoubtedly a great year for notebooks and we saw their adoption, that too at a extremely quick pace, The gone Christmas season was the best for Amazon but with 17 of the top 25 laptops being netbooks, trends could be worrying. With 2008 being the year of the economic downturn people were most likely looking for cheaper alternative.
I wrote a post a while ago about Netbooks not being able to replace notebooks and I 
still stand by what the situation was at that given time. Dell and Samsung have both announced Netbooks at 12″ screen size and MSI takes it up a notch at 13.4″. NVidia’s ION platform enables laptops with the Intel Atom processer to play HD at 1080p. At these sizes these machines become notebooks which as less-powered, but still very capable of performing everyday tasks required by most consumers as well as professionals. At this point netbooks start to creep into notebook territory. It’s no wonder Intel is nervous about it, and 
despite it being the lead provider for netbook processors, has criticised netbooks in the past with Intel’s VP Stu Pann saying netbooks are not an all day machine. Michael Arrington seems to think this is because “every Netbook sold is one less Dual Core that Intel can sell at a higher price and higher margin” and he may just be right.
What does this whole situation mean for netbooks as they have been known pre-2009, i.e., complimentary machines to larger, more powerful ones? What, if any, will be the distinction between netbooks and notebooks? Or are we coming back to a point where notebooks and netbooks come together again under one heading again?
Related posts:
- Netbooks: Not a question of ‘Either, or’ but instead ‘Whether, not’.
- Can we give the MSI Wind ‘some’ competition? Please?
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amazing stuff thanx
Hi, good post. I have been wondering about this issue,so thanks for posting. I’ll definitely be coming back to your site.
Great post! Just wanted to let you know you have a new subscriber- me!
Glad you enjoyed it Andrew.
Another a very great writeup by the author hope to read more really soon.
Maybe you could edit the page name Notebooks, Netbooks and the blurring lines. – Default – bhavishya KANJHAN to more better for your webpage you make. I enjoyed the the writing however.
the best and cheap netbooks are made by Asus or MSI, if you want reliability then the best is Hitachi netbooks~
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