Which is more desirable: Smartphone or Netbook?

Scott Stein | Jul 01, 2009

Just last week, we got a peek at Nvidia's new line of HD-video-playing processors in downtown Manhattan. One of them, the Ion, is a GPU that pairs with an Atom processor to give Netbooks gaming and HD-video-playing muscle, coming soon in Netbooks from Lenovo and Samsung.

The other is an all-in-one chip, the Tegra. It has an HD video processor and an ARM processor, making it an all-in-one computer on a chip that will be put on phone company-branded Netbooks toward the end of the year, according to an Nvidia representative.

But that's not all, it seems: Rumors around the Web are suggesting that the Tegra might be placed in upcoming smartphones as well. With a Tegra processor, these phones would have pretty impressive HD and gaming capabilities.

Add to this Dell's entrance into the handheld Internet device arena and the beefed-up graphics of the iPhone 3GS, and an interesting showdown is in the works between the new-generation smartphones and fall's upcoming crop of graphically superior Netbooks.

Assuming prices hold steady, the costs might be similar, too. A Netbook can currently run between S$500 (US$361.06) and S$900 (US$649.91), while smartphones run between S$800 (US$577.70) and S$1,000 (US$722.13), subsidized. There are even some new devices that try to have the best of both worlds--call them UMPCs, MIDs, or whatever you like.

For your money, which would you rather have--a smartphone that could handle HD video and gaming but wouldn't necessarily have a physical keyboard, or a graphically improved Netbook? Or are the two not necessarily mutually exclusive? A recent SRG research study found that women under 40 are using smartphones more than PCs as their mobile computing platform of choice. Is this true for men as well? Assuming your budget and gear bag aren't of limitless size, which would you choose?

Via CNET Crave

Filed under: Mobile Phones, Notebooks
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Devlin

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Devlin says...
Offering an HD-capable processor or GPU on a mobile device is pointless if the device's display doesn't natively support HD. The fact that it can output it to an external monitor whether through HDMI or wireless HDMI (if that ever takes off) is irrelevant as it defeats the purpose of having HD content on your device to begin with!

I'm all for better displays--I can't believe RIM can get away calling the BB 9000 Bold when it only supports 65K colors--but until we see at least a 720p display on a mobile device this'll be just one more thing to drain your battery. Even then, I still have my doubts over the readability of 3.5-3.8" displays on mobile devices (think Samsung Omnia HD, HTC Touch HD, and iPhone HD).

Jul 01, 2009 15:17