Every day, the world of portable equipment and electronics is becoming more advanced and new models of compact personal computers are entering the market. Many buyers pay attention that the Internet and specialized stores increasingly draw a line dividing laptops into two large categories - laptops and netbooks. But not all users know what the main difference between a netbook and a laptop is. This article will tell about the features of these portable computers and reveal to the reader their main purpose.
Before starting to list the main differences between a netbook and a laptop, let's briefly look at the history of laptop computers. Laptops (often called laptops in the West) appeared much earlier than netbooks. In fact, they should have become a full replacement for a stationary PC, but with the difference that the laptop was easy to move to another place, and even during this movement it could be turned on thanks to an autonomous power source.
Over time, laptops were divided into several groups, largely depending on their purpose. Even in our time, laptops can be divided into budget models, office, gaming, high-performance and so on. Some of the laptops can completely replace bulky stationary personal computers, and some seem to be created in order to use them only on the road. With the development of technology and the ever deeper integration of the Internet into the life of every progressive person, it became necessary to create a compact portable PC with which it would be possible to solve the problem of access to the network and office applications from almost anywhere. That is how the younger brothers of laptops - netbooks - were born.
The main difference between a netbook and a laptop is in its scope. A netbook is a compact device for accessing the simplest (mainly office) applications and the Internet, while a laptop can completely replace a stationary computer and solve a wide range of tasks posed by the user.
There are a number of signs by which you can easily distinguish a laptop from a netbook. The first is the size. If laptops with a screen diagonal of less than fifteen inches are extremely rare in the market today, then for a netbook this figure does not exceed ten to twelve inches. The advantages of a netbook are its compact size and weight of less than two kilograms. At the same time, more bulky and heavier laptops will delight users with better displays with a much larger diagonal.
Due to the difference in size, there is another fundamental difference between a netbook and a laptop. In larger laptops, you can easily accommodate a larger amount of powerful “stuffing”. Therefore, laptops are much more productive than their compact brothers, who are forced to be content with simple and small processors that do not need volume cooling systems. For the same reason, all netbooks are devoid of drives for reading and writing CD / DVD - they simply have no place in the tiny body of the baby. But this difference between a netbook and a laptop leads to another significant difference. Due to the more powerful hardware, as well as the presence of a cooling system, a DVD drive and a larger display, the laptop can last no more than two or two and a half hours on a single battery charge. At the same time, a netbook has one battery charge for eight to ten hours.
Before buying a laptop computer, it should be noted that the difference in cost between a laptop and a netbook is quite significant. If a modest netbook for working with office programs and Internet surfing can be purchased for two hundred dollars with a little, then even a budget laptop is unlikely to cost the buyer less than four hundred dollars. Do not forget that the netbook and laptop, the differences between which are quite significant, are designed for completely different purposes. It is enough to clearly state why you need a portable computer, as a decision on what to choose, it will be obvious.