Are 8.9-inch Netbooks on Their Way Out?

[JMcEntegart]

Last week Asus announced that it was discontinuing the 8.9-inch Eee PC, reports have emerged that say all netbook vendors are dropping the price of their 8.9-inch models in order to clear inventory. Is this the end of the 8.9 inch netbook?


Are 8.9-inch Netbooks on Their Way Out? : Read more

 

[mdillenbeck]

Personally, if I am going to go to 10.2" screens I might as well stick to my 12" tablet PC.

Would having a touch/stylus screen make the smaller screens more popular? Perhaps - however, with increased cost and probably questionable control, it may have done little to help this segment.

Unfortunately, it looks like the netbook market is about to die - instead, it is transforming into a low-cost laptop market. Those who want pocket-able will have to start looking at the UMPC market than wait and hope for netbooks to shrink.

 

[hellwig]

I don't get why the 8.9" was so unsuccessful. Compared to my 7" Cloudbook, my fiancee's 8.9" Acer is noticieably bigger. The 10" is bigger physically, but thats it. The monitor has the same resolution, and hardware internally is the same, it just has bigger pixels and bigger keys. For chrissake, if the keyboard is TOO small for you, get a normal laptop. You can get a Celeron or AMD laptop for the same price as a 10" netbook, and it will be more powerful too (Dell offers 15" w/ Celeron for $449).

The only reason HP and Asus and the like want to make bigger notebooks with an Atom inside is to increase its profits. Cheaper hardware inside means more profit, pure and simple. Anyone buying a 13" "netbook" is a sucker.

 

[eddieroolz]

If I was to get a netbook today, I'll buy a 8.9incher. I'm not going to ride along with the OEMs on this one - screw them. Pocketability is the central concept to netbooks and if you force it to be larger then what's the point of a netbook? Might as well get a laptop.

 

[philosofool]

[citation][nom]hellwig[/nom]The only reason HP and Asus and the like want to make bigger notebooks with an Atom inside is to increase its profits. Cheaper hardware inside means more profit, pure and simple. Anyone buying a 13" "netbook" is a sucker.[/citation]
Well, you can price beneath your celeron/turion crowd if you fit your 13" with an atom. Also, the battery life on an atom equiped machine will be substantially better. I find myself wanting a portable computer but having little desire for a powerful one; mostly I want it to be cheap and portable.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Its amazing to assume that the AMD alternative doesnt exist. Theyve been pushing to get vendors, as it only makes sense to have better GFX and a somewhat larger layout, for people with big hands and poor eyesight, besides all the bells and whistles, which Atom cant do. AMD has a good chance in this market, and itll only serve Intel right by demanding what theyre demanding

 

[scryer_360]

I don't see the reason for making Atom in larger computers than 10.2 inches. Once its that big, Core 2 Duo provides far more power and efficiency. It only doesn't provide the bare minimum power consumption, but the thing is about a 13.3 platform is that the screen will be using so much power and the (presumably installed) DVD drive will be using enough that the few watts the Atom shaves off won't matter.

C2D for 13.3 and larger. Atom for anything smaller. Done.

 

[Guest]

you know, the market of 7" screens are obsolete!
Today you can get more horsepower out of a MID then an Asus EeePc 701!
Plus, the device is smaller, and about as cheap.
A reason few people buy a 9" mininetbook might be due to the too high salesprice, not really because they are less favorable.
I see no reason to continue selling a 9" device with a 7" screen (meaning 2" of lost space), while discontinuing exactly the same device but with higher resolution.
It makes little sense to buy a 10" mini notebook as well, those have the same resolution as their 9" brothers; and when buying a mininotebook, size matters!
The issue might rather be,that there are tens of different 9" devices on the market,and ASUS isn't the cheapest amongst them.
Many favor the MSI Wind and Acer Aspire One over the EeePc901.

 

[Guest]

I don't particularly see the netbook market going down,rather going back to it's old roots, by creating small,cheap and affordable devices!

The EeePc was supposed to be sold for $199. Current mininotebooks are sold 2,5x that price!
That is offer and demand!
Let asus be a bitch, by going against the flow. They definitely didn't sell more 10" eeepc's as 9" ones!

I see the market for olpc opening up again; cheap and affordable is the future!
For everyone!
I'll rather go with a VIA chipset than with the expensive ATOM chipset (that uses way more battery).

NVIDIA and VIA will probably be offering MY solution on a netbook in their via powered ion platform.

 

[Tekkamanraiden]

I'm curious how much of a drop in price to clear them out. I'd gladly pick a $399 model up for $199.

 

[zodiacfml]

i think it is both screen size and keyboard size that matter which explains the popularity of the 10in screen size netbooks.
i've used an 10inch HP mini and i like it over my 14inch laptop which is not really portable compared to the Mini.

 

[Guest]

More tablets. When is the Eee tablet coming out in NA? Right now I'm saving up for a Fujitsu U820 but if something cheaper were available maybe. It's hard to beat 1.5 pounds though when your traveling on a motorcycle. If you have something 10 inches or under you should be able to flip the screen over to a tablet and hold it like a book. Dual core atoms will help too. I see no end to the netbook phenomenon just a refining of the package.