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Linux Rescues Battery Life On Vista Notebooks From Dell
nerdyH writes "Dell is preparing to ship two enterprise-oriented Windows Vista notebooks with an interesting feature — a built-in TI OMAP (smartphone) processor that can power instantly into Linux. The 'Latitude ON' feature is said to offer 'multi-day' battery life, while letting users access email, the web, contacts, calendar, and so on, using the notebook's full-size screen and keyboard. I wonder if someday we'll just be able to plug our phones into our laptops, switching to the phone's processor when we need to save battery life? Or, maybe x86 will just get a lot more power-efficient. Speaking at MontaVista's Vision event today, OLPC spokesperson and longtime kernel hacker Deepak Saxena said the project is aiming for 10-20 hours of battery life during active use, on existing hardware (AMD Geode LX800 clocked at 500MHz, with 1GB of Flash and 256MB of RAM)."
Well, I hope it's at least damn pretty, cause being the runner up to "the real os" isn't really something to be proud of. But if its flashy enough, then people will like it and will increase their opinion of linux. Then again... is it going to say its Linux?
Modding Trolls +1 inciteful since 1999
... when IBM PCs had BASIC in ROM which you could start instantly and (in theory) do some sort of work with without booting DOS. No bad thing IMO.
A LOT of people by a PC just to access email or the web. If they can do all this with an OS that starts instantly too , why will they want Vista? Time for MS to sweat possibly?
Going out on a limb here, but I suspect the use of a mobile phone processor contributed a teeny bit more to the improved battery life than the Linux. (FWIW, I don't see any statistically significant battery life difference between Xubuntu and Vista Business on my own machine, but that's another story.)
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
but without all that legacy x86 crap.
... you just need a very very big battery. Rather than quoting run time on battery we should probably start reporting the average power draw of the system idle and under full load.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
Given the Geode is x86, this could quite easily run XP and would likely achieve a similar battery life. It just wouldn't be instant on.
It's also an incredibly expensive solution that'll add weight and bulk to the laptop. If this kind of thing is important to you, get a PDA or smartphone.
... unless there is a tux logo displayed somewhere, this will do zero, absolutely zero, to help Linux get anywhere in terms of recognition.
Does the OMAP3 just share the hardware like battery, display, keyboard, usb, wifi, harddrive with the rest? Will it have access to everything?
If yes, then it would be possible to only use the OMAP and not those powersucking intel chipset and processor anymore. This would be awesum as this would be the perfect combination of powersaving processor (the intel atom chipset draws way to much power) and big keyboard/display/battery!
Oh and why did't netbook manufactures use OMAP3 yet? The power is okay for email+browsing, it's cheaper and battery life is better compared to the intel atom+chipset. Only because it's not x86 and windows will not run on it???
...you are aware that a good proportion of Windows Mobile devices run on OMAP processors, right? Like the venerable HTC Wizard etc?
How about putting a solar array on a notebook case/cover that could power your laptop and any other items such as cell phones and music players?
Seeing that batteries are a very limited resource, how about having the option to use the unlimited power of the sun?
It also has a dual benefit of forcing you to get out of your parent's basement every so often.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
I wonder if someday we'll just be able to plug our phones into our laptops, switching to the phone's processor when we need to save battery life?
That would be silly. Why not plug your foldable self-powered screen/keyboard thing into your "phone" when you need more pixels or want to type something long?
Okay mister Anonymous Crackpot, you along with so many others realize that. What would you have us do about it? Oh, you haven't gotten that far yet? Ah, my apologies. Let me know when you figure that out. I would be very interested to find out myself.
Yeah, I feed the trolls. Can't help myself. Sorry.
The interesting part, from my point of view, is that a free OS like Linux may foster the development of non-x86 binary architectures with different strengths.
I said this before: I would love to see a notebook chip with multiple ARM (or OMAP, or MIPS or whatever) cores that could be powered up and down depending on demand and desired power consumption.
The fact such machine would be completely Windows-proof would be a nice plus.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
Mod Parent +1 batshit crazy
If Dell wanted to save battery life on their Vista notebooks, why didn't they just integrate sideshow in their laptops? It comes with the OS and has a lot of plugins to choose from.
I know it's not a full blown OS, but outside of web surfing it does most of the functions of this system with even less power usage because of it's smaller screen.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
I can just see the commercials now. Dell is going to have to hire a guy to walk around with a laptop saying "Can you hear me now?"
It won't take long for people to learn they are NOT running a Microsoft product. For the moment, it makes sense to keep the Linux name out of the picture. Too many people mistakenly believe they need Windows. Once they realize that almost everything they need is available via the quickie instant-boot OS, then they can start to think about what is really running behind the scenes.
This is a nightmare scenario for MS. The closest thing they have to an instant-on OS is Windows Mobile, which was ever known for its stability (or Windows compatibility for that matter).
While Linux does not have to be compatible with anything except the Internet, MS is expected to run any product released since Windows 98 while placing a security band-aid on every vulnerability of each product.
As I write this (on an XP machine), McAfee Anti-virus is consuming 115mb of memory, with 250k page faults and 486 million read I/O operations. The machine has been on for less than an hour. Outlook is using 179mb of memory. Those two apps have already eaten more than the 256mb mentioned in the article. MS has nothing to offer in the world of lightweight apps. Kind of silly when you consider how simple the underlying protocols really are.
This TI processor is the same one used in the pandora box that was on slashdot the other day.
I'd like one without the x86 and without Vista, please.
According to the TI manual, it will do 40bit fixpoint mul as well, apparently for the sole reason that this is what is needed for implementing a quality vocoder? .. Hey, that is what I would like to call /sound/ engineering! :-D
send + more == money?
But seriously, when sleep actually works as advertised..... Why the fuck would you ever want to shut down?
Hum... increased battery life ?
Also while hibernating & powering off between usages spares more battery than maintaining the system on sleep, it doesn't solve the problem of battery usage *while* the system is up.
Whereas the Linux solution, besides being cool because it's Linux, is also really interesting because it runs on a separate low power TI OMAP hardware platform (like the recently featured Pandora gaming console, like the Beagle Board, or more mundane like the iPhone).
and *that* is something that is much less likely to drain your batteries than a full x86 platform running a full vista in all it's glory.
It brings a whole new level to dual boot : not only you switch OS and environment but even the CPU & GPU on which the OS is running.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
I'd probably opt for something else entirely.
Which operating system can run a complete desktop solution with web, mail, chat, word-processing and a few other task ? with support for complete support for LAN, Wifi, tons of USB pluggable peripherals and full screen with windowing ? On a low power *NON*-x86 chip ?
And is already used and deployed as such and will require minimal tuning (some branding at most ?)
Ok let's build a list :
and, huh... that's it.
Mac OS X ? Sorry when they ported it to the iPhone they stipped aways huge portions of the user interface. And without it UI, OS/X is just a boring BSD. Beside, Apple will never allow anyone running OS X on anything but Mac sanctionned hardware (on the other hand, now that the OMAP/x86 hybrid have appear on PC, you can bet that Apple will be quick to improve their ARM verions of OSX for similar and much better integrated hybrids)
Windows CE ? Supports OMAP and some of the basic tasks. But lacks support for tons of USB and other hardware for which drivers will have to be written. In short you *could* use it for the Web/Mail tasks, but nothing else, unless you throw several programmers at the task of writing all the missing apps & drivers.
PalmOS ? Well.... Seriously there have been some not widely known netbook in the past, and there was the cancelled Voleo ultra light laptop. But that's it.
Windows XP/Vista ? Hahahaha.... what a joke ! Have you ever seen it able to run on the required CPU ? Sorry these are x86 only (with the exception of some Itanium support).
Vendor opted to Linux because it's already mature and proven for this kind of usage, with drivers and applications already ready for the task.
The only thing left to do are branding and tuning (making a monolithic kernel for better boot time).
Anything else would have required much more development.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
It is worth bearing in mind that Linux is not an operating system.
Context, my friend.
When I say, "bear with me a moment", do you run off because you think that a bear is following me?
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
I'd rather plug my phone module into my PDA when I want a smart phone, or leave it in the dumb phone jacket to save power the rest of the time.
Been doing that for year between my PalmOS PDA and an antique GPRS phone.
Except they don't plug physically into each other but use bluetooth instead.
Why not plug your foldable self-powered {...}keyboard thing into your "phone"
Keybaords made by Stowaway/iGo/ThinkOutside. Except for the screen part, it's exactly has you suggest.
The phone module for the Visor was going to be a step in that direction, but Handspring had corporate ADD.
The saddest thing is that currently in most smart phones, the Phone portion is handled by a separate chip with its own RISC processor - a magic box which takes care of everything and speaks with "ATxx" style commands to the rest.
So technically ALL current smartphones are PDA + separate phone. You just can't physically separate them.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Given the high correlation between crackpot posts and spelling errors, we could probably devise an automatic "batshit crazy" category.
Why is it that nut cases can't spell? Or is it that they think the spell checker is the work of the government and turning it on allows them to spy?
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Just yesterday I successfully booted angstrom linux on my beagleboard I received from digikey.com. The beagleboard costs $149 and uses a TI OMAP processor and sounds quite similar to what Dell is doing. The beagleboard uses 2 Watts of power when running.
"Or, maybe x86 will just get a lot more power-efficient."
Umm, have you heard of the Intel Atom? The biggest mill wheel around the neck of that processor is that there is no power-efficient chipset for the laptop/desktop-class processors (the 945 chipset is an absolute dog in terms of power consumption). The processors targetted at the netbook/mobile market have a very good support chipset by contrast.
For reference, the N270 has a TDP of 2W which is pretty power-efficient in my book :-)
I wonder if someday we'll just be able to plug our phones into our laptops, switching to the phone's processor when we need to save battery life
I hope not, I certainly don't want to be at the mercy of my phone company for something like that.
I take it you're not a U2 fan, are you?
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
"You know, sleep does a number on your pc. So, what's YOUR PC's sleep number?" (not brought to you by SleepTrain)
http://www.sleeptrain.com/page.aspx?nid=91
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
I agree. The easiest thing you can do for Software Freedom is to refuse to make or support infringing copies of proprietary software.
Dell is saying that Vista is all but unusable on laptops. Most straight-laced normal business type people are allergic to computers that aren't "Microsoft" so they build two laptops in one. One is useless and runs Vista (runs hot, drains the batteries quickly, is slow etc.) and the other is a very small and efficient one that runs a proper OS.
It's like sewing a cute little kitten onto the side of a fat, asthmatic, lethargic old dog on it's last legs.
No one ever went broke by underestimating the intelligence of the PHB or marketing consultant.
I wish I'd thought of it.
Stick Men
On the surface, this is a really good idea.
But from a practical standpoint, I don't see any real benefit. Likely, anyone that needs instant and practically always-on email/Web access would have a smartphone; thereby reducing their need for the laptop to act as a smartphone.
But then, maybe this will help folks realize how much bloat and crap there is in operating systems, and how precious little is really needed to access Internet services.
Message contains 1 attachment: spam.gif
If newbies and windows-worn-out users can be shown enough of Linux to go "ooh"/"ahh", then it's time for the various Linux/Open Source Software hosting sites to embed feedback and usage links or make it more open if such links exist. Then, when users USE the apps, then should be asked to give feedback not to the original developer alone, but to an IBM/HP/Sun-sponsored entity that takes the most well-thought out/well-regarded apps and sponsor the developer/s of the apps to either afford to work more on them, or to bring in additional help to help enhance the app, but ensure helping it keep the shine and allure it started out with. Not the shine and allure seen by GEEKS, but by less gifted, daily users. GUI/UI quirks, limited functionality, strange behaviors, and so on could be dealt with faster.
The Linux distros have many of these feedback channels, but i can't help but wonder about the limited resources and lack of time possessed by the many well-meaning people who give us useful apps. But, the professionally-polished apps cost more money, have many restrictions, and the closed-source apps can often be so controlled by the owners that it could be one or 2 subsequent years before users get the stability or features they seek.
But, honestly, too, we collectively need to stop parroting that "Linux has more and freer and stabler and more functional apps than windows users could ever hope for".... That's true for SOME apps. Open Office, Celestia, Filelight, Guarddog, Firestarter, to name a few. But many still look like they are from the 70's or 80's, have constrictive interfaces, weird file exploration methods, and marginal usefulness. App comparisons need to be permanently linked online so that users who shouldn't be disappointed can have better, more realistic expectations. Otherwise, people will lose that ooh and all feel.
As for me, I'm using on my Gateway P-6301 laptop with 128 MB of video RAM, with 2 GB system RAM with 2 hard disks and 17" display (weight in at around 8.6 lbs), Mandriva PowerPack 2008.0, VirtualBox, and vista. I'm ONLY using vista because I cannot yet get used to CAD Schroer (though it's nice they made a Linux version), can't get Punch! ViaCAD in Linux, and have a number of other windows-based apps that have no Linux VERSION. I like that Celtx and StoryLines have Linux versions. I don't say "counterpart", as I don't want' a crippled/semi-functional knock-off. When i find a windows-based app i like, then I want ALL that functionality.
So, maybe we can try to cajole IBM to starting a merit pool for CAD and gamer companies to make a case for or tell that they've been "tapped" with a prize/award of $xxx,xxx.00 to in under 6 months bring to Open Source a product several users claim will be a HIT in Linux. Charge for support, but don't intentionally mire the app for income-generation purposes. It wouldn't be different than or any lower than what msoft goes to to keep developers hooked on mscode.
My suggestions:
Lotus SmartSuite ....
Punch! ViaCAD
Delftship
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
It is worth bearing in mind that Linux is not an operating system.
Context, my friend.
When I say, "bear with me a moment",
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! *Runs off*
Celio Redfly
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
FYI, the Redfly "smart phone terminal" is trying to fill this niche with its 800x480 screen and netbook-size keyboard ( http://www.celiocorp.com ).
Having dropped from $500 to $200 (supposedly only til the end of this month...), it might be getting some traction with mobile types who don't want to quite go the netbook route.
As a dumb terminal, it seems to be a few steps "below" the defunct Palm Foleo (think Palm shot themselves in the foot by not unleashing its full Linux potential and beating Asus to the punch...), but its specialization just might work for a certain niche - it can run 8 hours and power the phone in the process.
ROC