portable dvd player or netbook?

I will be travelling long haul soon and would like to be equipped to entertain a 6 year old and a 2 year old. If I were to purchase a portable dvd player, I would be happy to pay €249 for a Sony 9 inch one. Would it be better value to purchase a netbook for about maybe €100 more? Which netbooks have a internal dvd player? Will the screen resolution be as good as the portable dvd player? Also, would it be possible for 2 people to use a set of headphones each on a netbook at the same time? Thanks.

Most if not all Netbooks don't have a disc drive but you could preload movies onto it using an external source which will lower the load to be carried by a bit.

Netbooks, by 'definition', don't come with an optical (CD or DVD) drive.

It's possible to get a headphone splitter, i.e. feed 2 sets of headphones off one headphone socket.

Thanks for the replies.

My initial plan was to get the portable dvd player to play a few kiddies dvds while in the airport. If I have these dvds, how do i put them on the netbook memory? What software would I need? How much memory would I need for a 30 mins dvd?

A 2yr old is only going to watch movies/TV for certain amount of time before they get bored. So bear that in mind. Putting movies, on a Netbook, iPod is quite time consuming, bear that in mind. Also A 6yr old is going to able to play games on a netbook, DS, iPod. An iPod is a big hit in our house with the older kids. It can play movies, games, and more besides. Also lots of audio books, harry potter, thomas tank engine etc.

We also have a 13" laptop (Not a netbook) with a DVD drive. The kids use it for games,a nd we have used it for movies on occasion. Much more useful than netbook IMO.

To put the DVDs on the netbook, you need access to an external DVD drive.

Alternatively, you could rip the DVD on another PC and transfer the files across to the netbook, using an external hard drive or USB key.

If you're not familiar with this, it might not be a realistic option.

Whether netbook or DVD player, or laptop, battery life could be an issue. At a guess, you'd get no more than 10 hours out of the battery on any such unit and, AFAIK, you don't have access to a mains socket on a long-haul flight.

Some portable DVD players have a AA battery option. Obviously something like an iPod can be charged from a USB charger. You can get AA versions of them.

Hi AlbacoreA, pls could you tell me the 13 inch notebook/laptop that you got. I have looked on the net but most do not have an optical drive. Thanks.

Its a Dell XPS M1330 I got from the Dell outlet a few years back. Basic spec, but with a 9 cell battery.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCeHxyGuED0
http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3826

I'm sure theres better ones these days. You might even get something 2nd hand from adverts.

Shaz said:

Thanks for the replies.

My initial plan was to get the portable dvd player to play a few kiddies dvds while in the airport. If I have these dvds, how do i put them on the netbook memory? What software would I need? How much memory would I need for a 30 mins dvd?

Click to expand...

Handbrake (google it) is excellent for ripping dvds to mp4 format which plays on computers and is free. However, depending on the power of the computer you are encoding with it can take a long time. It will take ages on a netbook, much less on a fast quad core desktop.
You can set the quality to whatever you want, and this will impact file size. For 30 min cartoons and suchlike, 75-100 mb (10-14 videos per gig) would be sufficient. I have some episodes of American Dad at 30mb for 20 mins, but the quality isn't great. I also rip movies for watching on laptops and other mobile devices, and I generally go for 700mb to a gig for a 2 hour movie. This gives a viewing quality that is basically the same as watching the original dvd.

More generally, a netbook will be far more versatile than a dvd player. There are opportunities for education, games and the like.