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Good news for anyone looking for a cheap subnotebook. The Acer Aspire One, which is officially the cheapest Intel Atom-based computer you can buy right now, just showed up at Newegg for $380. And as of this morning, it was actually in stock.
In other news, the MSI Wind, which is the second-cheapest Intel Atom-based computer, got a small price cut at Amazon. A few weeks ago, when MSI announced it would be replacing the promised 6-cell battery with a 3-cell battery due to the global battery shortage, MSI promised to drop the price for the Windows XP version of the Wind notebook from $499 to $479. But for some reason up until this week, Amazon was showing a $499 price for the Wind. Now the shopping site is showing the same $479 price as the MSI Shop. I’d still rather have a 6 cell battery.
Of course, if the MSI Wind and Acer Aspire One are both too expensive for your tastes, you can always wait until next month when Dell will reportedly begin offering a $299 subnotebook. Dell’s base model will most likely sport just 4GB of storage and 512MB of RAM though, so if you want a bit more power, you’ll have to pay a few bucks more, which will likely bring the cost in line with the Acer Aspire One.
[via Small-Laptops]
In my analysis I think there are only 3 proper contenders in the ‘available now’ netbook space. These are the Asus 1000h, the MSI Wind and this netbook here – the Acer Aspire One. Although the Acer Aspire One takes up the low end of the ‘Big Three’ it is available widely where the MSI is not, and it also is available at low prices worldwide. Other players such as Dell, Lenovo or Samsung with upcoming and currently released netbooks are just more of the same and really aren’t adding to the already established and proven market entries.
Keep an eye out for the Asus N10 as the leader of the new-school netbooks. If you are interested in finding out more please see my site http://www.electricvagabond.com
Mine is on its way, too!
Mine will be here tomorrow.
What is the DC voltage and amperage?