Nokia Booklet 3G Netbook AT&T Exclusive

Nokia has entered the PC market, rolling out the Booklet 3G. The Windows 7 netbook is to run exclusively on AT&T's 3G wireless network. Adding to the surprise of the phone maker entering the netbook market is the price point of $300, since this is no entry level model. The catch is that to get the subsidized $299 price, customers must sign 2 two year service contract with AT&T ($60 per month). The total layout over the service life before taxes would be $1,739.00. Best Buy is the exclusive retailer for the device until after the holidays.

The claimed battery life of up to 12 hours is a big selling point. Competing netbooks at the $300 level typically have batteries lasting 4 to 5 hours. Reviewers are praising the Booklet for its crisp 1280x720 10.1-inch screen resolution and stylish lightweight design values. Booklet 3G specs include swappable SIM card slot, built-in A-GPS, a toolbar that syncs the Booklet with Nokia phones SMS messages and contact data, seamless switching between 3G and Wi-Fi, via Windows 7's wireless services handling. It features a relatively slow 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 processor, just 1GB of RAM, and the hard drive is 120GB, smaller than in many competing netbooks.

"Our company is about connecting people," said Nokias John Hwang. "We connected the world's first billion people through the cell phone. And the next billion will be connected via computing devices like a PC." Hwang notes that the line between phones and computers is quickly blurring. Smartphone devices now allow full Internet browsing and e-mail; when connected to high-speed 3G wireless networks, they offer even more new Internet-enabled applications. At the same time, laptop PCs have gotten smaller, thanks to cloud computing and Intels Atom processors. Reports indicate that over 20 million netbooks may be sold worldwide in 2009. So if Apple can get into the mobile phone market, why shouldnt Nokia go after the PC market?