Windows 7 to usher in crush of cheap laptops
Call it the Netbook halo effect: small and cheap is infectious. A quick peek at the lineups of new laptops slated for the Windows 7 (October 22) roll-out make it clear that the prices of mainstream and higher-end laptops are diving, even as the technology gets better.
"There's a new reality in laptop pricing," said Bob O'Donnell, an analyst at market-researcher IDC. "It's getting harder and harder to sell anything over $800." O'Donnell cited a data point that showed the average selling price of notebooks falling below desktops briefly in retail. "That may have been an anomaly, but the fact that's it's even close is indicative of this phenomenon."
That said, let's start with HP, the world's largest PC supplier. Svelte, well-built business laptops have historically been priced at a premium--starting at more than $1,000. Not anymore. On October 22, HP will begin selling the 13-inch ProBook 5310m that is about 0.9 inches thin, less than four pounds, and clad in an aluminum display enclosure and a magnesium alloy bottom case for $699.
HP ProBook 5310m starts at $699: this class of business laptop used to start at well over $1,000
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)That's about $800 less than the HP EliteBook 2530p business notebook series introduced in August of last year (that started at about $1,500). The 5310m is priced at $699 with an Intel Celeron dual-core processor and $899 with Intel Core 2 Duo chip. Both come with the Windows 7 operating system.
That's what I call a sea change in pricing.
But it gets better. Then there's the 4-pound HP Pavilion dm3 notebook that starts at $549 (no, it's not a Netbook) and will likely range up to about $700 in price for a reasonable memory and hard drive configuration. The 13-inch laptop comes with power-efficient Intel Core 2 Duo or AMD Neo dual-core processors and a standard 6-cell battery that delivers--so HP claims--up to 10 hours of battery life.
I was able to play with a dm3 at a function sponsored by Advanced Micro Devices recently in San Francisco. My immediate impression was that this was a light but solid design.
The Apple $999 MacBook is suddenly starting to look pretty pricey and a little on the thick and heavy side. (Though, according to reports, this may be about to change.)
Let's move on to Toshiba (speaking of sea changes). Toshiba has been known (along with Sony) for offering impressive but stratospherically priced ultraportable laptops. One of the most egregious examples is the 12-inch Portege R600, which starts at $2,099 and jumps quickly (by adding a solid-state drive) to more than $3,000.
That price almost seems laughable these days. Yes, the R600 comes with an integrated optical drive, powerful Core 2 Duo processors, and some other bells and whistles, but that will be an increasingly tough sell against Toshiba's new Satellite T100 Series that is also small, light, and relatively powerful but lops about $1,500 off the price of the cheapest R600.
Toshiba Portege R600--$2,000-plus executive laptops: an endangered species?
(Credit: Toshiba)To wit: the 11.6-inch Satellite T115 starts at $449, packs a dual-core Pentium SU4100 processor, claims up to nine hours of battery life, and weighs only 3.5 pounds. That makes the R600 and other "executive jewelry"--as Intel's CEO Paul Otellini likes to call these laptops--history. And the T115 may even give Toshiba Netbooks a run for their money. (Why settle for a single-core Netbook when you can get a dual-core laptop for $100 more.)
Dell, oddly, is going in both price directions. First, let's look at the Dell we know: a purveyor of inexpensive laptops such as the $449 Inspiron 14 replete with a 14-inch screen, dual-core Pentium, optical drive, 2GB of memory, and a 160GB hard disk drive.
And Dell has plenty of other inexpensive configurations, lending its considerable weight to the downward price pressure on laptops.
Then there's the Dell few people know. The reborn merchandiser of pricey executive laptops like the impressively sleek $2,299 Adamo or the equally stunning Latitude Z starting at $1,800. And then there's the ultra, ultra-thin Adamo concept. This certainly will not be cheap either (if it, in fact, appears).
Time will only tell how well this Beverly Hills boutique strategy holds up in the face of an onslaught of thin, attractive, and cheap laptops. Of course, there will always be room for a few Cadillac XLR-V roadsters and Ferraris at the top if the designs are compelling enough. (To be honest, I'm anxious to see how groundbreaking the new Adamo design is.)
Meanwhile, the future of laptops lies somewhere below $800. I can live with that.
Brooke Crothers has served as an editor at large at CNET News, an editor at Dow Jones' Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly, and a senior editor at InfoWorld. His CNET blog covers chip technology and computer systems, and how they define the computing experience. He also contributes to The New York Times' Bits and Technology sections. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. Follow Brooke on Twitter @mbrookec. 
Sure the Windows 7 launch, and the upcoming holiday sales are another reason to see these changes.
In the end its about these hardware makers, making up lost sales. I am betting Apple is going to come out with lower cost Mac's right before 7 launches. I think, $499 Mac Mini, $999 iMac and $799 Macbook.
No ms just adds to the cost.
Lets start by taking out their worthless os - $50-100 depending on the level of crap
Now lets start with the basics office suite - $400
So your $699 laptop is going to start $1099 for the basics. OR
Linux at $699 including the shipping and you have all the software including an office suite included.
Let see multiply by the average 50-100 to 1000 laptops at a company and that $400 savings just turned into $20,000 in savings for 50 laptops, thats enough to purchase 28 more laptops. That same $20,000 savings can be applied even if you stick with the w-os virus by simply using the free OpenOffice suite.
I'll take the 28 additional laptops or put the $20000 in to something else.
ms just adds to the cost.
As the race to the bottom continues, the price of the OS becomes clearer and clearer (MS tax) I just wish I could go out and buy a Laptop from whatever manufacturer I choose and have the option to get it without an OS.
I'm sure you're right, but only on the planet where you live. On Earth, Windows is the dominant desktop market leader and has been for decades. It delivers what people want. Apple fan boys and Linux geeks are delusional. Both products are DOA and only the electronics industry press keeps their memory alive.
Yes there are processor-intense uses like number crunching and gaming with the most advanced games, but it's no longer the case that a bargain computer is for email and word processing. A sub-$500 desktop will handle all your multimedia web browsing while acting as a music server and media center and running year or two old games flawlessly.
As for laptops, we're not that far off from having a multicore processor, no moving parts (SSD in the 64-128 gig range), sub-inch thickness, and all-day battery life, for well under a grand. At that point you're covering 99% of functionality for 99% of people out there at a price 99% of people can afford. This isn't like another bump in horsepower or price cut, this is like bringing out a 400 horsepower car that gets 40 mpg and costs 20 grand...
You are also right about the processor, SSD drive, sub-inch, and all-day (or near it) battery life.
Just last year a friend of mine bought a $400 Acer that had a dual core, 2gigs of RAM 250gig HD notebook. He bumped the RAM up to 4gig because the notebook came with Vista 64. That same notebook will run 7 great.
Magnesium only burns in a powder form. It has to be a very fine powder at that. Once started it burns at 2500F
Case design is probably more important in a business class model than anything else. You need it to be rugged but lightweight. It needs to be strong enough to withstand the abuses of end users who don't treat company laptops with the same care and protection they might use with a laptop they actually paid for. Why bother? It's just a company laptop and they won't be held financially responsible if they abuse the machine.
For example- Thinkpads were made by IBM and had a reputation for being rock solid and sturdy machines, if expensive. Then they sold the line to Lenovo with the stipulation that they would need to maintain the design to keep using the name for a set period of years. Once that was expired, Lenovo was no longer required to build the Thinkpad line to the same quality / ruggedness that IBM made them known for. Today the laptops are built like consumer systems- very thin cased, easy to break, and cheaply produced. They DO keep the reputation of high priced however. Heh.
For comparison, look at the T23 (IBM), T60 (IBM design, built by Lenovo) and the T400 (Lenovo all the way through).
I see a lot of broken case corners on the T400 that I never saw in prior Thinkpad models. I see broken screens on the W500's and the X series tablets have some serious issues. However... I do admire the hinge design on the tablets and think that Lenovo did a GOOD job on that part- thats always been a weak area of design on all tablets and they did very well there.
If you work out $800 in my local currency, you would run
$800 x $89 = $71,200 - that is not cheap folks
$1,099 x $89 = $97,811 - that is not cheap folks
$2,099 x $89 = $186,811 - definitely not affordable
So, the recession has a lot to do with the price of computers today. Yes, an $800 or $1,200 laptop might have looked very affordable 5 years ago, but it doesn't change the fact that people are getting less pay but still have to pay more for items today. That's why I am caring my Dell Inspiron 1525. I ain't buying anything until 2012 and it will be second hand.
Even in a place with weak currency and uses the term "dollar" to describe their currency, $US $800 would be NZ$ 1116.
If you take Indian, $800 is equal to 38,800 Rupee. But if you compare that $800 to the British pound, the cost is just 500 pounds.
The fact is the price last year was $1200. The price today is $800 for a better product. Regardless of the currency you use, that's 1/3 cheaper. That DOES make things far more affordable.
The problem is with the currency in your country. It isn't worth much and people there must be in a horrible economic situation. One of the worst economies on the planet is Albania, and that may be where you are from. There $800 equals 74,995 Lek, but not 74,995 dollars.
http://wwp.greenwichmeantime.com/time-zone/caribbean/jamaica/currency.htm
Mr Dee sshould have said $JD. He has only proven that the economy in Jamaica is as bad as the one in Albania. That's a sad thing.
So, for example, I know that UK hardware is often relatively more expensive than US hardware (often it's more or less the same number of £ as $ ). However, both countries have relatively high personal income.
In other countries, if average wages are $500 (or less, often) a month, then most of 1 month's salary goes on the cheapest lappy. In the UK & US, you'd get a hell of a lappy for one month's salary.
I guess what he was really trying to point out is the relative buying power. I'm UK based, & often hardware/software is the same number of £ as $ -so relatively more. That said, in both the UK & US we earn good wages compared to most of the world.
In many countries $500 would be a really good monthly salary; so, you could get the cheapest lappy - and not much else. On the other hand, the average UK/US salary would get you a heck of a lappy.
So just how is Windows 7 "ushering" in the sub-$800 laptops???
If you go into the store and look at this months $1,000 laptop you are essentially looking at Decembers $700 laptop.
Unless you absolutely have to buy a laptop this weekend wait two to three months.
$teve makes billions but really only helps the wealthy who can afford it, while Gates, Ellison, Dell etc donate money to really cahnge the world.
In other words, you get what you pay for - and it will be interesting to see how these inexpensive laptops actually stack up - if you can tolerate the bare-bones baseline prices they are offered at. When you try upgrading them when you order - my won't you be surprised.
I know I was.
It's time to stop bashing on Microsoft for the problems that come from hardware SIMPLY WEARING OUT! (underline three times and bold to get the message)
Yes, it's a great thing that Bill Gates is doing with his foundation. But for years he was criticized for accumulating so much wealth without giving back to society. Was that justified? I don't know, since I don't have access to his tax returns either.
As for Source forge software, as a web developer I have found that all of the major packages I use are available under OS X as well as Windows. There is not a single tool I have lost since switching to a Mac Book Pro. And I don't run Windows on it either.
So Steve Jobs *ONLY* has $5 billion in his bank account. I guess you've got that beat since you are looking down on him?
I asked hime how long you been working here? Oh about 3 years, so your about to get a new company laptop?
So how many service calls have you had on that laptop? 0
Has it ever crashed? no
Ever have any issues with it? You sure travel alot with it
Any performance issues? no
So whats your overall thoughts? Well Dell makes crap laptops, my Mac, is in a different league
So what do you do most of the time? I use it for browsing.
I thought you played a lot of wow? Does wow not run on it? Yah but I loose FPS compared to my HP laptop, so I use that for my gaming, and AION is not able to run on it. Have you tried boot camp? Whats that?
How old is your HP? bought it before I moved back here.. about 5 years? What you run on it? XP Ever get a virus? Nope? Any repairs? Nope its actually been pretty good.
Okay let me understand you piad $2700 + for your Macbook that you only browse with? Have had it in for repairs 3 times.
Your Dell you use at work have had 0 issues with
Your HP you use 90% of your time at home and have 0 issues with
But you are most happy with your Mac? and will be paying for it for the next 2 years on payroll deduction.
"Maybe we should send it in to so see if they put some sort of drug on the case?"
MACBOOK > ADAMO
That's the best phrase I've ever heard for OSX. "Also ran operating system". You're a genius.
Don't start any comments, I uses all three, and find installing Linux on Mac directly without any virtual machine is plain pain.
Unfortunately its all a scam. I made the mistake of buying a $200 laptop from Frye's that had Vista on it. It is a fricking brick. It takes, no joke, 12 minutes to boot and with the latest patches, nothing else running, just the operating system itself gobble 60% of available RAM and 30% of the CPU! The laptop I bought that was certified as Vista compatible is NOT suitable for Vista at all. The same will happen with Windows 7.
Microsoft has promised every single new version of Windows performs better, but on an apples-to-apples comparison, taking two identical systems with clean installs, the older version of Windows outperforms the newer version in almost all cases in terms of speed in getting tasks done.
With all due respect, I have tested Windows XP vs. Windows Vista.... Vista is FASTER in 90% of applications and common scenarios than Windows XP. Windows 7 is even faster than VISTA in those common scenarios and applications.
The biggest challenges will be for co's like MS who are still trying to sell expensive software. Windows now represents about 25% of the cost of a new machine. How long can that continue? When a full laptop costs $400 it will be closer to 35%. Netbooks will turn to ARM to get their prices down to $100 to $100. Selling Win 7 (profitably) on those? Good luck with that, MS.
If you look at the cost of EEE box on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=eee+box&x=0&y=0) the model with Linux is only $15 less than the model with XP.
And no, Linux is not free. The word on the street is that Dell pays Ubuntu about $3 per machine for Canonical's help in developing the software and adapting to Dell's needs.
Still, in the world of narrow margins, that $47 pretty much DOUBLES the profit a maker has on a particular sale.
But whatever the numbers, the point is that as computers become commodities rather than luxury devices, making money selling an OS is going to become less and less unprofitable.
If they don't sell bazillions of these craptops, then those low profits are going to reverb through the whole sales chain - the manufactures, the retailers and the tech economy is going to continue to languish.
I want everyone to have technology, but I want 'em all to have jobs too. If the technology continues to be junk, then consumers won't use it and it will sit on the shelf at home rotting.
That's just IMHO.
And perhaps Mr. Dee was suggesting that the *perception* of the amount of money to be spent (obviously in his local currency) is no different that ours (in USD), perhaps based upon take-home pay in the part of the world that he lives in.
And while Mr. Dee might not "understand currency conversion", I think he hits the nail on the head when he says that (and I paraphrase) the recession has taught us all to think much more critically before putting down gobs of cash for our toys.
dude, where do you come up with the welfare stuff.
I agree with most of the comments here about computing power, if your not gaming or running hefty programs (like auto cad, final cut etc) you can get away with a pretty basic system. What this makes me wonder though is the gaming community in general. Are we gonna start seeing more 'efficient' games as the hardware to run these power hungry ones become more and more rare? As the video game industry has taken a big hit already, the future doesn't look bright for the pc gaming community. Console gaming is evolving (heck, old folks homes have Wii's!), obviously the faithfuls will remain, but its more food for thought then anything.
So you tout the Linux bandwagon all you want (I run it for a server OS for web hosting and its fine for that) but in the desktop arena people do not want it. Economics made that clear.
And, personally, I think Windows 7 rocks. Extremely pleased how well it runs on a Latitude D600 laptop that is at least 5 year old.
- by lewac October 4, 2009 6:20 PM PDT
- what I'd REALLY like to see is ALL these companies that make laptops do so without the OS (or at least make that an option). just give me the hardware, please and I'll do the rest. why spend $$ on the OS and other proprietary software when ubuntu is free (along with 1000's of apps that also come with it)? why so? well the first thing I do with these things is wipe the drive... so why spend $$$ to obtain a clean drive if some of us only want a clean drive in the first place?
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- by cbscowards October 4, 2009 6:51 PM PDT
- That is how Windows got to the market position it has -- MS negotiated contracts where PC manufacturers paid MS for Windows on every PC they sold, whether it has Windows on it or not. That was the end of choice from the PC manufacturers.
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- by odubtaig October 5, 2009 12:34 AM PDT
- Haha, yeah. 'Negotiated'. Like Intel 'negotiated' exclusivity with PC manufacturers earlier this decade.
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