A few weeks ago the folks at Notebook Italia spotted a netbook called the Samsung NF208 which looks exactly like the recently released Samsung NF210 — except that it comes with a dual core Intel Atom N550 processor and it ships without an operating system. Unfortunately this model isn’t available in the US, where it’s hard to find notebooks that ship without an operating system installed. Most come with Windows or OS X, and occasionally if you look hard enough you can find a company selling a laptop computer with Linux.

The NF208, on the other hand, is a blank slate, allowing you to install your own operating system without paying for software you may not use up front.

The netbook has a 1024 x 600 pixel display, 2GB of DDR memory, and a 320GB hard drive. It includes a 6 cell battery.

SammyNetbook forum member citra_tdz reports that he picked up a Samsung NF208 in Indonesia. If you’ve found one in another part of the globe, let us know in the comments.

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14 replies on “Samsung releases NF208 netbook with no OS, but not in the US”

  1. Not available in the US! That sucks!

    More memory and bigger drive than NF310 at a lower price. So we boycott Samsung until the sell it here. LOL Who wants to buy Windows?

    The weird thing is what difference does it make whether you have a 250 or 320 gig drive? The increase in RAM matters.

  2. just bought this netbook in thailand for $375 / 11500 baht. its battery is 6600. served with free dos.

  3. I think the netbook is dying because a netbook now and a netbook 2 years ago aren’t that much different. Plus, the netbooks now actually cost the same or more than their 2 year old versions. Or maybe many people bought netbooks and like notebook users, they don’t buy new ones until their current one breaks in 2-5 years.

    With the netbook craze slowing down and people less likely to buy a new netbook that’s pretty much the same as their current one, I’m hoping manufacturers will actually put more effort in improving them. Maybe Intel can come up with a way to create an out of order Atom CPU without sacrificing power consumption.

    1. I’m known as a critic of Intel, so this won’t surprise anyone when I say the knowledge and capabilities are there. It’s what happens when one company controls the industry by no fault of their own. Drag your feet. No need to improve. Keep the HPs and Dells happy and keep netbooks at bay. Underpower them because afterall, should Intel actually unleash the beast, they would canabolize the higher priced premium models. Once Intel made it to a safe 8 hours, there was no demand by the public saying they want more and more battery life. More battery life vs. some increased speed and graphics. We all know what people want after that 8 hour battery life was reached. Go AMD go.

      1. Yes, it’s about time Intel got some competition. Stagnation was the biggest threat to the netbook market and could have been one of those victims of its own success stories otherwise.

    2. No, netbooks are cheaper now than they were two years ago. When the Eee PC 701 first came out it was priced $399, 7″ screen, only had up to 4GB SSD, and only about 2.5 hours run time.

      Even when they switched to lower cost hard drives the Eee PC 900HA was released at about $350, still only had just over 3 hours run time, only a 160GB hard drive, no bluetooth, XP, and many netbooks were still only WiFi B/G.

      Now you can get a netbook for $299, 320GB hard drive, Bluetooth, WiFi B/G/N, W7 Starter, and over 5 hours run time. Meaning you now get more for less! It’s just more confusing now as they’ve introduced “premium” netbooks that offer additional features and/or build quality to charge extra for.

      The market slowdown is just due to netbooks reaching market saturation, but the netbook market is still growing albeit slowly now. So there is still no evidence that netbooks will be dying, it’s just no longer growing rapidly and there are other new products taking up everyone’s attention right now.

      Netbooks however are still useful, cheaper than other options for what they give, and with AMD finally injecting competition we shall finally see some advancement in the netbook specifications. So I don’t think netbooks will be dying any time soon.

      1. Your larger point is valid… but the Eee PC 701 actually came out in late 2007. Two years ago today would be February 2009. By that point the Atom N270 processor had been around for a little over half a year, and things haven’t really changed all that much since then.

        That said, I paid something ridiculous like $580 for my Asus Eee PC 1000H in the summer of 2008, and it seemed like a good deal at the time because it was so much more powerful than the Eee PC 701 and HP Mini 2133 that had preceeded it.

        It wasn’t until a bit later (maybe around early 2009, but I can’t remember for certain), that we started to really see $300 and $400 models with specs similar to what you’d get today.

  4. I agree with these comments. I want netbook with Linux or no OS with a price of under $200 otherwise, I would rather buy an iPad or its equivalent. Phil

  5. Presumably there is little profit on a $200 netbook. Trying to get customers to pay more, the manufacturers have offered minor improvements to blur the price line with full-fledged laptops. Then tablets became a fad. Smartbooks, never more than talk, disappeared from the discussion. Are netbooks dead? My hope is that somebody will take up the abandoned niche of cheap netbooks costing much less than true laptops. Not holding my breath.

  6. I was a fan of netbooks, I have 2. When they first came out you can get a Linux netbook in the $200 dollar range, about what there where worth. Then they started getting more expensive with few real upgrades, more in the range of the notebook. I don’t want to spend a lot of money for any computer with a small screen. Don’t own a smart phone.
    Then xp disappeared and MS decided you should get a stripped os and pay more money for a real one. They want money not once but twice. CROOKS.I much prefer Linux anyway but it is no wonder the netbook is dying.

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