Are Ultra Cheap Netbooks Worth The Cost?

JMan1234

New member
Apr 18, 2008
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Texas
I need something that will get me fast and reliable access to the internet, and email.

I've been looking at the Netbooks, are those $299 Netbooks fairly fast with their wireless internet connection?

I've seen Netbooks in the $400-$500 range, but if I'm going to spend that much I might as well get a full blown laptop....

As an example of what I'm looking at, I saw this at Sam's Club for $299:
Intel® Atom™ N455
1GB DDR3
250GB Hard Drive
6-Cell 55WHr Lithium-Ion
 


I really see no point in getting a netbook... they don't even do anything, you'd be better off getting a cheap laptop, imo for the extra $50 or $100.
 
I have a cheap HP netbook that is light, compact and good for traveling. While at home I use it to run Scrapebox. It's slow and not particularly good for web surfing, etc., but good enough to take on a trip. Less worrisome than traveling with my $1,000 Macbook Air.
 
I have a cheap HP netbook that is light, compact and good for traveling. While at home I use it to run Scrapebox. It's slow and not particularly good for web surfing, etc., but good enough to take on a trip. Less worrisome than traveling with my $1,000 Macbook Air.

That's not good...
 
Yeah, netbooks are too slow and just straight suck. I bought a cheap laptop from walmart for about $300 (15" 2gb ram, 180gb hdd), great for everything I do (photoshop, flash, dreamweaver, web surfing, etc..). Better than any netbook I've ever used and can handle so much more and was really cheap, $300 well spent.
 
Well how fast do you need? The iPad 1 is about to be cheap (On march 11th) and on a 3G network is plenty fast enough to do basic browsing (of course with no flash video) and check your email. -It's also far lighter than most laptops and has a super-long battery life.
 
i have a netbook, i dont mind it...it is capable of stuff like dreamweaver and photoshop, just slow. In its peak the battery lasted 9-10 hours. I dont use it for much now except pr0n, emails, and light browsing but if i was traveling I could probably do everything i need to do on it. I paid 279 for mine at best buy when it was on sale, no complaints
 
I got this for my gf just the other day...

HP ProBook 4420S(XT940UT) Intel Core i3 370M(2.40GHz) 14" 2GB Memory 320GB HDD

for $525 from the newegg. I'm not a huge hp laptop fan but I'm kinda sweating it over my older laptop. The 400-500 netbooks make no damn sense when you can get so much more for not much more $.
 
Heck ya. I have one specifically because I don't need to worry about it. 10.1 HP with a 16GB SSD means I (or my kids) can treat it like shit and never bat an eye.
 
Well how fast do you need? The iPad 1 is about to be cheap (On march 11th) and on a 3G network is plenty fast enough to do basic browsing (of course with no flash video) and check your email. -It's also far lighter than most laptops and has a super-long battery life.

Forgive my ignorance, and I know this is going to be a dumb question for 99% of those here, but I've never used an iPad or any other tablet.

Browsing the net, are you able to login to secure connections and take care of business such as paypal, etc...? Is the browser capable of that?

And what about the WiFi on the iPad? Are those speeds okay?
 
considering you can get an ok laptop for 500-600 or an ipad 2 for 500-600 (with ipad 1s probably about to be like 300-400) i dont really see the point in netbooks as much as i did 2 years ago
 
Forgive my ignorance, and I know this is going to be a dumb question for 99% of those here, but I've never used an iPad or any other tablet.

Browsing the net, are you able to login to secure connections and take care of business such as paypal, etc...? Is the browser capable of that?

And what about the WiFi on the iPad? Are those speeds okay?

its safari, other than flash video it can do everything. Speeds are great, even on the older one.
 
i have one that i just took on a week long trip. It was pretty nice not having to lug around my 17" laptop thats too overpowered and only has like a 10 min battery life. The netbook lasted the entire flight span on one charge and i could easily carry it around from the hotel. It sucked ass trying to work on it the whole time but once you get used to it you can get everything done you need to and thats good enough for me.
If you're traveling a lot i'd say go netbook. if you're just wanting something to lounge around the house and work on definitely laptop.

If you're running win 7 starter on it be sure to get an extra gb of memory for it though. Even Win 7 starter uses up about 650mb just idling.
 
I've been checking out this one, though ugly, it is much more powerful than a netbook and good quality: Lenovo ThinkPad X120e review -- Engadget

I'd really think about why you want a netbook vs a laptop and how much you are willing to spend. If you don't really travel or aren't a student, might as well just go with a laptop.
 
Ive got an Asus Eee PC...upgraded the ram and I've run CS5 on it with little to no trouble.

10-14 hour battery life, and perfect for traveling.
 
Browsing the net, are you able to login to secure connections and take care of business such as paypal, etc...? Is the browser capable of that?

And what about the WiFi on the iPad? Are those speeds okay?
Yes and yes. In fact more secure.

Honestly I can't fathom why so many people are talking about laptops here for your needs. It's like they didn't read at all what you needed it for.

Modern wireless networks like 3G and 4G are thousands, if not millions, of times more secure for browsing and moving your financial data around on. If you ask your bank which is more secure; your PC or your Phone to do online banking they'll tell you your phone every time.

So srsly, if you just need stuff through your browser, you'd be a fool to carry around a laptop and the tablets like the Android Xoom or Apple iPad are likely to be exactly what you need.

As for Netbooks, I've got an Acer Aspire and it does the job; but it does the job of a computer, running windows, and is therefore slow and insecure. (You still have to run virusscans? What???)

For this reason I believe the netbook will be like Betamax in 5 years or less. Slates do the job far better in every way, are getting cheaper, have longer battery life, far more portable, and of course more fun.
 
Hi!

You mention...

As an example of what I'm looking at, I saw this at Sam's Club for $299:
Intel® Atom™ N455
1GB DDR3
250GB Hard Drive
6-Cell 55WHr Lithium-Ion

I've got something similar, with an Intel Atom N450 processor, and believe it or not, I'm actually running Dragon Naturally Speaking v10 on it! For the longest time I thought that this type of system was incapable of handling something like DNS v10, but by chance I re-read the technical specs on the Nuance website and indeed, it works on this type of netbook!

Ive got an Asus Eee PC...upgraded the ram and I've run CS5 on it with little to no trouble. 10-14 hour battery life, and perfect for traveling.

Yeah, these systems are insanely awesome and highly portable.

That being said, there's nothing wrong with a more expensive / higher end type of laptop, but you might be pleasantly surprised by just how effective an ultra cheap netbook can be.
 
For this reason I believe the netbook will be like Betamax in 5 years or less. Slates do the job far better in every way, are getting cheaper, have longer battery life, far more portable, and of course more fun.
Slates are no good for people like me who type for a living. I think full size notebooks will evolve to become lighter and thinner like the aluminum Macbook Air. My 11" is actually a few ounces lighter than the netbook.