National cell-phone carriers including AT&T (NYSE: ATT), Sprint (NYSE: S) and Verizon (NYSE: VZ) have begun offering subsidized versions of small laptops called netbooks this season for the low price of $49.00. Although $49.00 sounds like a deal for a laptop with wireless 3G internet, it turns out that these offers are no deal at all

These subsidized notebooks come with a required contract of an over-priced data plan for two years. You’ll also pay significant overage fees if you use more of their data plan than they would like every month. Although you might save $200 on the up-front cost of a netbook, you could find yourself paying up to $1,500 total for a $300 product over the course of two years.

This new marketing push by AT&T, Verizon and Sprint is very similar to what AOL, Compuserve and others were doing in the 1990s when they offered an new computer in return for signing a three-year contract for dialup service.

If you want to get the best deal on a netbook over time, you will be better served by shopping at an online retailer, such as Amazon, Dell, or Newegg for a netbook and then purchasing internet service separately from a company that does not have a monthly bandwidth cap.