LG withdraws low-end notebook

One of LG Electronics' first three notebooks has been withheld from release to the Australian market.

The South Korean vendor last week said it would enter the notebook PC market here with three 2.4kg-2.5kg models, each boasting the Intel Centrino bundle, 10 hours of battery life and another three hours with secondary battery.

However, LG Australia marketing manager Paul Reeves has since admitted that only the more expensive LM50-2 and LM50-3 models would be available.

“The LS50-1 we put on hold for the time being because ... we want to get pricing at a point which is possible for retailers and competitive in the marketplace,” he said.

Reeves said the 1.4 GHz LS50-1 -- which was originally listed at $2,999 -- would require more research to determine the most appropriate price. The 1.5 GHz LM50-2 has an RRP of $3,599 and the 1.6 GHz LM50-3 an RRP of $4,449.

A global release of the notebooks could follow if sales were good enough, he said.

However, LG Electronics would not make the notebooks available to the IT channel until mid-2004, Reeves said, as the company had decided to focus on its familiar consumer retail outlets, such as Harvey Norman, Betta Electrical, NARTA, Domayne, Good Guys and Officeworks.

“We want to get customers behind the product and build their awareness. We have very strong relationships with our retailers, in audio-visual and whitegoods.”

Reeves would not divulge details on LG Electronics' strategy to succeed in what was already a highly competitive -- some say saturated -- market.
 
However, he confirmed that the main notebook market was mobile sales staff and travelling executives although LG was initially targeting consumers.

“Probably by mid-next year we might look at something along the lines of bringing in the PC channel. I'm also looking at other products we might put into the channel,” Reeves added.

The notebooks use Intel Pentium M processors and have Intel 802.11b wireless network interfaces. Microsoft Windows XP and Norton Anti-Virus 2004 are pre-loaded. The LS50-1 and LM50-2 have 40GB of hard drive and the LM50-3 has 60GB.  All have a DVD/CD-RW combo drive.

Reeves said the long battery life was achieved partly by using composite materials to minimise heat dissipation.

LG also recently introduced a range of LCD monitors, CRT monitors and optical storage drives.