Best RSS Reader for Netbooks

As we all know, Netbooks lack the screen real estate that larger PC’s have. Sure you can plugin an external monitor to help out, but when you are mobile you don’t have that luxury.

I’ve sampled a lot of RSS Readers in my time, most fit for the basics of RSS subscription and aggregation but only a few really stand out of the crowd. Add in the needs of the mobile blogger / tech writer and you have an even harder task on hand, if you are a blogger constantly on the go then having a robust RSS Reader is essential.

So lets delve into the world of RSS Readers for Netbooks.

Google Reader

This is an excellent RSS reader for on the go for most laptop and cross-platform but is good for netbooks? Lets take a look.

On the plus side Google Reader does indeed fit the bill for portability, not requiring installation other than a current version browser and the much needed internet connection.

You can also use this offline with an installation of Google Gears and of course if you use Google Chrome then you can install the Google Reader Notifier Extension to know when new items are available.

Reading articles on the small screen with Google Reader is pretty good, especially if your browser has an excellent full screen mode.

To be accurate, Google Reader is a web app pretending to be a traditional desktop reader, it contains features that usually only desktop readers would have.

On the netbook it is as nimble as your current internet connection is, so waiting for content to load isn’t a problem, there are some UI elements which could be smaller such as the subscriptions sidebar width, it would also be nice to be able to minimize or remove the items listed in the sidebar that you don’t always need.

Pros: Google reader is fast, clean and built for usability.

Cons: A few UI flaws that need to be updated.

RSS Owl

RSS Owl has been around for a long time, longer even than Google’s offerings in fact.

First released in 2004, it has a lifetime of development to make it a strong RSS reader. Where it differs from Google Reader is this is a desktop solution, software that has been written exclusively in Java.

Although being a desktop application it is available for Windows, Mac OS X and a variety of Linux flavors.

RSS Owl is a great desktop reader, its interface is clean and uncluttered, plenty of options for the avid RSS reader and being written in Java its nice and snappy when downloading new feed content.

However on a netbook the only useful feed viewer setting is the newspaper view. Best of all though is that it comes in a portable flavor, meaning you can throw it on a USB drive and off you go.

Syncing is amazing with RSS Owl, the developers really have made it easy to sync from a wide range of sources, Google Reader, OPML and a plethora of others.

The wide and vertical views are not good on the small screen as you cannot read the post titles.

The one great saving viewing feature however is the tabbed views your open feeds is a great way to switch between each feed.

Pros: Quick, clean and useful and syncs to a wide range of sources including Google Reader. Portable version available.

Cons: Limited options for small screen space.

FeedDemon

FeedDemon is an enormously popular RSS reader, its also a reader that has been with us for a long time.

Originally being developed for Newsgator as paid software with online subscription features from Newsgator.com, fast forward a few years and it became freeware with feed syncing  to Google Reader.

FeedDemon looks great on the small screen, lots of space for your feeds to occupy, minimizing subscription pane, tiny header pane makes this all a joy to use.

FeedDemon has an amazing array of features that will keep even the most addicted RSS junkie happy.

On the downside, feed syncing is fairly slow, even with just a few feeds on a fast connection, so a large number of feeds would slow the process down considerably.

Another downside is that without hacks you can’t use the official build of FeedDemon as a portable app (mind you I’m sure the more industrious of you would find a portable version somewhere).

Finally and understandably it is ad supported. Going from paid software to freeware is a hard task, the ads are unobtrusive but still niggle at the senses while reading your favorite feed.

Pros: Probably the best reading experience from a downloadable client

Cons: Slow feed syncing, no portable version, it is ad supported.

FeedReader

FeedReader may appear to be one of the weaker of the RSS readers available for desktop use.

Its basic, really basic, but that might not be too bad.

FeedReader is really a bare bones reader, it has simple and functional features without providing a full on RSS reading experience like something like FeedDemon provides. No options to gather data from external online readers like Google Reader, it does have an import feature for OPML files so you can at least export your feeds from another source or sync from FTP / OPML hosted remotely.

The biggest drawback is that you need to add each feed manually to the reader, FeedReader does have auto-discovery which works for the most part but fails sometimes with websites that offer multiple feeds.

It comes in both installable and portable flavors to keep both worlds happy.

Pros: Terribly lightweight, great reading pane size.

Cons: Manual feed input, no syncing to online readers.

The Verdict

Really its up to you in the end, these 4 options are by no means the only on offer, feed tickers and other methods to get your RSS fix are available in droves.

If you have another reader you love to use on your netbook or have other alternatives for RSS reading, hit the comments to let me know!

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