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Ubuntu and Kubuntu are essentially the same distro, except one was modified to use KDE as a "desktop environment" / frontend, and the other uses Gnome. Ubuntu was designed to be a simplistic distro for those migrating from MSWindows, so I don't find it surprising if they don't bother with any special configurations. However, I don't think this is the case here.

Though, if a hardware manufacturer won't give out specs, then it is not as if anyone in the Linux community can do much about it. If the manufacturer doesn't bother to release specs to Microsoft, and you have to download "some obscure third party hacked Matrox drivers," would you say it was Microsoft's fault? Probably not, because this is what you have to do on MSWindows all the time! If they didn't release drivers compatible with Vista, and this is what you had, would you blame MS or Matrox??? Shitheads implying MSWindows is better than Linux for this "reason" are idiots.

As for Matrox, it seems they don't care about development for Linux on the P650. Read this and suck it. Only Matrox can supply specs or drivers for what it creates. Sometimes people are able to reverse engineer ways to use hardware without specs. Sometimes the manufacturer uses standard interfaces, so drivers can still be made without specs, but who in their right mind would expect someone to magically be able to do this all the time?

If it is so fucking easy, why don't you do it, asshole? Spoiled pieces of shit always demand others do the impossible, but do nothing themselves. Why don't you just buy a video card which does what you want it to with the software you are using?

Why not run linux on the Mac Mini?

http://www.sowerbutts.com/linux-mac-mini/

But simply google for 'linux mac mini'. First hit is Installing Debian GNU/Linux on the Mac Mini, an easy to follow guide on how to set up Debian.

Oh, and BTW, a driver for the Broadcom chipset used by Airport Extreme is indeed available now!

People have been making mini itx boxes with the idea of compactness etc. before the Mac Mini came out.

Sure, but let's consider the target market of the Mini: those wanting to try out OS X and (grand)parents because it does what they need. There are no complete EPIA-based hardware+software+support solutions with anywhere near the price point or functionality of the Mini.

Integration could be done by a reseller, but you'd be going to them for support as well. The point is not whoever made a small computer first. Apple gives you reasonable hardware, the latest software, and support for $500.

Via had long before Mac Mini came out announced nano-ITX

Duke Nukem Forever has been announced for years, but it's not out either. Having a retail product that has already been shipping for months is something else entirely. As far as EPIAs go, no one has made a complete system and sold it with software and support anyway.

Apple cult followers will now always say it was Apple's idea to make PC's small.

It was Apple's idea to make small computers viable, and the success of the Mini proves it. The cappuccino has been around for years: http://www.cappuccinopc.com/cappuccino.asp ... but no one *I* know uses them.

The EPIAs are fun for experimentation (check out the custom cases on http://www.mini-itx.com/ but they're far from the complete solution that non-enthusiasts want.

Offtopic: Speaking of experimentation, I've been watching the Epia platform rather closely for the past half-year or so. I want to build a low power, quiet, SFF Linux file server and have been waiting for an Epia that would overcome some of the technical problems that older boards like the M/MII Epias had (lockups on DMA I/O, etc.). The newest Epia SP solves that, but is hard to find in stock, has crap Linux drivers, and costs around $250 without case, drives, PSU, or memory. With distros like Yellow Dog, Ubuntu, and Debian supporting almost everything in the Mini with the default install (http://www.sowerbutts.com/linux-mac-mini/#support ), it's hard for me to justify going with the Epia platform.

"The enterprise division is interested in promoting PowerPC, which is the hardware architecture, and Linux. Now that it doesn't have the PC division as an inhibitor, it can pursue those goals without conflict."

*Cough Cough*Mac Mini*Cough Cough* -> Linux on the Mac Mini

Well a summary anyway, at "the Linux for BeBox website".

Here's a quote...

"...Be only made about 1,800 BeBoxes, I believe, and they are rapidly becoming collector's items, so you'll have to move fast. Be produced two models, which were identical in all but the processors. The first model was the Dual603-66, which was powered by two PowerPC 603 CPUs, each operating at 66Mhz. The second model was the Dual603-133, which had two PowerPC 603e CPUs. Each of these ran at 133Mhz, and in addition had twice the level 1 cache size of the CPUs in the Dual603-66. Both models of BeBox have been criticised for the lack of a level 2 cache, but it was a simple engineering choice: the MPC105 (the memory controller, bus arbitrator and PCI bridge) could either support a single CPU and a level 2 cache, or two CPUs. The performance gains due to a level 2 cache were vastly outweighed by the performance boost from a second CPU. The CPUs are soldered directly to the motherboard; one cannot swap them for faster (or, if you were perverse enough) slower processors.

The BeBox has some amazing features. Firstly, it has both the ISA and PCI busses which are so common in the x86 PC world. This means that one can plug any standard PC peripheral into it. It also has both ATA (IDE) and SCSI 2 disk interfaces, with an external SCSI 2 port. It has a standard AT keyboard interface, a standard PS/2 mouse port, four standard 9-pin RS232 serial ports, four MIDI ports (two in and two out, for two channels), two standard PC joystick ports and 16 bit sound line in and out through RCA phono plugs and stereo minijacks for a microphone and headphones. It also has some more strange IO abilities; three InfraRed ports (for IR device control, not IrDA) and something known as the "GeekPort".

Plus, the BeBox has one amazingly impressive feature that no other machine in the world has. On the front bezel of the BeBox, there are two bar graphs made of green lights. Each graph represents the amount of work each CPU is doing - you can tell at a glance whether the application you're running is taxing the machine's processors or not. As they say, "We don't understand the software, and sometimes we don't understand the hardware, but we can see the blinking lights!"..."

in theory you could install linux on the bebox and then install MacOS using Mac-on-Linux but I have no idea whether it would work. It would also probably violate the MacOS EULA, if you care.