MANILA, Philippines – It seems netbooks, the jack-of-all-trades machines that provided consumers with a cost-effective alternative to high-powered laptops, are heading off into the sunset.

According to an AFP report published by Yahoo, Acer and Asus will be ceasing production of netbooks in 2013. Acer and Asus are the last two remaining manufacturers of netbooks, and their statements signal the end of netbook production.

Netbooks were once heralded as the next wave of computing, providing greater portability and sufficient capability to handle many common work tasks.

The development of lighter high-end laptops and the advent of tablets’ popularity, however, contributed greatly to the netbook’s decline as manufacturers switched from netbook development to creating their own tablets. – Rappler.com