Retrospective of netbooks, the tiny low-end laptops that lit up the late 2000s

boing
#21

Netbooks were huge because, before that time, small portable computers of any kind were sold at a premium and still came with performance compromises. Netbooks achieved a low price by doubling down on the performance compromises at a time when performance was becoming less important — native desktop applications were taking a backseat to lightly interactive web content, and “web applications” hadn’t become so bloated as to need tons of browser power.

I picked up an HP Mini in 2008 or 2009 for around $200 to hold me over for a few weeks while my main computer went away for warranty service, and it grew into a really reliable second device/backup/travel/guest computer. It also came with my first SSD… a whole 16 GB, but storage was never the point for me.

Later, when my custom-built home server inexplicably died, I installed Slackware on the Mini and it had a nice second life until the Raspberry Pi — even less powerful but still good enough — came along.

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#22

Since they’re utterly dependent on the network, I consider Chromebooks to be netbooks and bristle whenever somebody refers to one as a laptop.

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#23

Well… “SSD” more like an IDE thumbdrive really… Getting it a real 1.8" drive make it far snappier.

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#24

Yeah that ticked me off, that when Psion had the Netbook all the reviews trashed the size/form factor, but once the big players decided to get in the game suddenly it was cool and the trade offs were worth discussing.

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#25

Get yourself an Intel-based Chromebook and turn it into a lightweight linux laptop or Win 10 machine using Mr. Chromeboxes firmware replacement: https://mrchromebox.tech/

It’s the next best thing to a netbook. I’m running GalliumOS (an Ubuntu-based flavor of Linux optimized for Chromebook hardware) on an older HP 11 G4 and it’s pretty damn good.

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#26

The Acer Aspire One is my favorite tiny laptop I’ve ever used. Surprisingly snappy with Linux Mint on it.

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#27

I owned an eeePC and traveled extensively with it in the mid-00s. It was eventually outclassed by the Macbook Air, but for a while there we could suddenly have a sub-three-pound PC with good battery life that did all the web things at a price my little non-profit could afford.

Netbooks still exist, but we call them Chromebooks.

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#28

The main difference would be the ability to run Windows or Linux on the netbook and install any platform compatible software versus running ChromeOS which is more limited in available applications.

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#29

I still have an EeePC 701 – the original version that came with Linux preinstalled – which I use all the time to play music in my dance class and at functions. It makes a very versatile MP3 player, especially when coupled via Bluetooth with a Wii remote control (the EeePC 701 didn’t come with built-in Bluetooth but a simple USB-Bluetooth dongle works fine), and the screen is still readable from the far end of the gymnasium.

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#30

i had a 2009 msi wind. it had a pretty small but dedicated hacking/modding scene, and with the community’s help i was able to turn into into a hackintosh with osx snow leopard and it ran flawlessly. even did some internal mods to improve the speakers and so on. 2gb ram, and an ssd it worked well for a long time. when osx finally gave up the ghost i put lxde debian on it and hooked it up to my stereo so i could play all my plex music from it. ran again for years as my media player. finally retired it a month ago after 12 years.

i love the 10" form factor. wish they would build powerful and fast laptops in a sub 12.5" form factor.

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#31
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#32

I went from an EEE to a Chromebook, but most Chromebooks have a decent screen size 13" or 15", so they aren’t really netbooks in that regard. Granted, due to advances in technology they aren’t all that much heavier than my 7" EEE.

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#33

Back when people took the Media Lab seriously. Then again, I do still love my Lego Mindstorms.

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#34

I did the same thing with an Acer 14" Chromebook not long after I got it, and it’s over 5 years old now and still going strong. It was my daily driver for writing papers when I went back to school. GalliumOS RULES. Turns a limited machine good for not much more that browsing the web into a real productivity beast.

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#35

I had one, put Ubuntu on it.

Liked it so much I bought my dad one for a present.

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#36

That’s what killed my Dell mini 9- the drive on it was essentially an IDE SSD that used the miniPCI style interface, and the controller chip on the system board died. It was a ‘decent enough’ machine when it was working, at least- I dumped the windows starter edition on it and installed some flavor of linux on it, and it ran well enough for what I needed it for, which was basic web browsing and checking email.

#37

I loved my mini9, I even changed the disk from 8 GB to 32, and tha battery because the original one stopped working. Now is definitely dead ( neither the battery nor the power sueith Ypply work).

It came Ubuntu 8.04 installed, but after a while I replaced it with Gentoo, making it even more usable.
What I really liked was the lightweight and that was fanless.

If you are into the Linux/ARM niche, pine64 produce a cheap 14’ notebook (specs are quite nice, with battery life up to 9/10h). They had an even cheaper 11’ version, but they discontinued it.

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#38

I loved the linux based netbooks. Cheap. Extremely portable. My Eeepc could run for ~4 days on a single charge after some tweaking. I took it with me for backpackings holidays to keep a diary. When it finally died 3 years ago when my daughter poured a glass of milk on the keyboard I tried to use a tablet with a BlueTooth keyboard for the same purpose, but it was way more cumbersome. The tablet’s battery life was OK, but the BT keyboard kept losing connection, or emptying it’s batteries because something pressed a a key in my backpack. Also no libreoffice on an android tablet :-(. I’m still looking for a better succesor to my humble baby-green little eeepc.

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#39

Any reasonably recent Chromebook can run Linux apps, or boot into a full Linux desktop. All w/o overwriting ChromeOS (which is itself a version of Linux). A bit of Googling will reveal the details and caveats.

#40

I think the saddest thing about it it that iPads are good for consuming content, Fire Tablets are good for consuming content, phones are pretty good for consuming content…

But Netbooks and PocketPCs were more about working and creating content and accomplishing things. There is something really cool about having an accessible, $300 full fledged (if slow and slightly limited) computer that could do both.

You can still get a laptop from Dell for under $300, although it looks like it’s a bit of a chunky boy. But giving them a cute name and a low price and them being popular kind of changed the tide a bit.

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