Are netbooks out and tablet slates in now?

A year or more ago netbooks were so popular. They are still available but it seems the emphasis has been greatly shifted to tablet slates, with everyone following in the footsteps of ipad.

I think there is still merits to having a proper keyboard? Perhaps conventional tablet pcs with the flip screen may be the all around warrior then?

Are the days of the netbook dwindling?

 

as a fashionable item ? i believe so.

for actual use, I don't know what a tablet is good for other than bragging. for specific industry, it may has its usage. for general purpose device, i can't find one single usage of it.

 

a more polyvalent ebook reader?

meh the realy cool thing are the convertible like the inspiron duo

 

Tablets used to be in vogue a while ago and then faded out of usage, likely for good reason. It is just a resurgence of a fad.

 

I do use a netbook, but would never buy anything like an iPad - to me it is a nice toy, but as a matter of fact pretty useless! Don't think netbooks will be faded out. But I bet tablets will - sooner or later. It is just "that new cool thing my friend has and I want to have as well"...

 

The prices are driving netbooks from the market.
The function is eroded by CULVs which cost only somewhat more, but are much-much better. The "coolness" is eaten by the tablets...so there is essentially no market left for netbooks. Thats why they cost under 300€ currently, but even there its not easy to sell them.

 

My Vaio P is still cool, there's still nothing like it. I watch Top Gear in 720p and Victoria Secret Fashion Show in 1080i with it connected to my bluetooth headphones. It's amazing.

 

tablets make good coasters

 

I'd say netbooks are gonna loose out when it comes to Tablets for the simple fact that people buying netbooks buy them to check the web and email. If you buying a 12" Netbook so it has a real keyboard to do "real work" then you just bought a small underpowered laptop. When the eeePC came out nobody bought those things thinking oh yeah, i'm gonna do photoshop work on this. Samething for a Tablet. Granted i wouldn't get the iPad for anything but some 8.9" Android Tablet to just check email and browse the web (wouldn't even do forums because i know i'll wanna reply) then a tablet is better than netbook. It's about the same weight but has much more screen space to view just what you want, information.

 

if I want to check web or email, an iPhone serve that purpose quite well. Why would one wants a much larger device for that ? I am assuming those are casual usage(5-10 minutes on the bus/train/starbucks) rather than prolonged usage.

anything slightly more involved that asks for keyboard, iPad can be put aside.

 

My friend won an iPad a while back and he used it a while for taking notes on etc. he eventually sold it for £500 and bought a netbook and has said the netbook is much more useful. I got a netbook for £157 the other week and it has proved to be very useful for taking notes etc and is now quite quick too after upgrading from crappy windows 7 started to windows xp professional

 

Like chimp said, unless you are using the tablet as an e-reader, what can you do on an ipad that you can't on an iphone? Why even bother getting an ipad?

Also, the cost of notebooks is slowly falling - a couple years ago you could find used laptops on ebay for $400, but pretty much never a new one. Now you can regularly find them under $400 brand new; they aren't the kind you can game on, but for an "average" user that just surfs and watches a movie they are more than enough. Once battery life starts improving netbooks really will have no market - you'll either have a laptop or a smartphone, or both.

 

Netbooks were/are cheap (though they have spread out a lot in price range). Notebooks have come down in rice to compete, so why buy a netbook?

Tablets were expensive and had limited appeal.


The Ipad, is a different beast, and I wish companies making them woudl actually look more at what they are competing against.

The Ipad isn't a typical computer. You could say it's Newton 2.0, which was a good system, but had limited appeal and a high price (just as slate tablets, which also pretty much failed). At the time though, it was a standout. The Ipad, was/is a standout. There was nothing like it on the market, it was also a cheap way to get online with a computer over a cell network and it ran on a system many already knew. Another thing in it's favor is that it's pretty much the cheapest Apple "computer" (remember most are not geeks buying these). Apple has a brand name associated with quality (stop laughing, people think Cadillacs are also quality), as mentioned it's cheap, and new.

Other companies are trying to ride this trendy, emerging market (gee, nobody has ever tried copying Apple have they?) by doing the same things they have always done... Take a refined Apple product, cheapen it, put Windows on it (or possibly Android) and hope people are stupid enough to pay the same amount for it. It's a limited appeal product that companies are after a slice of thinking it's a goldmine, IT IS!, but with the caveat that Apple has a monopoly on the market at the moment. Divide up future Ipad sales 10 ways and see how much it's worth.

Notebooks already push into netbook battery times. More expensive models were doing it 3 years ago. My SZ still does 5-6 hours (optimized), a new Toshiba R705 (?) does 8 or so out of the box, with effort, 10.

 

It isn't a typical computer, it is a super-sized iPhone. I like iPhone as that is a perfect balance of feature, size and weight. iPad is a standout but a standout of a useless category(in terms of size, interface etc.) is still useless.

e-Reader at least is cheaper and it still is targetting a very specific group of people.

The other day, I was on a bus watching a young gentleman sketching out his interior design things on pieces of paper for over 45 minutes and suddenly he pull out his iPad beneath those papers and go online to check for a woody floor material for about 2 minutes and got back to his papers. That tells you how useful an iPad is.

 

A 400€ 11" CULV can do 8 hours without much hassle...and if you want eat a 300€ netbook for breakfast...

 

Well, you have to make the distinction about what you are talking about: a tablet (ala iPad), or a Tablet PC (such as my HP EliteBook 2730p)

tablet:
-extremely underpowered OS/ hardware
-crappy touch only interface
-generally pretty poor screens
-no real usability, or functionality that some other product does not also do.

Tablet PC:
-essentially a really nice 12" notebook (or a good netbook)
-usually has decent screens (and you can get them, new or used, with amazing AFFS+, or IPS screens -it is like having a backlight magazine)
-a full sized keyboard & decent sized trackpad, sometimes a pointing stick as well
-runs Windows 7, Linux, or Mac OSX (on the Axiotron modbook) on "full" notebook hardware (usually only integrated Intel Graphics chips, but coupled with either a LV, or a full voltage C2D, or Core-i processor)
-has (at least) a Wacom / N-Trig active digitizer in the screen (think mini Wacom Cintiq), and sometimes has a Wacom / N-trig multi-touch layer on the top layer of the screen
-usually has the "Swivel" hinge (bi-directional), or is sometimes in a purely slate form factor (thus, sans keyboard and trackpad)


Usually no one ever pays the Tablet PC's any mind, and they don't make the distinction between a iPad and a Tablet PC (even though the difference is as obvious as a rock and a Corvette). Will Tablet PC's gain ground? maybe.. but it is -and has been- a niche product, but who knows what the future will hold.

 

Lol, the irony.

My wife loves her netbook (MSI wind U100 w/ Atom N270, 2GB RAM, and 7 Pro). She does schoolwork, her job, and facebook on it, she also watches video no problem.

 

My wife loves her iPad. I'm actually posting on it now. . I think the one real useful thing about it is how fast you can get on the web. There is no boot time it just turns on. Not the best browsing experience in my opinion but it is very convienant.

 

One of the selling points of the netbook is its small form factor. The point is you can carry it anywhere in your bag. To me anything more than 10" is not much of a netbook.

How many people upgrade their netbooks from starter to home or higher? I spent $300 on my netbook and I have thus far refused to spend anymore on it so it will remain the dual boot win7 starter + linux.

 

Well netbooks started as linux machines. The Eee PC's were strictly Linux, until people realized they could fit XP on it and turn it into a tiny Windows laptop.

I agree though, netbooks still have their usefulness. Problem is they're still relatively expensive for what you get. If I could get a 10", or 11" preferable, netbook with 1366x768 or even 1280x720 screen (no stupid 1024x600 crap), anything more powerful than an Atom N270 and GMA 450 with linux for $200 or Win 7 Starter (Home Premium preferred) for $250 max, I'd be fine with that. A more or less disposable web and application machine. But they all cost $300+, many $400.

That's when you get into much more powerful subcompact notebooks like the Hannspree Hannsbook 12" notebook I owned. SU4100, 2GB RAM, 320GB HDD, 1366x768 resolution, Win 7 Home Premium for $400, refurbished for $329. I'll sacrifice a little weight and size for performance any day.

 

Yeah, netbooks really need to be no more than 300 dollars otherwise a real laptop is in sight albiet bigger perhaps.

It really has to be a dirt cheap web surfing machine, something you are not afraid to bring to your starbucks or coffeeshop, maybe not even in your own neighbourhood, and have no worry that your machine gets swiped while you goto the toilet or something.