Netbook

Netbooks are often ridiculed as a solution looking for a problem but they are also regarded as the ancestors of present day Chromebooks and “cloudbooks”. With the resurgence of these more modern but still low-performance devices, it might seem that the netbook is due for a revival as well. Or so that seems to be the proposition GPD makes with its almost literal Pocket computer. But does that make more sense now than it did before, especially in an age of powerful smartphones? We take the Ubuntu Edition of the GPD Pocket for a good and thorough testing to find out.

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Remember netbooks? Archos does, and it's not willing to let them go, announcing the Android-powered ArcBook with a 10.1-inch touchscreen display and a keyboard. Running Android 4.2 Jelly Bean on a dualcore Cortex A9 chip with 1GB of memory, the ArcBook is unlikely to set any speed records, but Archos is positioning it as an affordable sub-Chromebook option for education.

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After almost four years of existence spent mostly on ignominy, Intel is shuttering its customized AppUp app marketplace that probably very few know about. The official statement is that the company wants to focus its resources on platform innovation, but it's not hard to see some business common sense coming into play as well.

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This afternoon the folks at AT&T have made clear - sort of - their plans to move forward with their Mobile Share plans through the future, suggesting as they do that users currently on non-data phone plans will be able to stick to the old ways (for now). Until a time when traditional plans are axed completely, the basic $40 USD plan for 450 minutes of talk time will remain available - that's without data or text messaging of any kind, mind you. Mobile Share plans have been laid out as well.

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I always thought it was a combination of people wanting or needing new computer and an economy that meant they couldn't afford normal notebooks that led those who would normally purchase notebooks to the netbook world for a few years. There were a few people out there who purchased the little machines simply because they were tiny and they wanted portability. The netbook also made a nice first computer for younger users.

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Netbooks may have had their five minutes of fame, but it looks like Lenovo still thinks life left in the category. Netbook News has spotted specs for the upcoming Lenovo X131e, the successor to the X130e that was running AMD’s Zacate platform. The X131e looks to have the new Brazos 2.0 APU, featuring either a E1-1200 or E2-1800 CPU, plus boosted Radeon HD 73xx graphics. Just like the X130e, there will be an optical ULV Core i3 option too.

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Toshiba has confirmed that it will no longer be offering new netbook models in the US. The news isn't too surprising given the forthcoming onslaught of Ultrabooks, but it does further confirm the grim outlook for the ill-fated netbook market. Dell and Lenovo are already officially out of the netbook space, while Samsung and Sony haven't launched any new models this year either.

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You might not necessarily want some of those upcoming Ivy Bridge mobile processors. Netbooks are still fine for light browsing and whatnot, right? Acer has just the thing for you in that case. The company has added a new netbook to its line, the Aspire One 725, which makes use of AMD’s low-power Fusion chipset, or more specifically, the dual-core C-60 processor.

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For those looking for a lightweight web-browsing, media consuming, and casual game-playing machine for 2012, the current Ultrabook lineup doesn't always add up against the iPad. Though notebooks and desktop computers have been around for quite a few more years than the iPad, the latter essentially wrote the book on a vertically integrated hardware and software experience with Apple. Netbooks died because they couldn't replace what the laptop did for them for computing power - now the Ultrabook is here with plenty of power that the average person simply does not need. Is the iPad that perfect medium for the post-PC era?

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You may have heard a lot about it, but when it comes to actual physical products, Google's fully functional computer operating system hasn't exactly made its splash yet. That doesn't mean the search giant doesn't still have wide-eyed passion and seismic-sized plans for Chrome OS, though. In fact, in some respects, Google is just getting started. It just rolled out its newest edition of the operating system for developers.

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An unannounced Chromebook from Sony has surfaced on the FCC website this week. The Sony VAIO VCC111 Chromebook has been pictured in several photos along with a user manual, all of which were recently published after the FCC's confidentiality agreement with Sony had lifted. The original filing actually dates back to last September.

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Consumers who have an ASUS netbook, rejoice. Developers have managed to create the latest version of Android so that ASUS Eee PC customers will be able to run the latest Google operating system on their device. The initiative is not endored by ASUS or Google, but it seems to work pretty well. At least, that's the word on the street from the Android-x86 project.

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