It’s one bright spot in this tough economy, mini-laptops with matching mini price tags. Sales are expected to quadruple over the next four years. But are they right for you?
They’re called NetBooks, with 9 to 10 inch screens, they’re much smaller than traditional laptops, and they only weight two to three pounds.
They are basically for internet, emailing, word processing, the simple stuff and not designed for speed and performance.
They’ll only cost you from about $300 to $400. For that price, you do give up some speed and memory, that’s why at Micro Center in Madison Heights, they’ll tell you if you do a lot of heavy gaming or video editing, they’re not for you. But if you stick to the basics of web surfing and emailing, it’s a great cheap alternative.
You can’t play a movie with these, because there’s no DVD drive. But use a USB powered optical drive will solve your problem.
Battery life on NetBooks varies from about 2.5 hours to up to 7 hours. Also, if you’re looking for one, because they’re smaller, try out the keyboard.
Other differences, some screens are mat, others glossy and some take more pressure to activate the track pad.
Our partners at Consumer Reports recently tested NetBooks, and they name three of them for $400 each they had particular advantages.
They are the ASUS EEEPC 904HA, the Lenovo IdeaPads 10, and the MSI WIND U100-016US.
