After 3 years, my trusty laptop died. In its day it was a great laptop sporting 1GB of RAM and lots of other geeky stuff. I knew its time had come when I had to resign myself to sending it to a repair shop. After a couple of goes, the repair guy gave me the sad news….it was over.
Like a nerdesque organ donor, I told him he could take the “good bits” from the laptop and after a period of mourning, I headed to PC World to buy a Netbook.
I think my laptop must have known it was his time to go as a few weeks before his last BSOD (blue screen of death), I had been looking at these mini laptops and had noticed that they were exactly as good as my laptop but over half the size! I’d even chosen one I would like if the unforeseeable should happen.
It was a Samsung NC10. The reason for this was easy. Firstly, it runs Windows XP instead of Linux. It also has a massive 160GB hard drive unlike some other Netbooks which have 8GB or so. The price tag was €429.
I bought it a week ago and I love it. I can carry it in the smallest of bags and it only weighs about a kilogram. It also has a built in microphone and web cam which my old laptop didn’t have.
So…why am I blogging about it in a primary school blog? I happen to think that netbooks are ideal for schools for a couple of reasons:
- They’re cheap(er) – Windows XP versions cost from €349, Linux from €299
- They have no CD drive – this stop kids from loading their rubbish on them
- They are smaller – ideal for small hands
- The battery life is HUGE – I get 5-7 hours from mine
- They load up quickly – I’m up and running in less than a minute
I reckon that when the price comes further down, schools will sit up and take notice. The last laptops I bought for my school were €500 so getting 2 netbooks for the price of a laptop is a good investment in my opinion.
