Months prior to the original Eee PC launch, IT hacks were talking about sub-$200 netbooks that could change computing on the go for peanuts.

Of course, as soon as vendors realized they could make money on these toys, the market degenerated into showroom for nearly identical, overpriced netbooks based on Intel's brilliant yet very boring Atom CPU. Two years and a recession later, consumers will finally be able to get a brand new Atom netbook at just $199, courtesy of Black Friday.

Target is offering Acer's 10.1-inch Aspire One with Windows XP for $199 in a limited Black Friday deal. It's nothing spectacular, Atom N270, 1GB of memory and 160GB of storage, but it's still a very good deal. You can get it here.

However, going cheap doesn't mean you have to go ugly. You're not in a bar. Hhhregg is selling Asus' gorgeous Eee PC 1005HA for $199, and it's quite a bit more stylish than the Acer.

We're pretty sure a Google search will yield quite a few $199 Black Friday netbook offers, so we won't bore you with all of them. However, if this isn't cheap enough, bear in mind that several retailers will also offer similar models for $149, although the offers will be much more limited.

Frankly, we see no point in getting pricey, feature packed netbooks anyway. If you want a netbook, go for the cheapest ones, as that's the whole philosophy behind the netbook market anyways.