What is a Netbook Computer?
Posted on September 3, 2009
Filed Under Cheap Laptops, Netbooks |
These days your choice of laptop computer is not just limited to Mac or PC, you also have to decide whether to get a laptop of a netbook. As if life wasn’t complicated enough already! You have to choose which courses to take this year, so why aren’t laptops simpler? Sigh.
Well it’s not all bad. Netbooks are actually not a whole new kind of computer, they’re really just focussed, trimmed down versions of laptops. Netbooks can still be PC or Mac, and you can still spend a lot of money or a little on them. The choice is yours… or your parents.
So what is a netbook, already?
Ok, I’m getting to that. The reality is there is no hard and fast definition of what a netbook is. The phrase ‘netbook’ has been bandied around for a while now, but it’s only recently that manufacturers have jumped on the netbook bandwagon - seeing a way to make us buy another computer as well as our boring old laptop. A quick search on the Goog gives the following ‘definitions’:
- “A netbook is a small portable laptop computer designed for wireless communication and access to the Internet.” - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netbook
- “An economical notebook computer” - en.wiktionary.org/wiki/netbook
- “Netbooks are small portable computing device, similar to a notebook, and are great for surfing the Web and checking e-mail.” - www.webopedia.com
Hmm.. so basically a netbook is a small laptop. That’s pretty much the only commonality there! On top of that a netbook is really designed to just let you quickly connect to the internet to use the web and web based services, such as the great Google email (Gmail) and Google docs. Netbooks are also generally small and easily portable, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be cheap - just check out the awesome Macbook Air as an example of how netbooks can still be expensive design objects of desire.
Netbooks can be great - especially if you have to carry your computer to a lot of lectures - as they are small and even more portable than a normal laptop. However the downside is that they tend to be less powerful, so you won’t be able to play those cool role playing games, and they also don’t have DVD players/burners - so no watching your huge collection of DVDs. In future articles we’ll discuss the pros and cons of netbooks for college vs. laptops for college, but in the meantime have fun getting ready for all the fun of the new college year!
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