Pick up any PC magazine or go into any electrical store or even Carrefour and you will see a veritable cornucopia of tiny, diny, weeny laptops. Now affectionately none as netbook.
I did not realise just how big the netbook phenomenon had become till a few days in the UK. Sure you see a couple of Acer or Asus models in the UAE. In the UK it seems that everyone is in on the game with models on display from MSI, Samsung, Dell, Acer, Asus, Medion, HP and Fujitsu the choice is kind of bewildering.
The netbook started out with the with Asus E-PC last summer. I looked long and hard at them but the 8″ screen, 512mb ram, 8GB flash drive, linux OS and 2 hour battery life did not really make it an appealing option to me. But six months is a long time in the consumer computing market and how things have changed.
Yesterday I chose a Samsung NC10 notebook. It offers a 10″ screen, full size QWERTY keyboard, wireless/bluetooth 1.6Ghz CPU, 1GB RAM, 160gb Hard Disk, Windows XP and a stonking 6hr battery life all for around $500 was an offering I couldn’t turn down.
My experience with low end processors in the past has been less than stella with 1.2Ghz Ultra Low Voltage CPUs give lack lustre performance. But the new “Atom” architecture chip from Intel gives sprightly performance. In web browsing it easily handles half a dozen tabs in Mozilla. Right now I am typing this blog sat in an economy seat whilst one side of the screening is playing an episode of Dexter.
Portability and power with an extra long battery life. I really am impressed. Now there is no real need for me to carry the excellent Arhcos media player with me to watch some TV/movies on a flight. It has a much bigger screen and a superior battery life. I am three hours into my flight and the battery still shows 3.5 hrs to go and 54% charge.
OK – so I won’t be playing crisis on this or using it to drive the latest Adobe photoshop. But for a travel computer to show a presentation, edit a document, browse the web, watch some TV or check some email I can think of nothing better to have with me, Also as it weighs a very modest 1.2kg it is extremely portable without breaking the bank.
Sure there are always comprises – I would love a slightly higher resolution screen and perhaps wireless n support. Other than that it is perfect. I think it will find a place in briefcase for zipping around the middle east on day trips – no power supply required.
There are plenty of netbooks on the market – I can not really speak for the others but this little Samsung NC10 is fantastic place to enter into the world of truly portable computing.
Overall 9/10 – a fully featured netbook that has a battery will last most of the day and will not break the bank. Oh – did I mention you can get them in white, black and dark blue. For me I went with stealthy black.
Filed under: Technology | Tagged: Netbook, Samsung NC10 |
For the Love of Tech 
Even though I’m a huge Apple fan and an editor of an Apple magazine, I did go out an buy an Acer Aspire One netbook and I really like the little bugger. Now I need to find a good Linux distro to put on it 🙂
hi,may i ask from where did you get this nc10 here in dubai?..i really wanted to buy this netbook..tnkz
Now the time has come where I have finally purchased a new laptop (long overdue), I understand what RAM and processor mean! Maybe not entirely, but I guess the processor and its combination with the latter 2 make sense, even though with the ‘amazing product knowledge’ generated in local stores, I feel a little more educated, and decided to purschase a fujitsu siemens 4gb ram intel duo with pentium, which matches my basic needs of ‘multi-tasking’.
I did read your post before making my decision and it makes much more sense now.
Am so not a hi-tech person and had to drag in some male friends for support even to just make the purchase as tech speak is so not my cup of tea, but this fujitsu had better work out to be my best friend until its sell-by date, or the newest technology comes out, whichever comes first!
Hi i*maginate – I hope you enjoy your new laptop. It certainly appears to be a nice powerful model – I expect you will be blogging even more!
Hello Aaron,
I read (GN business news – quoted) Windows 7 is coming out, and XP is being ‘phased out’.
Windows 7 has ‘new features’.
Well, I needed a new laptop and got one which I think I will be happy with for another 12 months.
My new laptop is Vista compatible, whatever that means.
Not being computer-savvy, I am content with the speed my laptop loads…
As for newbie info, Windows 7, as for what I’ve read in the media, seems to be the way forward.
I am a very basic user, but I think if technology is advancing this way, the average consumer had better make a use of it.
Lets hope the local selling lads can advise when it’ s time to buy! 12 months down the line, I wonder what the offering is going to be. Not that I care much: I just see what’s on offer in the ads, and read the news. A single laptop purschase doesn’t seem to make much difference in the scheme of things.
How’s the IT world? If spending is at a low, can consumers expect technology at a high?
Lets hope the local selling lads can advise when it’ s time to buy! 12 months down the line, I wonder what the offering is going to be. Not that I care much: I just see what’s on offer in the ads, and read the news. A single laptop purschase doesn’t seem to make much difference in the scheme of things.
How’s the IT world? If spending is at a low, can consumers expect technology is at a high?
Hi i*maginate – the roadmaps for a lot of consumer technologies are laid out 2 to 3 years in advance. So I can imagine things only getting faster, smaller and cheaper for sometime yet!
After carefully reading reviews on the web and YouTube i found out that the NC10 is the best netbook all around. I bought it along with the Crucial 2GB memory both for $489, as soon as it arrived i changed the memory module and i have to say that its way too easy anybody can do it. After fully charging the battery and setting up the OS i was very impressed.
Pros:
-Amazing battery life mine lasted a little more than 6 hours at normal performance.
-You can select between Max battery life, normal and max performance which is great for saving battery life.
-Great recovery tool, it saves the initial state of your laptop in case anything goes wrong you can just go back to the beginning
– The keyboard is great, and the keys are in the right place unlike some other netbooks.
-The screen is very bright and can be adjusted, also its not glossy so you don’t have the usual glare when using it outside and its very bright when using it outdoors.
– Bluetooth and Wifi (The NC10 gets a better signal than my HP notebook).
– It runs fast.
– Great touchpad gestures.
– Very nice design i specially like the front led’s at night.
– Integrated webcam and the software for it is good, it allows you to record video and take still pictures.
– Great connectivity: 3 USB, Ethernet, External display, mic, headphones, Memory card reader, Bluetooth and Wi-fi
CONS:
– You have to get used to the keyboard and keypad, the touchpad is small, takes a little bit of getting used to but the touchpad gestures make it way easier to use and you get used to both pretty quickly.
– Was unable to install Adobe Illustrator due to the resolution of the screen (basically the screen is too small for that program) but not to worry i have it installed on my other computer.
– The memory card reader is not compatible with the Memory Stick (MS) format it only accepts SD, SDHC and MMC.
– Requires an external CD/DVD reader, but that’s to be expected on a netbook.
Its a great netbook specially because of the battery life, great for traveling and moving around, i really appreciate the freedom it gives you since my old laptop’s batteries where old and gave up in only 40 minutes, now i have 6 hours of use, its very fast with 2GB (i highly recommend buying it along with the 2GB memory).
Find cheap Samsung NC10 Netbook
A very nice review Mr Samsung. I am still enjoying the NC10 though I do find the button on the keypad a little hard to press when I need it. Otherwise it is as you say a great netbook.
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