Sub-$1000 Laptops Abound!

The $100 barrier for portable computers has been breached and this can only mean a more exciting future for gadget enthusiast like me. There was a time when one would have to sell a kidney (and a cornea) before they can afford a portable computer (or even a desktop computer at that) but advances in technology, dropping prices of core components and wide availability of parts has made the $100 laptop possible. Nope, they may not be the speed demons that are being churned out by Toshiba, Alienware, HP and other "branded" companies but for the daily use of students and geeks (like me), these should suffice.

Here's a few of the not-too-expensive laptops I found around:

The Twinhead EFIO! D212A (Php 48,558.00 or approximately $933) -- this is an Athlon-based laptop with 12" XGA screen. The memory is at an anemic 128 MB (easily upgradeable) but it has a built in Combo drive and is preloaded with Windows XP Home edition. There is an even cheaper Twinhead laptop costing Php 39,888.00 (around $768) which is Celeron-based, has a 256 MB AM (still anemic IMHO) and a Combo drive but this one doesn't come with an O.S.

The RedFox Navigator is also an AMD-based laptop (Turion64) that costs Php 44,358 (approximately $854). The Turion64-based Navigator comes with a 12" XGA display, a 40 GB drive, 256 MB RAM but doesn't come with an O.S. It has a Sempron 3000+ version which costs Php 41,888.00 (approximately $806).

Other inexpensive sub-$1000 laptops can be found at http://laptopking.com.ph/. Another purveyor of inexpensive laptops is http://www.cooltoyzph.com/ which also deals with refurbished and "generic" no-name notebook.

technorati tags: portables, laptops, notebook-computer