Is the Netbook Hysteria Starting to Wind Down?
Is the Netbook Hysteria Starting to Wind Down?
Posted 04/21/2009 at 7:38am
| by Paul Lilly
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Much to the delight of Intel, whose Atom processors have become the de facto standard in all things netbook, the ultraportable PC has proven more popular among the mainstream crowd than Jonas Brothers tickets among tweenage girls. It would seem at this point that netbooks are much more than just a passing fad, but could sales be gearing up to level off?
According to news and rumor site DigiTimes, Taiwan-based netbook vendors say shipment volumes for Q1 are falling short of expectations. The un-cited sources claim that while Acer was estimated to ship two million of its popular Aspire One netbooks in Q1, channel sales didn't hit the mark. The same held true for Asus and its Eee PC sales, which were expected to hit one million units, but fell shy at 900,000. Meanwhile, MSI also reportedly saw lower than expected sales, shipping just 200,000 netbooks.
To make up for the shortfall, channel vendors say both MSI and Acer have started focusing on ultra-thin notebooks.
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wk
April 22, 2009 at 1:26pm
I know that many people love netbook. but i never understand the idea, there are many light notebooks with good 12" screen that has the mobility and long battery life to satisfy every need, and at least they have reasonable specification for every use. the main difference may be price but these low prices come with a lot of compromises (small screen, low processor power, small stoarage, no gaming ability ... etc.)
so i think the hype needs to end.
MPC is my home page
dannyblaze
April 21, 2009 at 3:18pm
I use an Acer Aspire One netbook and love it. I have been computing now for over 15 years now and love it! No, they are not for gaming (but can do games), no they don't have dual core processors and crazy amounts of video RAM. Thise machines for for getting a job done and they do it well. I use open office, Google Chrome, Thunderbird, CamStudio Screen capture, and Picasa for my photo needs. This machine does all of this and does it very well. I paid only $298.00 US for my netbook and once you get past the idea that this is not a super computer or gaming machine and just want a simple inexpensive office computing solution then you will see that netbooks are here to stay.
I purchased a 9 cell battery and I don't need to plug in all day and even into the next day. I have a 160GB SATA HDD and 1GB DDR2 RAM. I have no problem with the 8.9 inch screen and I wear glasses. I can edit video on my Acer Netbook, write my articles, post comments like I am doing now, and I love this machine. I have a full size notebook from Acer also but I just gave it to my son for school and this is all I need to get my work done.
I can understand the issues with netbooks when they first came out with the small SDD and all but now they have SATA drives that are more then capable of doing what the average office personal need to get done. This is a great road warrior machine and I recommend them to all my friends and family who want inexpensive with quality build. Acer fits this bill for me. IMHO.
jcollins
April 21, 2009 at 12:46pm
My suspicion is that the market's saturated. Even at 200 bucks, a crappy computer's a crappy computer. With price creep at $400-$495, people are at the point of "If I pay a couple hundred more I can get a real laptop".
NAYRhyno
April 21, 2009 at 12:58pm
Where are people pulling $400-$495 from? Most netbooks are $350 or less
http://www.buy.com/prod/asus-eee-pc-1000ha-10-netbook-intel-atom-n270-1-6ghz-1gb-160gb-hdd-802/q/loc/101/209708402.html
http://www.buy.com/prod/hp-mini-1033cl-intel-atom-n270-1-60ghz-netbook-1024mb-ram-60gb-hdd-10/q/loc/101/210958196.html
http://www.buy.com/prod/acer-aspire-one-aod150-1920-10-1-netbook-intel-atom-n270-1-6ghz-1gb/q/loc/101/210692642.html
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jcollins
April 21, 2009 at 3:29pm
I was thinking the "high end" netbooks.
Examples:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220368
http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/laptop-inspiron-10?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs
http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/laptop-inspiron-12?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&cs=19
NAYRhyno
April 22, 2009 at 10:26am
Netbooks are great computers. Not a replacment for your desktop obviously, but as a secondary ultra portable for browsing, hulu'ing, classic gaming (read), and programming or writing they are really awesome, and a good value (at $300-$350).
It will be great if we get a sub $400 nvidia ion based "netbook" (sub-notebook) for the holiday 09 season.
One reason they are so popular is that smal laptops used to be the most expensive, now small can be cheap, and people have been waiting for that.
ubuwalker31
April 21, 2009 at 11:33am
I own an Asus EeePC. I love it. It is hackable. You can install Ubuntu on it. It is a handy dandy device. Its great for commuting since its light or checking your e-mail or surfing the web at Starbucks. Students seem to love it.
The problem is that the screen isn't big enough, its still too heavy (I wish it was less than a pound), Firefox greys out sometimes due to memory issues, and typing for longer than 10 minutes gets uncomfortable. Also, battary life sucks.
Bender2000
April 21, 2009 at 11:54am
Did you get it just to see what it was about, or did you get it to replace something? Do you think most netbook users realized the limitations when they got them?
ubuwalker31
April 22, 2009 at 12:25pm
I never owned a laptop before. There were way too many compromises. Too big, too expensive, too underpowered. The Asus EeePC got the price/feature/weight ratio right for me.
Bender2000
April 21, 2009 at 9:22am
Is the market for netbooks saturated now? I think everyone who was updating from an old laptop to a netbook did it over the holidays.
chronium
April 21, 2009 at 9:19am
Fom my understanding netbooks were supposed to be in the $100-$200 range but most are in the $400 range. At those prices I rather buy a notebook instead.
ubuwalker31
April 21, 2009 at 11:35am
Eee PCs can be found in the $100-$200 range refurbished. If you don't care about portability and size and price, splurge on an old notebook.
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