Best Netbook to buy in India

Best Netbook to buy in India

Netbook, as already covered in this blog, is sleeker, lighter, cheaper version of full size

laptops that even come at half the price tag.

Most famous size being 10 inches, as per latest survey, market share of netbook is increasing and that of full size laptop is decreasing. There are a hoarde of netbooks

being launched in US and other markets on Oct22, in sync with the launch of Windows 7, but coming them to India will still take sometime.

As of now, there are many international best buy and bestseller netbooks availabe in India, as of October 2009.

After going through configuration, user reviews, editor reviews, videos across best of the market websites, here is my take on best buy netbooks.

Depending upon your budget, look preference, batter life preference, you could select between any of these: Asus 1005HA, Samsung N110, Samsung N120, Samsung NC20, Dell 10V, Toshiba NB200, MSI Wind, HP mini, Lenovo ideapad S10 (not in that preference order)

Now, to be specific, the best choice would be between ASUS 1005HA and Samsung N120.

Both being best sellers internationally (1005HA winning editor’s choice award by CNET,

and also maintaining No.1 Spot on Amazon in this category).

A close fight would be with N120. Difference being, 1005HA offers a little better battery life, and in some parameters it performs a little better than N120 Atom processor.

N120 holds advantage in its full size keyboard (best in market across all 10 inch netbooks), nice looks, and Samsung being better established in India in terms of after sales than Asus.

Price wise, Asus 1005HA comes at Rs. 21,500 in Delhi (as of Oct-09) and Samsung N120 coming at Rs. 22,500 (and as part of diwali offer giving away DVD Writer free with any Netbook).

Under fully loaded conditions 1005HA offers around 30 min more back up than N120 (around 5 hours 51 minutes, at lesser load both give around 8 hours back up)

N110 is a bit lower version of N120, not much differences, but it offers better battery backup than N120.

Dell offers good customer service/support, offers good hardware, but still has to come with a winning netbook, though its Dell Mini 9 was a bestseller (phased out now), and its present Dell 10 does a decent enough job.

Lenovo ideapad S12, as available in India, is not as par with its latest product s12, present in US and other markets, but is decent enough.

Same with Toshiba, in Indian market it has NB200, which is not at par with internationally available product NB-205 (which ranks higher than Samsung N120 in many reviews).

MSI Wind has been a bestseller in initial launches, but competition has taken the better of it and it has yet to come up with another bestseller.

Also, it is to be noted that currently all netbooks come loaded with Windows XP, now Windows 7 (as sought out to be best Microsoft OS yet), should come loaded after 22October with most of the coming netbooks, it makes sense to enquire about free upgrade options before you buy any netbook.

One more important thing is launch of Nvidia Ion platform for netbooks, enabling it even to play games and view HD content. HP Mini 311 is the first to feature it, but is not available in India yet, and when it comes, expect it to push the prices by at least 5-10K.

(in US thought it would cost around 20,000 after converting to Indian currency), so if you can get some netbook from US, it would be much better value for money and better hardware than what is available in India. (though that is the case with most of the electronics product).

Will keep updating about the latest!!!! Feedback is welcome.

Netbook, as covered in the last posts, is sleeker, lighter, cheaper version of full size laptops that even come at half the price tag (and sexier too )

Most famous size being 10 inches, as per latest survey, market share of netbook is increasing and that of full size laptop is decreasing. There are a hoarde of netbooks being launched in US and other markets on Oct22, in sync with the launch of Windows 7, but coming them to India will still take sometime.

As of now, there are many international best buy and bestseller netbooks availabe in India, as of October 2009.

After going through configuration, user reviews, editor reviews, videos across best of the market websites, here is my take on best buy netbooks.

Depending upon your budget, look preference, batter life preference, you could select between any of these: Asus 1005HA, Samsung N110, Samsung N120, Samsung NC20, Dell 10V, Toshiba NB200, MSI Wind, HP mini, Lenovo ideapad S10 (not in that preference order)

Now, to be specific, the best choice would be between ASUS 1005HA and Samsung N120.

Both being best sellers internationally (1005HA winning editor’s choice award by CNET, and also maintaining No.1 Spot on Amazon in this category).

A close fight would be with N120. Difference being, 1005HA offers a little better battery life, and in some parameters it performs a little better than N120 Atom processor.

N120 holds advantage in its full size keyboard (best in market across all 10 inch netbooks), nice looks, and Samsung being better established in India in terms of after sales than Asus.

Price wise, Asus 1005HA comes at Rs. 21,500 in Delhi (as of Oct-09) and Samsung N120 coming at Rs. 22,500 (and as part of diwali offer giving away DVD Writer free with any Netbook).

Under fully loaded conditions 1005HA offers around 30 min more back up than N120 (around 5 hours 51 minutes, at lesser load both give around 8 hours back up)

N110 is a bit lower version of N120, not much differences, but it offers better battery backup than N120.

Dell offers good customer service/support, offers good hardware, but still has to come with a winning netbook, though its Dell Mini 9 was a bestseller (phased out now), and its present Dell 10 does a decent enough job.

Lenovo ideapad S12, as available in India, is not as par with its latest product s12, present in US and other markets, but is decent enough.

Same with Toshiba, in Indian market it has NB200, which is not at par with internationally available product NB-205 (which ranks higher than Samsung N120 in many reviews).

MSI Wind has been a bestseller in initial launches, but competition has taken the better of it and it has yet to come up with another bestseller.

Also, it is to be noted that currently all netbooks come loaded with Windows XP, now Windows 7 (as sought out to be best Microsoft OS yet), should come loaded after 22October with most of the coming netbooks, it makes sense to enquire about free upgrade options before you buy any netbook.

One more important thing is launch of Nvidia Ion platform for netbooks, enabling it even to play games and view HD content. HP Mini 311 is the first to feature it, but is not available in India yet, and when it comes, expect it to push the prices by at least 5-10K.  (in US thought it would cost around 20,000 after converting to Indian currency), so if you can get some netbook from US, it would be much better value for money and better hardware than what is available in India. (though that is the case with most of the electronics product).

Will keep updating about the latest!!!!