Performance

A subnotebook (also known as a palmtop, a kneetop or an ultraportable) is an extremely small and lightweight portable computer, with all features of a standard laptop computer and running all its applications. Its overall size is much smaller than an A4 paper notebook (8.27"×11.69"), but somewhat larger than a handheld computer. Hence it often has smaller than 10" (diagonal) screen and weigh less than 1kg; as opposed to full-size laptop with 15" screen and weighing 2kg or more.

The earliest subnotebooks were the Poqet PC and the Atari Portfolio, which were both released in 1989 and ran DOS. In 1996, the Toshiba Libretto 20 was first released with 6.1" screens, 270MB hard disk, weighing 840g and running on Windows 95. In 1997 Hewlett Packard and Casio launched a very sophisticated range of handheld palmtop PCs running Windows CE.

Examples of recent subnotebooks sorted by weight are:

Other examples