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In the not too distant future, you’ll start to see netbooks running Google’s Chrome OS. How popular the OS turns out to be remains to be seen, but one thing’s for sure – Google appears to be taking a pretty serious approach to system security. According to Will Drewry, a Google software security engineer, all of the Google Netbook products will ship with the Trusted Platform Module (TPM) installed to ensure security in key storage and multi-factor authentication.

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Samsung on Thursday said it plans to launch a new line of multimedia “powerhouse” R80 series notebooks at Best Buy, both online and offline, on March 7th. The sub-$1,000 notebook line will come with Blu-ray capabilities and Nvidia GeForce graphics. “Best Buy continues to be an important retail partner for Samsung, and we’re excited to offer a range of notebook and netbook options to our customers that deliver exceptional craftsmanship and performance,” said Todd Bouman, director of product marketing at Samsung Electronics Information Technology Division. “True to Samsung’s unique, customer-focused design aesthetic, these mobile PCs are flexible enough to be used as mobile devices or desktop replacements for all-day use.” There will be three models in all — R480 ($730), R580 ($830), and R780 ($930) — all of which come built around Intel’s Core i3/i5 platform. The flagship 17-inch R780 unit will include 4GB of RAM, Nvidia GeForce GT 330M graphics, a 500GB hard drive, DVD burner, 1.3MP webcam, Wi-Fi, and Windows Home Premium 64-bit.

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We saw this one coming before the weekend, and just as we expected, Intel today officially took the wraps off of its new Atom N470 processor. “This new, faster Atom processor for netbooks has integrated graphics built directly into the CPU to help enable improved performance and smaller, more energy-efficient designs or the popular netbook category,” Intel said . No big surprises here, at least not in terms of technical specs. The new single-core chip runs at 1.83GHz and features 512KB of L2 cache and DDR2-667 support.

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Chinese PC maker Teclast first made headlines during Computex last year when the company was showing off an Nvidia ION-based netbook, and then disappeared under the radar. Well, the company’s back with a new netbook , though the modest specs aren’t likely to draw much excitement. Tapping into last-gen netbook parts, the newly announced Teclast X8 comes equipped with a 10.2-inch screen, Intel Atom N270 processor, 1GB of RAM, 160GB hard drive, Wi-Fi, 1.3MP webcam, and choice between Windows XP or Windows 7. In other words, exactly the kind of netbook you’re likely to find on clearance as vendors look to move old inventory and make room for Pine Trail. To its credit, the X8 does strive to be a bit more portable than the average notebook, measuring just over a half-inch at its thinnest point and weighing a little over 2 pounds.

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DigiTimes says competition is heating up in the netbook market , and it’s Acer, the largest global netbook vendor in 2009, that seems to be feeling most of it. So much so, that Acer may be advancing the release of its Chrome-based netbook to the middle of 2010. DigiTimes says that Acer shipped nine million netbooks in 2009, about two-thirds more than did second place Asustek. DigiTimes expects that Acer has nearly peaked, with little room for growth in this market, while its main competitors: Asustex, HP, and Samsung, still have plenty of room left. To keep its lead DigiTimes expects that Acer will release early the Nvidia Ion 2-based Aspire One 532G netbook , which it showcased at the Mobile World Congress

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German website NetbookNews.de discovered something rather interesting about Lenovo’s ThinkPad X100e. As it currently stands, the X100e sports an 11.6-inch screen with a 1366 x 768 display, AMD Neo MV-40 single-core CPU, and ATI Radeon HD 3200 graphics, but an overhaul might be in order. NetbookNews.de stumbled upon the X100e’s support page , which showed a different set of specs next to the above. The alternate specs included a 10.1-inch screen with a 1280 x 720 display and Intel Atom N450 processor

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The Highlander battle among chip manufacturers has started anew . This time it’s among the makers of chips that run smartphones. Besides initiating a new round of cutthroat competition, this battle suggests that computing is undergoing a substantive conceptual shift–from units that are all powerful to ones that are strategically powerful. The objective is to make more powerful chips that consume less energy, and take up less space, with the intent of creating products that are smaller and less functional than their PC brethren, but are more in-tune to the particular needs of their users. The big players include the well known, such as Intel, ARM, Samsung, AMD, and Apple, and the lesser known, such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing, Microelectroincs, and GlobalFoundaries

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Those of us in the States have been able to pick up Samsung’s NB30 netbook for quite some time now, while our U.K. brethren have had to wait patiently. The wait is over, as Samsung’s Pine Trail netbook has finally started shipping in the U.K.

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Acer’s Aspire One range helped launch the netbook market a couple of years ago and, ever since, it has been adding to and refining its brand. The Aspire One 532 is the latest addition and also one of the first netbooks to feature Intel’s latest Atom processor, the N450. The Intel Atom N450 is different to its predecessors because it features both the graphics and memory controllers on a single chip. This is intended to increase battery life as well as processing and graphical performance

The full story can be found on Tech Radar

Since Asus kickstarted the modern netbook market, it is only apt that it has now released one of the world’s first dual-core mini-laptops. The Eee PC 1201N is the most powerful netbook we have seen so far and further blurs the line between laptop and netbook. The use of a 12.1-inch screen – rather than the 10-inch screen usually seen on netbooks – means the machine straddles a fine line between netbook and ultraportable laptop. This is becoming more common as netbooks move away from their initial small and cheap remit

The full story can be found on Tech Radar