I bet you heard those words a lot: laptops, notebooks and netbooks. To be honest with you, if you were going to ask me a lot of years ago, back in 2000 about the difference between a laptop and a notebook I would probably give you this answer: A laptop and a notebook is the same thing the difference is that people from USA call them laptops and those from UK call them notebooks or vice versa, I don`t remember the order. You`re probably laughing now but I am sure that there are many other things that needs to be learned. So let me share with you my experience regarding those terms.
A laptop comes with these features :
1. Widescreens between 14`- 17` ( rarely I saw laptops with 19` )
2. Nvidia or ATI graphics
3. DVD-ROM/DVD-RW drive available + floppy drive
4. Large featured keyboard ( not so big as a PC keyboard but large enough )
5. 2-3 hours battery life
6. Some components can be upgraded
7. Comes with Bluetooth, network, integrated dial-up modems and even Wi-Fi capabilities
8. Most of them comes with high quality audio and speaker system
9. Most of them can replace a desktop PC.
10. The lowest price for a new laptop ( starting with $ 700 )
A notebook comes with these features :
1. Widescreens between 12`- 14`
2. Minimal graphics subsystem
3. No DVD or CD for some of them
4. Small keyboard
5. 4-5 hours battery life
6. Low profile ( better said thin )
7. Integrated modem and network
8. Low consumption
9. Ultralight, less weight when compared with a laptop
10. The lowest price for a new notebook ( starting with $ 700 )
A netbook comes with these features :
1. Widescreens between 7`- 11`
2. Minimal graphics subsystem
3. No DVD or CD or floppy ( attach an external DVD-ROM or external hard via an USB port )
4. Really small keyboard
5. 5-9 hours battery life
6. Extremely low profile
7. Low consumption
8. Ultralight, the average weight is around 1.3 Kg
9. Ultra-mobile solution
10. The lowest price for a new netbook ( starting with $ 250 )
When to buy a laptop, a notebook and a netbook :
Buy a laptop: If you need a computer that could bring you the same power like your desktop PC from home, then you need a laptop, don`t even think at buying a notebook or a netbook. A laptop will give you the same power like your desktop PC but with one major advantage, you can take it with you almost everywhere.
Buy a notebook: If you need something smaller than a laptop but with more power than a netbook, then definetely a notebook will get the job done. It`s the perfect compromise between a laptop and a netbook.
Buy a netbook: If all what you need is to check your email, visit websites and everything related to the Internet activity, a netbook is everything you need because of his high battery life and his weight.
Conclusion: Prices that I mentioned here are for decent units, probably you can obtain even lower prices but it will affect their performance. Once again, the laptop is what you need to replace all activities from your desktop PC such as playing games, watching movies etc. The notebook is something smaller, with a less weight, more mobile than a laptop and coming with a lot of features but being limited by his size and by a greater price. The netbook as his name suggests `net+book`. `Net` is a common used shortcut for the `Internet` ( Inter+net ) is the perfect solution if you need to access the Internet for a couple of hours. Spending an entire day in front of an netbook would probably hurt your eyes so use it only when you really need to access the Internet. As you can see the difference between laptops, notebooks and netbooks exists but it depends from what angle you`re looking at them.