DisplaySearch says netbook sales will slow as ULV laptops get cheaper
By Donald Melanson 
posted December 29th 2009 4:59PM
posted December 29th 2009 4:59PM
Netbook sales have been on a solid upward tick for about as long as the product category has existed, so it shouldn't come as much surprise that research firm DisplaySearch is now forecasting that shipments will exceed a hefty 33.3 million units by year's end, which translates to a full 103% jump in growth over the previous year. What is somewhat surprising, however, is that the firm is also predicting that growth will slow considerably in 2010 (down to "just" 20%) as more and more laptops with ultra-low voltage processors dip under the $500 mark. Of course, 20% growth still means that netbook shipments should be in the neighborhood of 40 million for 2010, and DisplaySearch even estimates that growth will hold steady at about 20% for 2011, so we wouldn't be so quick to put them on deathwatch just yet.
Obvious post is obvious.
water is wet.
@One Love Your poop is still brown. Mine still stinks.
as netbook gets faster and more capable, ULV laptops get cheaper and more power effecient, that will create good new cheap laptops for everybody and get rid of those two categories.
@htd In other words, The two will basically merge, and they'll just be thought of as normal laptops.
God I hope so, 18W Arrandale FTW!
@jon fuck yeah, ULV Arrandale is going to be teh shiz.
In the end all those designations for a portable computer would make more sense if they made reference to the total of the CPU+GPU+brigdes power consumption:
< 18W = netbook
< 36W = laptop
< 90W = not so portable common brick
> 90W = super-expensive desktop-like thing in a smaller shell
I can't wait till CES next week...I want more news about the Lenovo S10-3t now!
I heard the sky was blue.
me too
@stabbytheicepic Did you hear about that dog? It bit a man.
Netbooks seem to be getting more expensive than cheap like you'd expect. You're hard pressed to find any netbook below the $350 mark these days, and more frequently find them for $400-500, in which case what's the point? :|
@(Unverified) because the uninformed drones have been told to go buy netbooks, because they will solve all problems for them, therefore they will buy the more expensive ones because if you pay more for it, it must be better, and its still (slightly) cheaper then a full functioning notebook.
@(Unverified)
Because Windows 7 Starter is hot shit, y0!
@SirNoDroin I assumed that was an obvious unspoken point. :P
@(Unverified)
"in which case what's the point?"
Same as it ever was. Portability and battery life.
If you can find a notebook with a 10" screen that gets 8+ hours off a charge for less than $500 please let me know.
@jon
Acer 1410/1810, also has a Gateway monkier (since acer owns gateway)
Comes in both a dual and solo core version under 500$. The dual core is quite a bit better, but even the solo falls over laughing at the N280 atom.
Has X4500HD intel intergrated--which while not pronominal, which almost looks like high preformance compared to the GMA950 underclocked as most netbooks heft.
11.6in, barely larger than ye aveage 10in netbook.
Admitedly, no optical drive.
Although. It comes with W7 Home Premium, not starter... XD Which is worth a good pile right there.
Lenovos supposed to have a simular one out... forget its name.
Other than that. *shrug*
@(Unverified)
Good point. The 13" macbook is now like what, 700$?
So compare that to a 500$ netbook using pinetrail...You get way more power (games, audio \ video editing), and in some cases, better battery life.
@RogueThunder
The Lenovo is the U150, it starts at around $650, and if they re-release it in a couple months with a westmere ULV chip, it's going to be my next computer.
I had in my head that the 1410 was a 14" system, can't imagine why I thought that.
Point taken, though I specified 10" for a reason.
The source has more details:
Mini-Note (Netbook) Shipments Grow 103% Y/Y in 2009; Revenues Up 72%
http://www.displaysearch.com/cps/rde/xchg/displaysearch/hs.xsl/091222_mini_note_netbook_shipments_grow_103_y_y_in_2009_revenues_up.asp
I think with Nvidia ION now people that just watch movies and high def, while browsing the net, and don't need a lot of power have a good choice for netbooks.
With more things on the cloud, we now have no reason to lug around a huge notebook. DVD/CD burning is dead , the slot drives waste space and battery power on notebooks.
I believe we will see the final death of them in 2010
Mostly agree. For my work laptop (a Thinkpad), I use the Ultrabay that is meant to hold a DVD drive to hold a second hard drive. Since I need a lot of storage I use an SSD as the primary and a 500GB Seagate as the 2nd drive in the bay. Gives me the best of both worlds. I think for a little while it would be nice if some of the larger laptops (15" and up say) could offer two bays for such things. I know this is somewhat common for 17" laptops, but the Thinkpads support this today in the 15" models. Kinda useful until SSD prices fall and storage goes up to the point where we don't need spinning drives anymore...
this article makes a great point. we just got a toshiba T-135 (have tried HP, Dell, Sony in the past). It's an ULV and got it for around 500$ after looking around at netbooks. the upgrade in performance, display and upgradeability made it really attractive. the lack of a dvd-drive, the only design drawback, is pointless since we can make dvd images on the desktop and mount them for whatever purpose. the netbook market will be divided between these ULV on the top, and mobile devices (ie smartphones) on the bottom.
As a recently new owner of a Netbook, coming off from a 17" C2D with graphics chip 9lb monster, I would appreciate netbooks with CULV processors. The atom isn't too bad, my mom wouldn't mind it (who worked on 286's for far too long at work), but it hangs way to often. Well, more likely, I just need to get more RAM.
But 10"-12" ULV netbooks for $450-$500 is a great option to C2D 15" notebooks that don't have the portability or battery life some want.
I'd also like to see an option of 9" netbooks and tablets that use Tegra or Snapdragon innards for ultra-long life and are basically oversized iPod Touches, for ~$250. But, that may be asking too much.
Better said is that ultra portable laptops (of various power levels) will continue to take up the lion share of new sales.
Netbook sales will slow down, because they are not netbooks anymore. They're becoming slow laptops. Their sizes are larger than ever, their prices are creeping up, yet performance is still lacking just for the basics, like watching a regular video on youtube. Imo the "netbook" class is going to be replaced by the likes of smart devices with mobile OS. The current netbook class (Atom based laptops) will merely become a low end "training-wheel" laptop that everybody will buy and throw away once they can afford a more powerful laptop, or simply a secondary/tertiary laptop for the empty desk corner.
@pika2000 - Say what? Netbook performance is constantly improving and the standard size is still 10", with sweet edge-to-edge keyboards. The only real performance issues the standard user encounters is HD flash content, but hardware acceleration in 10.1 addresses that on the updated drivers. :)
A netbook is a true flexible real computer, just smaller and lower but sufficient performance for "net" functionality. This is not true of our smartphones, which without subsidy are still enormously expensive without fullsize keyboards or screens large enough to appreciate HD.
@Ducman69 Constantly improving performance? From Diamondville to Pineview? That's far from "constantly improving performance." The main goal here is less power, not performance. Ion helps, but intel graphics is still the majority, especially with Pineview in the mix. And no, I'm not even talking about HD playback. Even a standard youtube video will peg an Atom processor close to 100% all the time.
Netbook's "performance" is fine for the "net" usage of yesterday (checking emails, basic web surfing). Today's "net" usage are watching streaming video online and working with online apps while multitasking with IM/VOIP. The performance of netbook is no longer sufficient, especially with manufactures only focusing in upselling the screen size and upping the price.
as long as netbooks are "= 13 inch screens", there will be a market for "netbooks". The insides may become indistinguishable, but the market for mid-range devices isn't going to go away.
That's like a tautology...
I had an aspire one netbook the 9" version.
Now I have the acer 1810tz 11.6" with a ULV CPU. With this config I can run all the apps I would on my usual laptop comfortably including photoshop CS4. It even plays back 1080p videos smoothly.
So it just makes sense that more people go for this kind of config.
So wait... Small low voltage laptops will sell less because people will be buying slightly larger low voltage laptops... Can we PLEASE get rid of all the different titles? They're all laptops. Small laptops, big laptops, desktop replacements, netbooks, notebooks... All laptops. "ULV laptop" is ok, because it's not unnecessarily changing the name.
The only portable computers that deserve their own name are tablets and UMPC's, which have very obvious form factor differences and purposes. Netbooks are just smaller underpowered laptops. We don't call a compact car by a completely new name, they are just compact cars! Let's try to come up with a new namr for it right now. Compact cars are now called "roaders." Wait, giving it a special name is annoying and redundant? BUT HOW WILL WE DIFFERENTIATE BETWEEN NORMAL SIZED CARS AND SMALLER, UNDERPOWERED CARS?!?
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH *head asplodes*