Notebook sales are soaring... .no wonder. I'm Fred Fishkin with Bloomberg Bootcamp. While desktop computer sales have remained pretty steady... .the biggest gains have been in the notebook market. Why? Prices are a lot more reasonable than they used to be. And they can do everything a desktop can do... .at home, in the office or on the road. Toshiba's Steven Andler says the latest models in the 28 hundred series can not only play DVD movies... they give you the rich sound from the movies too... .

"And actually the 28 hundred series is a multimedia platform and includes a new standard of sound quality including a subwoofer and two main speakers so it's got that dynamic range you expect of a home stereo." A subwoofer in a notebook? "Absolutely. We're kind of used to marginal sound in notebooks but this one really sets a new standard for playing movies or listening to music."

In fact... more and more college students are using notebook computers in classrooms as well as dorm rooms. And they're a whole lot easier to transport back and forth from home... than a desktop PC. The 28 hundred series prices start at about seventeen hundred dollars. At the high end, Toshiba's Tecra series speed along at up to 850 Mhz. The price zooms up too... to about 43 hundred dollars...

"Portables are about trade-offs. And so the reason we have such diversity in their product line is so that we can find the right set of trade-offs for people."

You can find more information at Toshiba.com. Bootcamp, I'm Fred Fishkin, Bloomberg Radio.