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Mandriva Joins the Netbook Market With the GDium
AdamWill writes "Lately it's hard to avoid the buzz about netbooks — the small, cheap laptop systems that were popularized by the Asus Eee PC. Mandriva is providing the innovative operating system for the upcoming GDium netbook system, produced by Emtec. The first GDium will be a netbook with a 10", 1024x600 resolution display and a battery life of four hours, weighing in at 1.1kg. The innovative G-Key system stores the Mandriva operating system and all the user data on a USB key — nothing is permanently stored inside the GDium. You can use your own desktop and data by plugging the G-Key into any GDium."
As I understand this, the root partition is stored on the machine's internal ROM. The user's home folder sits on the USB key, along with something that somehow links to /etc/passwd to provide authentication. The key is automatically mounted when inserted. Correct me if I'm wrong.
This doesn't sound particularly promising - it would be very easy to lose the key. I also fail to see why, when most ultra-sub-notebooks are bought by a person for their use, and their use only.
Also, will the home folder on the key be accessible when plugging into another computer, say, a desktop running OS X, Windows or another Linux distro? If so, it would kind-of defeat the object. Emtec would be entering the market very late, so they can't expect this to take the market by storm. If it doesn't, it kind-of defeats the object of sticking everything on a USB key.
Those using pirated Tinysoft signatures(TM) are a real threat to society and should all be thrown in jail.
These devices fit in the bag I use to and from work, and about 1-1.2kg extra doesn't bother me. A "normal" laptop doesn't fit with all the other stuff I carry around, and weigh too much. The size difference also means a great deal when traveling in terms of how much extra space I get in my carry on for other items (which means less likelihood of having to check in a bag, which means less time wasted at the airport, which makes me a hell of a lot happier about business travel)
Bear in mind that that pricing probably includes the VAT, which non-Europeans won't have to pay. That brings the price down a little closer to, say, an EEE 701 (I paid a little under $375CAD for my 701 including 5% GST). So if that price is correct, it's competitive with other netbooks. I might grab one just to have a MIPS machine to play with. I also installed Mandriva on my EEE and am quite happy with it, so that's icing on the cake.
This poo is cold.
Yeah, but at least they're becoming way more usable. The small low-res screen, shitty keyboard, low storage and relatively poor battery life made sure I wasn't getting myself the EEE 4G/700. Now Dell is coming up with the $299 "E" laptop which appears to be what the EEE should've been all along, and I'm rather interested.
No matter how many unpaid overtime hours the Chinese kids work, there still is a certain price floor at the current technological level. I'd be quite satisfied if they just kept improving the product at the current price range until it's feasible to go lower without producing something completely useless.
Very good point, surfing today takes a bit more power than ten years ago for sure. That's why I wanted to upgrade my backup machine, that PB1400m that is a 1997 model, just not enough processor or RAM to be of much use for much longer. Thankfully you can still get an iCab browser for it that works pretty fair. Thanks for the link to that new Dell review! Getting closer! I'm still going to hold out a bit longer though, joe cheap here, heh.