14 DAY TRIAL // The latest in the speculations regarding the PC market has a certain report saying that netbooks will see shipments and prices drop considerably in 2010, with some makers of such systems even dropping out of the market.
Back when the iPad first came out, PC makers didn't think it, and the slates that came after it, would be any threat to netbooks.
Turns out, however, that tablets very much did take off and have supposedly already started to erode netbook market share.
One of the reasons behind this is that tablets are more multimedia-oriented and have a higher degree of portability, though their lack of a keyboard does constitute an advantage for netbooks.
Nevertheless, reports circulating the web have begun to truly bring to light how entry-level mobile PCs aren't doing as well as their makers initially hoped they would.
According to Digitimes, netbook vendors have been forced to reduce the prices of their products and may take even more drastic measures next year.
For instance, while ASUS is doing its best to improve the feature set of its Eee PCs, those based on the Intel Atom N450 CPU now cost an average of NT$8,500, which is the equivalent of US$288.
Likewise, the ones using the Atom N550 dual-core are priced at under NT$12,000.
This is just one of the first symptoms, however, as the same report states that not just ASUS, but Micro-Star International (MSI) and HP (Hewlett-Packard) will have their single-core models selling for less than NT$10,000.
On the tablet front, shipments are expected to reach 20 million in 2010 and to jump to 40 million in 2011.
This is a stark contrast to how netbooks are expected to drop in shipments, though actual numbers were not given for them.
Regardless, ASUS and Acer may end up as sole netbook vendors, as smaller vendors, like MSI, might just back out of the segment entirely.