Comments on: Intel's sales chief talks Netbooks vs. notebooks

Chipmaker's sales chief talks about the impact of new low-cost notebooks on the Netbook phenomenon, ahead of the Computex trade show.

[forever4now]

I think the term "smartbook" should be reserved for "netbooks" (x86 or ARM) that include all of the typical smartphone hardware (3G, GPS, accelerometer, compass, etc.). This hardware enables "smartphone" functionality like location-based services, cell phone calls, SMS, automatic screen rotation, etc.

People wanting a notebook-like computer would get a "netbook" running a desktop OS (Windows,Ubuntu,...). People wanting a smartphone-like computer, would get a "smartbook" running a smartphone OS (Android,Symbian,WinMo,...).

[ikramerica--2008]

Well, you can already get a full fledged "last years model" laptop from Dell or HP for the price of a netbook. So it's not just about price. It's about portability. That said, i think you can see from Dell dropping the mini9, that customers didn't like the tiny screen or the tiny storage space. "Why can't I do XYZ with this?" So they put the mini9 guts into their 10 inch chassis, with normal SATA drives (120GB is standard).

I am sure a lot of netbook customers didn't exactly know what they were buying. They thought it was a "little laptop" but found it it had less usable storage space (once the OS is installed) than an iPhone.

[cosuna]

I agree with @ikramerica, although every time I hear Intel talk about Netbooks, it seems that they don't want this category which was "invented" behind their backs. They don't want it 'cause they know the Atom isn't supposed to run anything higher that Windows XP Embedded or Linux, so that kicks both them and Microsoft in the but.

They are promoting the new ULVs (based on their champion product, the Core 2 Duo) as an alternative, cause they know Microsoft's gonna be happy if everybody forgets the netbooks existed and start buying into the ULV mombo-jombo.

This time, both are wrong. People are buying netbooks 'cause they "simply work" they aren't overbloated and overequiped like today's laptops with FireWire, S-Video, HDMI, DVD double layer, LED screens, etc. In the end, this add cost and in the end people don't see the difference when the S-Video output is always vacant, they don't burn a lot of double layer DVDs and never use the FireWire.

So yes @ikramerica, you can buy yesterdays technology for today's price, but you'll get Vista and forget about all the benefits.

[ikramerica--2008]

I really don't think you agree. My point was that a netbook is slower and less powerful than a closeout model from the HP or Dell website. And the reason netbook sales have plateaued already and that Dell dropped it's 9" is because many customers are responding to the netbooks they bought in a less than enthusiastic way. "Why can't it do this?" "I can't even fit my music on here. Now I want to have pictures on it, too." "I can't watch a DVD nor is there room to store more than 1 or 2 movies."

The main reason the netbook is limited in power is not price but because MS says it has to be. Intel can't make their chip faster because MS is (illegally?) defining a market limitation. People get on Apple's case about control, but the way MS has dictated what is allowed to be considered a NetBook just so you can sell it with XP (1.6G single core or slower processor, 1GB or less storage) is really what is keeping this computers from being what people want them to be.

So as long as that limitation is there, some will be disappointed with the NetBook and think twice about another in the future. Maybe MS will remove this limitation with Windows 7, but I doubt it. If they are going to offer an extra cheap OEM version of Windows 7 for netbooks, it's going to come with strings attached.

[tipoo_]

" "The more the merrier. The more innovation there will be. It's good for the industry to have competition," Maloney said. "

Intel...Talking about competition being good?


My head asplode.