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$200 Linux PCs On Sale At Wal-Mart
Placid sends in a Wired blog entry on Wal-Mart's new sub-$200 Linux-based PC. Wired calls it "a custom distribution of Ubuntu Linux," and the AP identifies the distro as gOS, made by a small company in Los Angeles. Wal-Mart began selling Linux PCs in 2002 but they have been out of stock for a while. From the Wired blog: "It has a 1.5 Ghz VIA C7 CPU embedded in a Mini-ITX motherboard, 512MB of RAM and an 80GB hard drive. Normally, this would simply mark it as unacceptably low-end for use with modern software. By using the fast Enlightenment desktop manager (instead of heavier-duty alternatives like Gnome or KDE), the makers say it's more responsive than Vista is, even on more powerful computers."
I saw this yesterday and was considering if it would as the next pc for my parents. I don't think so - for one reason, powerpoint. But my folks might be a little unusual with that requirement. I also wonder if my dad could sync his palm to it.
Then we'd need to make sure that their printers are going to work all right. And I'd probably need to teach them how to use new software for printing photos. The more I think about it, as much as I hate to say it, the less I think it would work.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
What is this "modern" software they speak of? Just how much horsepower do you need to browse the Web, type something in a word processor? Is there some sort of super Solitaire with realtime physics simulation and ray traced graphics that I don't know about?
How much precisely will you pay to have your UI look like glass and all your games run at the highest resolutions? I think we're approaching the point where only avid gamers & people with too much disposable income will support the ladened OS that is Windows.
My work here is dung.
This seems like a great machine to use for backups and file storage on a home network. Just replace the 80GB hard drive with a bigger one (if necessary), and you have an extremely cheap file server.
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This isn't the sig you're looking for. Move along.
Great! Now more people want help on the linux forums.
Why UNIX?
These computers are in cases that would fit a full-size ATX motherboard. Supposedly Wallmart did a survey, and found that most of their customers believe "Bigger is Better", even when it isn't. It is not a terrible deal given that it's a mini-ATX motherboard, but using that big a case for it is just wasting space.
Even better than that, the computers being sold as 'green PC' meaning thats the mfr's product name, and has nothing to do with being enviromentally conscious.
Probably quite power-efficient with that chipset so long as they have a recent (tickless) kernel in it, such as with Gutsy, though I would like a little more memory for one of my apps:
http://www.earth.org.uk/low-power-laptop.html
Might also do nicely as an off-the-shelf monitoring device for networks, HVAC, etc...
If they sell one at a similar price here I might buy one to play with.
Rgds
Damon
http://m.earth.org.uk/
Unacceptably low-end for modern software? Huh? I do some development at home, but other than that nearly all of my time is spent either reading email or surfing the web. Neither is particularly heavy.
And I'm happy with my bottom-end MicroCenter PCs that cost under $300, even with the development work. I did double the memory to 1GB, but that was the only change for two years. (Last week I decided to add a low-end NVIDIA card.)
I'll grant you that it's not a great choice for playing movies, and would undoubtably suck as a game platform, but for a lot of people that system would easily satisfy their needs and is far more affordable than the crap I've seen pushed at the same market -- get a 'name brand' pc for only $19.99/week for a year!
So is it for everyone? No. Is it a good choice for a lot of people? Yes.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Will the hardware makers do what they have to to make sure the project fails by installing the worst software Linux has to offer and a broken configuration like they usually do?
Not to go off on a rant but my #1 pet peeve with software, especially anything from Microsoft, is all the hardware gains of the past 20 years are lost of bad software. Whether due to bad design (feature bloat) or bad execution, Vista and MS Office on current consumer hardware aren't any more responsive than Win 3 and Word or AmiPRO or whatever was running back in the day.
There was a /. story recently linking to a web log article about security analysis. The author, an employee of Microsoft, made a ridiculously inane comment about developers responding to users' requests. Really made me want to kick the guy in the nads. Does he really think users want to upgrade to faster CPUs and larger hard drives to benefit developers rather than themselves?
When MS Office 2k7 was in beta and the PR push was on for the new menu system, I read an analysis by MS of MS Office apps and their menus over the years. The space taken up by menu bars was listed as number of pixels and as a percentage of the typical screen size. The message was, although menus had grown in absolute size, the percentage of the typical screen had stayed the same. Like that was a good thing.
For the obligatory automotive analogy, would people take advantage of the improvements in engine design, lighter materials, etc. by buying large trucks rather than getting improved fuel efficiency with cars of the same size?
Nevermind.
Normally, this would simply mark it as unacceptably low-end for use with modern software. By using the fast Enlightenment desktop manager (instead of heavier-duty alternatives like Gnome or KDE), the makers say it's more responsive than Vista is, even on more powerful computers.
You're taking an underpowered machine, with a non-standard desktop, OS and software, and selling it to what is likely the least tech knowledgeable market that you can find.
a) Sell crappy Linux box to unsupecting mark.
b) Mark can't figure out why it isn't like every other computer
c) Mark can't make $9.99 computer game install
d) Mark can't make MS Word document open.
e) Profit?
Ever consider that there was a reason why Wal-Mart's last cheapo Linux PC has been "out of stock" for so long? It's because they can't sell them without having them returned.
Three Squirrels
I ordered a Wal-Mart Linux PC. I'm using it for a backup server at home right now.
This was back in 2002 or 2003. It was $200, only available by mail-order, and came with a CD-ROM drive and single hard disk (20GB?). I picked up a crummy CRT at the local second-hand computer store and started exploring Linux. I replaced the hard drive with a removable hard drive bracket.
It took me a while to figure out that the CD reader had subtle errors (after 3 different distributions of Linux failed to install) and replaced that too. The thing was, the smaller box (is that called mini-ITX?) would only fit the very smallest CD drives, and both my new CD RW and the removable hard drive bracket protruded out the front in a rather ugly way.
The thing came with Lindows (as it was called at the time). I tried it for 10 minutes and then replaced it with "Pink Tie" Linux, then Mandrake 8.1, then LibraNet Linux. (I tried Debian, too, but that "dselect" thing is way too cryptic.)
Looks like Wal-Mart is back with more PC's for the people. That's great. It will bring more visibility to Ubuntu, and Linux in general. And that's the point of the whole thing: to let Linux have more visibility so that manufacturers, and people in general, won't say, "Hey, we don't have to make our video player compatible with Linux because nobody uses Linux."
404555974007725459910684486621289147856453481154 in hex is "You sank my Battleship?"
[GPG key in journal]
You're looking for avant-window-navigator. Be warned that it won't work without Compiz running.
"I think an etch-a-sketch with an ethernet port would beat IE7 in web standards compliance."
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883114030
Here is one of your cheapest alternatives on the market
Brand eMachines
Model W3609
Recommended Usage Home / Home Office
Processor Intel Celeron D 356(3.33GHz)
Processor Main Features 64 bit Processor
Cache Per Processor 512KB L2 Cache
Memory 512MB DDR2 533
Hard Drive 120GB SATA 7200rpm
Optical Drive 1 DVD±RW 16x Multiformat Dual-Layer Optical Drive
Graphics Intel GMA 950 Up to 224MB Shared Video Memory
Audio 6-channel (5.1) high-definition audio
Ethernet Intel 10/100Mbps Ethernet LAN
Speaker Amplified Stereo Speakers (USB-Powered)
Keyboard Standard multifunction keyboard
Mouse 2-button wheel mouse
Operating System Windows Vista Home Basic
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Jack Tramail of Atari and Commodore used to say that $200 is a sweet spot for consumers
"Computers for the Masses, not the classes"
Wait, what?
The desktop that they're showing in the screenshots (Enlightenment + Some File Manager + Some Dock App) is as full featured as any common desktop system today, and it should be able to compete at bling as well. Going with XFCE probably would have been better-integrated, but to noob users this system will look as good as a Mac (and thus *look* better than Vista).
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
They should really have used Ubuntu and XFCE.
I like Enlightenment, but it is VERY different than Windows, and not completely intuitive. For example the icon bar (like a task list) defaults to being able to go under things (in Ubuntu anyway). Also, no start button and no files on the desktop.
XFCE works very close to gnome or Windows and looks great. Stuff saves to the Desktop, it has a start button and a task bar. No autoflip on screen edge (by default) no multi-view ports (by default at least). Using enlightenment almost to me sounds like designed failure. I would think a slightly sluggish Gnome or KDE would give a better impression.
I also think the biggest thing would be a lighter-weight (than Firefox) but still highly site compatible (like Firefox) web browser would help. On my system (that uses Gnome) Firefox is the biggest memmorey hog. I also have a Celeron 3.4GHz with 512 MB of ram. I installed Xubuntu, but also some Gnome and KDE apps. Firefox is using 125MB of RAM. My SWAP is at 400MB used of 800MB. I am using XFCE and as long as no super Flash site comes up things run fairly well, though there is definite lag in the Google Apps, they are functional.
I like Enlightenment, but it is just too unixy for the complete novice I think.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
I think I can punch it up to a gig of memory if memory serves me right. Can't remember off the top of my head what model number the motherboard is, I've had it for like 3 years...
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
A couple of months ago, before my 2 ghz XP box went kaput, I would have judged this Wal Mart offering as anemic.
The backstory:
Trash in our neighborhood is picked up early Friday. I was out for a 'round the block smoke-walk late one Thu night and came upon an old HP Vectra VL on the curb with the other trash. I thought "what the hell and loaded the heavy PC and keyboard onto my shoulder. When I got home, I plugged it in and found it to be a 333 mhz box with Win98, and it worked. I played around with it a little and then put it in hallway, where it became the favorite perch of Ernie (my cat).
A couple of months later the HD and mobo fried on my 2ghz XP box. I had everything replicated and backed up on a USB drive, so I saved my data. I put Ubuntu on the Vectra and it runs great for a machine with such out of date specs. Of course it is slower and less reponsive than my original PC, but there are some functions (changing the desktop resolution, for example) that are considerably snappier even on the outdated equipment.
I have installed Linux/X on several machines through the years but the latest install from Ubuntu (7.04, now 7.1) was by far the smoothest. If I hadn't lost my XP box, I wouldn't have appreciated what can be accomplished on an older system with better software.
Wal Mart is evil, but I might just have to go over to the dark side and grab that $200 PC.
The sacred and the propane
"It has a 1.5 Ghz VIA C7 CPU embedded in a Mini-ITX motherboard, 512MB of RAM and an 80GB hard drive. Normally, this would simply mark it as unacceptably low-end for use with modern software."
You've got to be f-ing kidding me.
That is nonsense. the author has been talking to sales people and/or the microsoft vista team.
That is double the spec you need for XP with office-like software and broadband Internet multimedia stuff.
The latest games and vista are the only "modern software" for which those specs are inadequate.
And that is only because games can always use more power and are thus coded for the latest and greatest equipment.
(I can't explain vista)
PC's aren't generally that useful without a screen, maybe headline should have read 1/2 a pc for $200?
The OLPC is not mainly a giveaway, anywhere. It's an enterprise device designed to meet the neds of a particular industry, i.e., national education systems in the developing world. There are some "giveaway" projects, and some investigation of one government buying them for another, but the principal focus is selling them directly to the governments that would integrate them into their national education system.
OLPC, despite the cries of some (including numerous slashdotters) who would like it to, is not competing in the American retail market. Sure, there is a limited fundraising effort in direct sales in the U.S. loosely analogous to, say, a PBS pledge drive that offers a gift with a specified donation, but no effort at mass retail sale of the XO in the U.S.
The XO has not gotten more expensive. The XO ended up more expensive than it was hoped to be. There is a difference. You can't get more expensive before you have an actual price, rather than a price goal.
The operating system of the XO is an equally real version of Linux.
Why? What Wal*Mart is selling is more expensive than the XO and lacks many of the key features that were identified as essential to the XO project. Why does the existence of a product that is both more expensive and doesn't meet the goals of the XO project indicate that the OLPC project should abandon the suppliers it has and the highly specialized machine that it has developed?
Your comments suggest that you imagine that there is a battle between OLPC and for-profit groups to make sub-$200 PCs that meet a need in the first-world retail market. There is not. While some of the technologies advanced through the OLPC project may eventually have some effect on the first world retail market (and, indeed, the project itself may have played a role in spurring the very demand that Wal*Mart and others are now meeting in that market), the market the OLPC project is addressing and the market this Wal*Mart product is targeting are completely different markets.
There are certainly efforts by for-profit companies to fight the OLPC for the kind of large-scale sales to public educational institutions in the developing world that the OLPC is targeting, particularly from hardware and software vendors for whom large-scale adoption of the XO in education might, in the long-run, pose a threat to their present market dominance. But those are completely unrelated to this Wal*Mart product.
"I miss my Garfield cursor. This thing can't even run Bonzai Buddy. And what am I going to do without Weather Bug? Worst machine ever. I'm going back to Windows."
I just read Slashdot for the articles.
I agree that ubuntu is much easier to use than debian potato, or woody (released in 2002). However, they certainly predate any ubuntu release. I use ubuntu and kubuntu on almost all of my machines, but I would be cautious in attributing all the development in linux to ubuntu. They are simply pulling together other people's work....although that is what disto makers do, and maybe the word "simply" is inappropriate there. =)
Adept is sponsored by Canonical. Synaptic predates ubuntu and in fact was started by Conectiva. Aptitude apparently dates all the way back to 1999. (all info from wikipedia)
Building a healthy future; Connecting communities
The real story is that five years after Wal-mart started selling linux PC's online...they are still selling them online, not in-store. That's the real story, and it still shows that linux isn't ready for general idiot consumer use, because well, wal-mart employees still don't know what linux is and hilarity would insue at most wal-marts when their employees try to explain that the computer doesn't have windows, but that the employee doesn't know if x game that specifically says it's for windows only will run on the $200 pc.
Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007 - retail version
"The software is not licensed for use in any commercial, non-profit, or
revenue-generating business activities."
So only use it for homework or family use. DO NOT use it for charities, churches, working at home, etc.
The good part is that you can legally install it on 3 computers at home.
"But then what do you want for $200?"
A problem too is that consumers who are unfamiliar with *nix will not jump in and think, "Oh, well, this distribution and hardware is alright and decent for $200, I wonder what a more feature-filled distribution with better hardware would be like?" Rather, they'll think, "this Linux thing is adequate for $200, but it's in no way a competitor to Windows."
Maybe a comparison could be made between Linux distributions, and different versions of Windows... except then my parents would ask, "well, what's the latest one?" The confusion to my parents arises with such different distributions all being under the "Linux" umbrella.