ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Share

Charbax writes "Last April, Microsoft argued that it controlled the netbook OS market for devices sold in certain Microsoft-friendly US retail stores, while ABI Research claims that Linux actually has 32% of the worldwide netbook market, and that its market-share is growing. At the recent Netbook World Summit in Paris France, Aaron J. Seigo, Community leader at the KDE Foundation, and Arnaud Laprévote, CTO at Mandriva Linux, give us their estimation for next year's Linux market share (video) in the consumer laptop market. Their estimation is that Linux will dominate in ARM-powered laptops and that those may take over a significant share of the overall laptop market by their significantly cheaper prices (as low as $80), longer battery life (as long as 20-40 hours on a small battery using the Pixel Qi screens), as well as lower size and weight. Running some of the Chromium OS builds for ARM available shortly and having a full browser experience on those cheaper and better ARM-powered Linux laptops could make it a significant mass market success to shake up the Intel and Microsoft consumer PC/laptop monopoly in its boots."

Comments

ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Share

[omar.sahal]

Like I heard some kids say last year, I would rather have a crap laptop with the internet than a nice laptop without (said about a Christmas present last year that was a disappointment)

I am french as well

[Anonymous Coward]

Do I also have such a shitty english?

Re:I am french as well

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes.

Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've showed a few friends and relatives some of the virtual machine builds of Chromium OS. These are "everyday people". A couple of them are school teachers, one is a doctor, one a pharmacist, and the other a college student. None of them are overly technical.

Basically, they all said it was shit. They didn't like how they couldn't play their existing games or use their existing apps, for instance.

Only the college student uses GMail. The rest of them use Outlook or Thunderbird and their ISP's email system, so they didn't see any benefit there.

One of the teachers already has a MacBook from her school, and says it works perfectly fine at the Starbucks when she gets her morning coffee. Plus she can use all of her other apps.

None of them said they'd use Chrome OS on a regular basis. It just didn't do anything useful for them.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[piripiri]

I won't say it's shit, but I agree, it looks more like an internet cafe web terminal than an everyday OS.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

True. At least put Xubuntu on it, minimalist, fast and you are not restricted to privacy-invading inefficient online web-apps.

An ARM Netbook running Chromium is a waste of perfectly good hardware. Its like buying a 1 litre beer bottle with only 10mL of beer inside in it. (sorry I hate car analogies)

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[ickleberry]

and it doesn't even come with support for a coin validator....
*shakes head in disappointment*

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[larry bagina]

I don't think browser-only is the way to go, but I don't think the lack of existing apps or games is the problem. Look at the iphone and the app store. A desktop-class browser (minus the flash and java) plus games, apps, and utilities designed for the device plus an app store could be a success.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is this guy modded funny? What he says is true. Most people are not geeks. The only thing they think when they buy some app or game at Best Buy and then it won't install on Chrome or Linux is "that's shit, I'm going back to Windows, which at least works".

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

I think you're missing a very, very big point here, and that is that even if there is a Windows 7 port to ARM, those people would still not be able to play their existing games, or use their existing apps, because those games and apps were written for x86 architectures. So the when the ARM netbooks come out, you will have your choice between Linux and the vast majority of Linux's apps, or Windows and the vast minority of Windows apps.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Bert64]

Only if properly marketed and heavily promoted...
Most linux distros already have desktop class browsers, including flash and java combined with a package manager that functions just like an app store... Users just don't realise that, and there is no marketing propaganda telling them differently.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[DrXym]

Basically, they all said it was shit. They didn't like how they couldn't play their existing games or use their existing apps, for instance.

I doubt many netbooks let you play any games on them for one reason or another (crappy resolution / CPU / memory etc.) so I don't see that as a valid objection. What is a valid objection is that Linux distributions tend in general to be incredibly poor from a usability perspective compared to commercial offerings. Even the best of them (which is Ubuntu) still has flaws to catch out the unwary. Chrome OS had better polish the experience to a shine or it will suffer by comparison with Windows or OS X.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

> So the when the ARM netbooks come out, you will have your choice between Linux and the vast majority of Linux's apps, or Windows and the vast minority of Windows apps.

Which is another way to say, "People are not going to buy ARM netbooks".

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

We will see, I'm betting that the allure of of a sub-$100 netbook that can go all day on a full charge and can check email and browse the internet will be attractive to a lot of people.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

The crucial difference between Chrome OS and the iPhone OS is that the iPhone OS was for a new hardware platform (phones) on which existing operating systems sucked. Chrome OS is for netbooks and laptops, where there already very established OSes and applications (Windows and Mac OS). You can already get a netbook today with Windows on it and an 8-hour battery life for $300. Maybe Chrome OS boots faster... so what. With an 8-hour battery life, you can just put your laptop to sleep and it will wake up in a couple of seconds, with negligible impact on the battery (ask anyone who has a Macbook; it takes over a day of sleeping to drain the battery even on the older ones).

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

Astroturfing troll much? Here, I'll go point by point.

Of course it doesn't use their EXISTING games and apps. It's a whole new system. That's like complaining that your new Civic doesn't use the same parts as you had bought for your Ford Focus. Basically, no shit Sherlock.

Anyone can use GMail with any ISP's mail system. Figure it out.

Oh, I'm glad to hear that a $1000+ Apple Macbook works "perfectly fine" for elementary browsing. Hope she got the local taxpayers' money worth out of it vs a $100 ARM-based system.

Your post is without any real points. Try again later.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[TrancePhreak]

Gaming on a netbook is actually not very bad. We're not talking big budget titles, but lots of indie stuff runs perfectly well. The market for Bejeweled was huge and that runs just fine on a netbook.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[grcumb]

We will see, I'm betting that the allure of of a sub-$100 netbook that can go all day on a full charge and can check email and browse the internet will be attractive to a lot of people.

Especially the next 3 billion customers who can't afford anything else.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Billly Gates]

Consumers do not know this.

Witness the intel integrated graphics. Many wow players bought these notebooks and were shocked when wow ran at a full 5ps in Dalaran.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

Casual games made for .NET would be able to run on ARM.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

CLR apps should run on a CLR port to ARM, yes. Assuming they are 100% CLR, which I hear isn't very often.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

If Microsoft ports the .NET framework to ARM, many apps could run. I don't think that's a total show stopper. If anything, it might promote writing more apps in .NET languages.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

Yes, .Net apps will have a much easier time. Now list off some popular .Net apps for Windows....

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[shutdown -p now]

I think you're missing a very, very big point here, and that is that even if there is a Windows 7 port to ARM, those people would still not be able to play their existing games, or use their existing apps, because those games and apps were written for x86 architectures.

Not written, compiled.

If writing Windows applications for ARM will be as simple as a recompile (and there's no reason to believe it won't - it's already the case between x86/x86/IA64 on Windows, and Microsoft already has VC++ targetting ARM and other platforms - think WinCE, XBox, etc), then you'll get tons of existing Windows applications ported in no time. Basically everything that is still being actively developed. Possibly some older popular games would be recompiled and re-sold as "netbook editions" as well (I find it hard to believe companies would skip the obvious ability to profit here).

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[voss]

People are not gonna buy an $80 netbook to run microsoft office 2010 , they are gonna buy it to surf the internet and
check their email and maybe play bubble trouble or watch some flash videos, and chat with their friends, and maybe even
do some skype calling.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[westlake]

So the when the ARM netbooks come out, you will have your choice between Linux and the vast majority of Linux's apps, or Windows and the vast minority of Windows apps.

I wouldn't count out Intel and x86 at the low end. I wouldn't bet on ARM and Chrome making it to retail at $89.99, either.

The geek has been betting on white knights like OLPC and the Simputer for as far back as I can remember. None of them has gone the distance.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Risen888]

Only the college student uses GMail. The rest of them use Outlook or Thunderbird and their ISP's email system, so they didn't see any benefit there.

Wow, that is so contrary to my experience (and I support home users for a living). I can't think of a single client I have, of any age, that uses Outlook (or what have you) for their personal email. Not one. Everyone who has to use something like that at work hates it with a bloody mouth-frothing passion. Everyone uses Gmail or Yahoo or God help us, Hotmail. I don't even bother asking anymore.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Risen888]

What is a valid objection is that Linux distributions tend in general to be incredibly poor from a usability perspective compared to commercial offerings.

That's ridiculous. What's Microsoft's presence in the netbook space? Is it Vista? Is it Win7, the much-ballyhooed "Linux netbook killer?" Fuck no. You get Windows XP, sucker, the same stale crap they've been shoving down your throat for nearly a decade. If you're seriously trying to compare that to, for instance, Ubuntu Netbook Remix or KDE's Plasma netbook interface, you're off your meds.

Needless to say, Apple offers nothing. As usual.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Yfrwlf]

"Basically, they all said it was shit. They didn't like how they couldn't play their existing games or use their existing apps, for instance."

"One of the teachers already has a MacBook from her school, and says it works perfectly fine at the Starbucks when she gets her morning coffee. Plus she can use all of her other apps."

Chrome OS doesn't have any apps for it, while OSX is loaded with apps that *everyone* wants, needs, and uses. Gotcha. Geezus, biased much? While I agree that it sucks being confined to a browser as a lot of apps I use are not, a lot of computer users now days use very web-centric programs. IM, email, and games being some of the more commonly used apps. Our opinions don't really matter, the only question is will web app use continue to rise? I think it will. The web as a "platform" runs on all the major OSes, and thus it continues to be a big lure for developers. As web apps become able to do more, which they are especially with OpenGL coming to the web, it will continue to increase. I think Google has it right and are wise to that, but I will continue using Chromium and Firefox on my full-featured Linux desktop.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Yfrwlf]

It will be, and Chrome OS will have an advantage of being incredibly slim even over full-blown Linux desktops like Ubuntu. I would think Ubuntu would actually do better at first, if it weren't for Google's brand name recognition as well as Ubuntu machines needing a tad bit more power. Even if it's a small amount, being the cheapest is going to score you loads of buyers.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Yfrwlf]

"Needless to say, Apple offers nothing. As usual."

Their strategy for quite a long time has been hardware style and to some degree quality of course, but that's not such a good business angle during a recession, and certainly not when faced with the netbook competition. Closed OS, fairly closed hardware still, over-priced...something has to break eventually. I'm just wondering what will give first.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[supernova_hq]

Didn't the OLPC people promise us that like 3 YEARS AGO?!? Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't every single laptop ever made that didn't support windows magically get some "Microsoft Funding" in order to allow the machines to run windows..?

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[supernova_hq]

Did you seriously just point out minor flaws in linux, then flaunt windows as a shined and polished alternative???

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

Microsoft can't pay someone to make ARM chips compatible with existing Windows software. Every other example has been based on an x86 platform that was just not powerful enough to run Windows. The problem with ARM isn't power, it's architecture, and that's not going to change.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

ARM devices are already ubiquitous, proven technology. All that's happening here is they are being used in a new form factor.

I agree, though, I wouldn't count on seeing $89.99 devices anytime soon.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[FrankieBaby1986]

Why does everyone want the netbook to do everything and the kitchen sink? I used to own an HP Jornada 320LX (tiny "Palmtop" PC, MIPS, no internet. Few apps). I was in highschool. Ran on two AA batteries which lasted weeks, and I was able to carry the thing in my pocket. Even had a decent keyboard. Could do assignments and type notes anywhere, play little games to pass some time, etc. It was of great utility and because of the great battery life, always available and convenient. A $100 ARM netbook with at least 6 hours battery and the ability to do all that AND to surf the web and watch video and play music... ssh into my main computer and stream things/vnc? DO WANT. NOW.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you're missing a very, very big point here, and that is that even if there is a Windows 7 port to ARM, those people would still not be able to play their existing games, or use their existing apps, because those games and apps were written for x86 architectures. So the when the ARM netbooks come out, you will have your choice between Linux and the vast majority of Linux's apps, or Windows and the vast minority of Windows apps.

And for exactly those reasons those people wouldn't buy an ARM netbook. Microsoft will continue to dominate the market because open source fanboys continue to applaud stuff they think is wonderful and everybody else thinks is irrelevant. Low power netbooks will be purchased by diehard 'nuxites, the financially disadvantaged and the curious.

[Disclaimer: use Linux everyday, like and support it.. Just like to look at life through non-rose tinted specs every now and again.]

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

And for exactly those reasons those people wouldn't buy an ARM netbook.

That's ridiculous. You're basically saying people won't buy a smart phone before they can't run Windows games on it. Or they won't buy a TiVo because they can't run Windows games on it.

ARM netbooks are not going to be desktop replacements, or even desktop alternatives, they are what netbooks were originally designed to be, ultra-portable Internet appliances. That is why the cheap price and all-day battery life is important, because these are not going to be sitting at home on your desk day in and day out.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[DrXym]

That's ridiculous. What's Microsoft's presence in the netbook space? Is it Vista? Is it Win7, the much-ballyhooed "Linux netbook killer?"

Currently its XP which is doing just fine clawing back market share from Linux, and soon it will be Windows 7 starter. There is nothing ridiculous about it, it's a reality. What is notable about both offerings is that they run fine on netbooks, provide a familiar experience and also work great with 3G modems and other attachments that people are likely to attach to them. Microsoft badly screwed up with Vista's system requirements but even using XP as a stopgap proved to be sufficient to stop Linux making further inroads.

I know from bitter experience the sort of obstacles Linux throws up that don't even occur on Windows. I started with an EeePC 701 running Asus' homebrew Linux. The support was terrible, no doubt caused by using unionfs on the ssd - every patch actually gobbled up user storage space. So I reinstalled with Ubuntu. The first couple of iterations didn't even support the netbook's hardware but eventually I got a basic working netbook. The pain didn't stop since I bought a 3G modem which worked fine on Windows. Did it work fine on Linux? Of course not since the kernel didn't even support usb modems, or usb devices that switch modes. So I spent hours rebuilding the kernel to include usbserial, and crafting scripts to flip the modem into modem mode, invoke wvdial etc. I had basic working network connectivity even if it meant dropping to a shell to get stuff running. Finally Ubuntu caught up with 3G so now I can use the network tool. This is a major advance but it's still very flakey, lacking signal strength info and dropping connections WAY more than Windows. So 2 years after buying my 701, one of the best dists is barely at parity with what Windows could have done out of the box.

You know how hard it is to get a 3G modem working on Windows? Plug it in, run the installer and you have 3G networking. That "stale crap" makes using hardware a fairly painless exercise and represents the level of simplicity that Linux needs too.

As for Ubuntu & Plasma, we'll see when we actually start seeing netbooks that actually ship with them. I have lot more faith in Ubuntu providing a netbook suitable experience than KDE. Ubuntu (and GNOME) has a proven track record of putting usability front and center even if it comes up short supporting drivers. KDE has never gotten usability, not even in 4.x which is a dogs dinner of simple & advanced menus, toolbars & settings all mixed together. I have no faith that slapping some netbook skin on top will materially change things.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[LWATCDR]

I do agree. An App store would make such a device. The issue would be populating it. If you based it on Linux you could "fine tune" some exists FOSS apps and have a huge software base.
The think is getting people to change the names of the apps to something that did Start with a K or a G.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[supernova_hq]

Unless Microsoft pays them to change the chip to x86.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

In which case they won't be ARM netbooks...

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[supernova_hq]

That was kind of my point....

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[mhall119]

Your point is that in order to get Windows to run on a low-cost, high-efficiency platform, manufacturers will simply switch to a high-cost, low-efficiency platform?

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[ckaminski]

Virtual Center 2.5 and SQL Server Enterprise Manager.

Both of which are COMPLETE SHIT compared to the C++ apps they replace.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you that old? It tookme fifteen minutes to convert every classmate I've done groupwork with to Google cloud products. They've all felt the pain of a zero because the assignment was not in on time, and errors caused by word crashes. Furhermore, Docs supports office 07 better than the office on school computers. It even tolerates internet explorer (7 and up) responsiveness-wise. It convers faster than word, and is amazing. I even prefer it to openoffice because the admin left version 2 on the computers, oblivious to the low cost of upgrade. Word is beginning to be phased out on some computers, and corel will be too. Our dl speed at peak usage is 15kbps, which is ok for XHR, and will improve when word is completely removed, which puts less stress on the network servers hosting the autosaving doc files. I AM currently looking or such a netbook, but cannot find one, as speed is a priority, and I regret my Windows 7 purchase. I run linux on it, but I hide this fact. The battery life increases around 50% to 3hrs with linux, VNCing to my desktop, wasting wifi, cpu, and battery on linux. I do not believe that a chrome os netbook will last all day, but five hours sounds quite spectacular.
While we are talking about google, bing's search is up because new ie points mistyped urls to bing, who has worse results. Google is on the addons page, but you must search because it's not on the front page. I just use firefox because new so-called awesomebar resolves all (url, domain, name of). Also, my school forces windows because it has no chance of usb boot, no wifi, and the wires are tightly bound to the chassis where a laptop cannot reach. 3G is slow because of concrete roof.

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[badkarmadayaccount]

Qemu.NET
Who's up for it?

Re:Except Chrome OS is shit.

[badkarmadayaccount]

Chrome OS is a Ubuntu shell replacement.

OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[PCM2]

Linux is expected to dominate ARM-based netbooks because Windows doesn't run on ARM, full stop. That math's not hard.

The question is whether ARM-based netbooks will sell at all. It doesn't really matter what OS a netbook is running. Nobody buys any kind of computer to run an OS. They buy computers to run apps. You can argue all you want that Mac OS X is more elegant than Windows, or whatever -- but if you couldn't get a word processor for it, nobody would use it.

Chrome OS runs on a Linux kernel, but it offers exactly one app: a Web browser. If an inexpensive device that does nothing except access the Web is attractive to people, they will buy them. I don't really see how that will "shake up the Intel and Microsoft consumer PC/laptop monopoly in its boots," (sic) though. A Chrome OS device is not competitive with consumer PCs or laptops.

So sure, we can expect market share gains for Linux in the future -- in the same sense that Linux has dominated the market for home wireless routers, a market where Windows is a total failure. As single-use embedded systems, Chrome OS devices seem like a natural opportunity for Linux, which is already gaining popularity in the embedded systems market.

I'd be more impressed if Android (which also runs on the Linux kernel) made real inroads into the smartphone market. I keep hearing how many models of Android phones are coming, at the same time I keep hearing how disappointed developers are with the Android software market (in other words, nobody's buying).

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[gedw99]

I expect that if ARM netbooks take off, then running own apps on a simple linux server at home will also perhaps take off. Everyone has a dsl connection, and a dynaci DNS is a no brainer. Then with the advent of JS common etc for server apps and nosql databases; installing your software on your home Ubuntu Linux server will be a drag and drop exercise. i can image many people running their own Google like apps at home. gmail, documents, etc Ged

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[omar.sahal]

The question is whether ARM-based netbooks will sell at all

They well could do. As I said below 2008 showed that if a laptop is cheap enough it will sell. I don't know about Google's approach, it would get some kid on facebook , so for many it would be good enough.
I hope they do well, then every other company will come out with there own Linux offering.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[buruonbrails]

Typical netbook apps (Firefox, OpenOffice, Pidgin) are already ported to ARM Linux, so ARM netbooks may fill the niche that used to be occupied by ASUS eeePC 701 and similar devices. As x86 netbooks move to "small, inexpensive laptop" niche, ARM devices may fulfill the role of "small inexpensive device for web browsing/word processing". Their competitive advantages over x86 netbooks are lower price and better battery life.

The best thing about ARM-based netbook (and the worst thing for an average consumer) is that you cannot put Windows on it. So, every ARM netbook sold is a plus to overall Linux market share.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[LBt1st]

Yeah sounds simple and fun to us geeks but try explaining to the average joe what a server even is.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Hurricane78]

Also, Linux has tons over tons of apps that run on ARM, as opposed to any other OS out there. I mean my portage repository has 13,628 packages. Nearly all of them run on ARM. And that is only the main repository! (With over 180 smaller ones.)

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[NickFortune]

They well could do. As I said below 2008 showed that if a laptop is cheap enough it will sell.

That's exactly right. If Microsoft's own history shows one thing, over and over, it is that "cheap and good enough" will win out over "expensive, slick and over-engineered".

Of course, MS would be aware of this. So we'd expect them to try and leverage their market position to make linux netbooks go away, either by persuading retail chains not to stock them, or OEMs to stop selling them.

Hmmm....

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[ceoyoyo]

The question is whether ARM-based netbooks will sell at all. It doesn't really matter what OS a netbook is running. Nobody buys any kind of computer to run an OS. They buy computers to run apps. You can argue all you want that Mac OS X is more elegant than Windows, or whatever -- but if you couldn't get a word processor for it, nobody would use it.

Good point, but you mix a couple of factors together. Nobody would buy an OS that didn't offer a word processor, no, but sometimes the particular word processor it offers isn't important. Some people do buy a computer to run Word, but most buy a computer to do word processing. If you can offer equivalent functionality then they'll go with the machine that otherwise best serves their needs. Since both Windows and OS X offer word processors, some people do buy Macs because of the OS.

Chrome does offer a word processor - Google Docs. Whether it (and all the other apps people use) works sufficiently well to provide equivalent functionality to Word, Open Office, Works, or whatever is important, but so is the OS.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

The question is whether ARM-based netbooks will sell at all. It doesn't really matter what OS a netbook is running. Nobody buys any kind of computer to run an OS. They buy computers to run apps. You can argue all you want that Mac OS X is more elegant than Windows, or whatever -- but if you couldn't get a word processor for it, nobody would use it.

"This archive contains 27841 software packages." Yup, there's clearly no software available for ARM. (That's from the Ubuntu Karmic ARM port -- Debian also has a port and I'm sure some smaller distros do also have one).

Porting is not (typically) a problem for open source software.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[s0litaire]

Doesn't Windows Mobile (WinCE) run on ARM?

I can see Microsoft slappin' the "Microsoft TAX" on these ARM netbooks by sticking their Mobile OS  on it, with a few tweeks... >_<

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[hairyfeet]

I'd say it'll have a niche, I just wouldn't count on it being a really huge one, or it being their "main" PC by any stretch. I for one would pay less than $100 for one, just to have a little laptop to surf when I'm at the doctor's office, but I doubt I would get on the thing more than an hour a week, if at that. But most guys here seem to act like if the ordinary folks were just exposed to Linux, or that if you can find the perfect "Average Joe" distro, that suddenly Windows would find itself on the ropes. But it ain't the OS, hell working PC repair since the days of Win 3.x I can say that most folks don't know WHAT OS they are running, it is the little programs I call the "gottas".

You see every average Joe and Jane I've worked for has had 1 or more programs that according to them they "gotta have", period. And they ain't gonna care how pretty or secure your OS is if it can't run the "gotta", well it just ain't gonna be real useful to them. Like the retired graphic artist down the hall, who even though he has a nice new AMD XP box I built, had to be taught by me how to use a KVM switch and have me build him a NOS 1.5GHz Win2K box because his new AMD wouldn't run his "gotta", Macromedia Xres. The girl whose PC I just fixed brought her camera software, which turns out she has carried over through 3 cameras now, because that software is her "gotta".

So you see it isn't that Linux is bad, or that folks just need to be exposed, it is the "gotta have" software that keeps folks in Windows. A lot of my customers are looking at either sticking with XP or getting Windows 7 Pro simply because their "gotta" won't run on Windows 7 without XP mode, and without their "gotta" it just isn't that useful to them. So while I'm sure it will sell some to guys like me that know what ARM is and just want something cheap, I don't know how well that will translate to Joe and Jane. I have a feeling that they are gonna have to warn folks at retail or have a lot of these things get returned when folks that don't know about anything but Windows, which there is quite a few of those, believe me, try to install their "gotta" and find that Windows x86 don't run on Linux ARM. And if they lock it down with Chrome I don't think even I'd take it. I want to choose what apps I have and have the option to change distro, thanks anyway.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Bert64]

Yes, it does, but that will cause a lot of problems for consumers..
They will buy the "windows" version because they think its the same as the desktop, get it home and find that it isn't and won't run the apps they have (and its hard to find any apps that even will run on it)... If they buy a linux one they have no expectation of it being the same, and there will be a much larger repository of apps too.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[0123456]

Doesn't Windows Mobile (WinCE) run on ARM?

Probably... but most Windows apps won't run on it without recompiling. And people don't buy Windows to run Windows, they buy Windows to run Windows apps.

So if you're going to buy a new netbook that won't run your old Windows apps anyway, there's much less reason to spend $150 rather than $100 just so it runs Windows rather than Linux/Chrome/whatever.

I guess C# and the like could be an option, but running non-native code on ARM seems like masochism to me.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[MemoryDragon]

Believe me dump cheap 50-80 Dollar arm based netbooks suitable for websurfing etc... into the supermarkets as pickup items along the candy and beer and people will pick them up on the run.
I am speaking in potential of hundreds of millions of machines which can be sold that way and probably even more in the third world as cheap surfstations!
I think what we see here is just what happened to the calculators, first expensive and scientific only then the common ones medium expensive and then becoming cheaper and cheaper and now they are sort of a present if you open a new bank account etc...
The Netbooks just follow that way, and I cannot see where Microsoft wants to be in this market with their prices of 50 USD per WinCE license, if Google gives away the alternative for free and shares even the income of the searches over those machines with the hardware makers!
50 USD price difference was enough to keep NVidia out of the netbook market with their ION Chipset it is currently enough to drive phone makers away from Microsoft! And in a segment of 50-100 Dollar Netbooks it will be enough to kill WinCE on ARM netbooks before it can even make a foothold!
The only advantage of Windows is not present in this segment that is the load of desktop applications so Microsoft is on equal ground here and they usually loose if they cannot use their monopoly to gain ground in other segments!

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Nutria]

Everyone in my sphere of acquaintances has a dsl connection

There, fixed that for you...

There are a lot of people who live in sufficiently rural areas as to not have even decent dial-up service.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[selven]

And if you don't feel like being useless on the subway/airplane/vacation / at your non-wifi-owning friend's house / during a power outage?

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[TrancePhreak]

It is dead simple to find apps that run on Windows Mobile.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[simplerThanPossible]

Ubuntu is already available for ARM processors.

So, if linux has already been very popular on netbooks, since Ubuntu is one of (if not) the friendliest linuxes, then the OS will be no more a barrier to adoption than it was for netbooks.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[macemoneta]

Why is this moderated funny?

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[CAIMLAS]

Chrome OS runs on a Linux kernel, but it offers exactly one app: a Web browser. If an inexpensive device that does nothing except access the Web is attractive to people, they will buy them. I don't really see how that will "shake up the Intel and Microsoft consumer PC/laptop monopoly in its boots," (sic) though. A Chrome OS device is not competitive with consumer PCs or laptops.

Yet, there's at least half a dozen ARM centric distros out there which are more than just a browser. At the very least, you've got Ubuntu, Debian, OpenEmbedded, and Angstrom distributions. You've also got a handful of special-taylored distributions.

And then you've got the graphical 'frameworks' for handhelds/embedded ARM systems: Opie, GPE (seemingly dead/merged elsewhere, I think), Qtopia/QTembedded, Maemo (based on matchbox window manager, I think), and a handful of other environments. A couple of them (well, Opie and QTembedded, at least) are more featureful and useful than both the iPhone (which some are supplanting for computers) and Windows Mobile/WinCE. There are a lot of 'base' applications there, too.

With QTembedded, you should have access to applications like koffice, which is at least on par with Pocket Word. Aside from web browsing, that'd meet 90% of most people's use. Throw in a half-decent but bare bones image editor, and you're set.

And if Linux fails you in any above combination, there's always BSD. There are a lot of applications available for ARM, many of which have already replaced Office, IE, etc. on people's desks. Sometimes, the users don't even notice the change.

Finally, you've got things like TinyCore, a minimalistic Linux distro which has a different approach to package management and the like, and also boots incredibly quickly (it's the progeny of DSL).

Honestly, I think the first person to come up with a general purpose "computer" in the form factor of a cell phone (complete with cell radio for actual use as a phone), capable of connecting to a desktop monitor and keyboard/mouse will make a killing. Make them in high enough numbers, and you could still sell them for under $400 with a decent display - and they'd still fly off the shelves.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[CAIMLAS]

Probably because 13,628 packages is a drop in the bucket compared to the slew of applications available even on Windows 7 (which, arguably, is going to have fewer than, say, XP).

Granted, not all those applications are good or useful. But the perception is that more = better, and that the option, or use, of a variety of applications is a necessarily good thing. Personally, I'd rather have a dozen applications which do one thing well, than a hundred which don't scratch even one of those itches satisfied by the 12.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[macemoneta]

Since we're talking about ARM, WinXP/Vista/7 aren't relevant. The point of comparison is Windows Mobile/CE.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Must-have software has always been a chicken-and-egg type problem, and the way it's always worked is chicken (hardware) first, eggs (software) later. From word processors and spreadsheets on old machines to the iphone app store today, that's how it's worked; hardware comes out with some usefulness bundled, but then more software gets written for it, and suddenly people are buying the hardware specifically for that software.

Get $100 netbooks out there en masse with long battery life, basic web browsing, word processing, mp3 playback, and video playback, and they're already worth it for the price. And then there's a market for more software for it, and various enterprising individuals and companies will write software for it or port the old stuff. The new stuff will contain must-haves.

Due to the low price point, for a great many people, there is no "either/or" decision between getting a $100 netbook and running the stuff they already need: it's cheap enough that they can do both.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[pizzach]

They buy computers to run apps. You can argue all you want that Mac OS X is more elegant than Windows, or whatever -- but if you couldn't get a word processor for it, nobody would use it.

I find that argument a bit depressing nowadays. How most people repeat that it is seriously starting to sound like they just keep repeating, "You are not Windows. Give up already." If someone wants a specific program made by a specific company, there is only so much you can do. There is only one Microsoft Word. Is that reason enough to give up on development of Linux? There is only one blue E for getting on the internet. There is only one iPhoto. There is only one iMovie.

Linux has a lot apps. What it is missing are "killer apps" IMHO that you can't get elseware.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[westlake]

I have a feeling that they are gonna have to warn folks at retail or have a lot of these things get returned when folks that don't know about anything but Windows

This is exactly what happened at Walmart.com just before they closed out their Linux inventory.

It had got to the point where every Linux PC was black-flagged by a Crime-Scene Yellow banner in bold type:

"This PC will not run your Windows software."

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Risen888]

Windows doesn't run on ARM.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Risen888]

it is the little programs I call the "gottas".

That stuff fades. It's ephemeral. I used to "gotta have" WordPerfect 6.

No, seriously. Listen. We're give-or-take 25 years into the "PC era." In that eyeblink of time, the applications we've run, the capabilities they've had, and the platforms that they've run on have changed more times than I can name in one paragraph. No one over the age of 25 was "born using Windows."

The software monoculture that we are living in now is an historical anomaly.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[AmyRose1024]

Even so, a lot of people may expect these new netbooks to run their x86 software because it looks, acts, and feels like a small laptop.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[hitmark]

if people get bluetooth hid devices going, that may be the case with the nokia n900.

btw, i think microsoft worked on a similar project almost a decade ago.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Hurricane78]

You mean the number of applications for Win7 running on ARM... which is exactly ZERO! ^^

You should not make wild speculations, and then use them as a straw-man argument. We never talked about Win7. We talked about ARM and ARM OSes.

And why Linux is the best choice for ARM-based systems.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Tapewolf]

It is dead simple to find apps that run on Windows Mobile.

Yes. And they won't work either! You can make a CE app that runs on WM, but a WM app will not run on bare CE because of many missing dependencies. AYGSHELL in particular.

All the CE-based netbooks I have seen so far are using just the bare CE.NET core.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Tapewolf]

Probably... but most Windows apps won't run on it without recompiling. And people don't buy Windows to run Windows, they buy Windows to run Windows apps.

I guess C# and the like could be an option, but running non-native code on ARM seems like masochism to me.

It will take more than a recompilation in most cases, I assure you. Windows CE 5 (which is what the netbooks are using) has a per-process limitation of 32MB. It's touch and go whether you can allocate more than 1MB in a single chunk, at least that's been my experience.

The APIs are subtly different so you will have to find the places where you've used the SendMessageA or something instead of SendMessageW, or where the parameters are simply different and fix those. You'll have to rewrite the menu handling as the APIs are simply not the same. You'll have to rewrite it again for the Windows Mobile version as they're different again. You'll have to make sure you're not relying on the current working directory because CE doesn't support that.

All in all, it can be done (I've gone the other way, CE->win32) but it would be a major problem for anything substantial as you'll run out of memory and have to use memory-mapped files or some other hack. I would imagine that most developers wouldn't bother. Using .NET rather than straight C++ might help a bit, but I can't see it overcoming the memory limitation - it's liable to make things worse as the runtime will want its share, and you won't be able to roll your own memory manager to access >32MB.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[TheRaven64]

Porting can be a problem for open source software, but porting from x86 to ARM is not. If you are using C, the only thing that will work on x86 and not on ARM is a few somewhat obscure pointer casts (which might work and generate slow code on ARM, if the compiler notices that they might be unaligned, and will always generate slow code on x86). It's not like going from x86 to SPARC64, where the word size, alignment restrictions, and endian all change.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Porting is not (typically) a problem for open source software.

So If I slap GPL/BSD/etc on my code and give it away, it becomes magically portable?

No? Then what? Code written with portability in mind is portable? Nice wisdom there..

Cmon, lets see the penguin dance ! dance for me !

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[hitmark]

sadly, the "killer app" wont happen on linux.

two reasons why:

1. open source basically do not do lock-in. any app that gets interest will be ported to any available platform within days.

2. proprietary companies prefer a "sure thing", and so will go for the biggest market first.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Eunuchswear]

if people get bluetooth hid devices going, that may be the case with the nokia n900.

You mean removing input from DisabledPlugins in /etc/bluetooth/main.conf doesn't do it for you?

http://wiki.maemo.org/Fremantle_Unsupported_Bluetooth_profiles

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Archos 5 internet tablet are running android
http://www.archos.com/products/imt/archos_5it/index.html?country=en&lang=en&p=guidedtour

regards,
glyj

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[tepples]

I expect that if ARM netbooks take off, then running own apps on a simple linux server at home will also perhaps take off. Everyone has a dsl connection

Not everyone; a lot of people live too far from the nearest DSLAM. Also, residential-class DSL TOS often restricts servers, and one would still need to fork over $720 plus tax per year for a 3G Internet connection while away from home. These apps would need to have kickass offline support (using HTML 5 or the like) because you're only going to be able to sync them up at home.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[hitmark]

seems i overlooked that find, thanks.

Re:OS is nothing. Apps are everything.

[Nikker]

Try explaining to them what a daemon is they'll never be able to run one on a linux box.... o wait...

As long as I can run the apps I want, cool.

[IANAAC]

I run Linux full time, with an occasional Virtualbox WinXP session running (for one stinking application).

If I can run everything I currently run on my x86-based netbook/laptop, I'm all for it.

Unfortunately, I don't think I can run everything I need just yet.

Forget the "Cloud" - it doesn't interest me.

Re:As long as I can run the apps I want, cool.

[Anonymous Coward]

Virtual machines rely on the underlying architecture being the same. You can't run a virtual machine on arm for an os that thinks its on x86.

You'll have to find a replacement app.

Re:As long as I can run the apps I want, cool.

[Steve Max]

Actually you can, but then the "virtual machine" is called an "emulator". With qemu you can install ARM Linux on a VM running on Windows x86_64. The performance is abysmal, though.

Re:As long as I can run the apps I want, cool.

[shutdown -p now]

As long as I can run the apps I want, cool.

Considering the trend set by Chrome OS, it seems that the way it'll be is, "any customer can have an any application on his netbook, so long as it's a browser".

Christ, AGAIN!?

[Blakey Rat]

We keep seeing this story over and over and over again.

WHERE ARE THE NETBOOKS!?

Please, direct me to a ARM-based Linux netbook I can buy from a store right now. Any one. Even if I have to climb the dominating tower of Atom-based Windows netbooks to reach them.

Can we all agree to put a moratorium on this story until the product it's talking about *actually exists*? Thanks.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[gedw99]

I agree. Where the hell are the arm based networks with a graphics card, and 64 GB SSD. NVideo Ion & Ion2 is nowhere to be seen. I think there are 4 laptops in existence only. The market for these is huge i think. I have been waiting a year for a decent one to come to market.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Archos 5 Internet Tablet.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Good point. In 2007 we heard the ARM netbooks would hit in 2008. In 2008, we heard they'd be huge in 2009. In 2009, we heard maybe they'll be here in 2010. Somebody sell me a Snapdragon based netbook for a reasonable price and I'll buy it.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Eluan]

I remember seeing some ARM netbooks in one of those china importers, but (surprise) it ran Windows CE by default!

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[dgym]

But we were all told about the 10 ARM netbooks that would appear on the market by Q3 2009. It is now Q4 so they must exist, and you must be wrong.

I'm pretty sure this is a Microsoft stunt to make their market share look better. If you can't make geeks buy Windows, then make sure they don't buy anything at all because of all the sweet smelling vapourware on the perpetual horizon. Then again I'll blame them for most things, including a sock I lost.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Cyclops]

Here's one (and I have the SmartQ7 model): http://www.smartdevices.com.cn/

Nice and cheap.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Blakey Rat]

I'm pretty sure this is a Microsoft stunt to make their market share look better. If you can't make geeks buy Windows, then make sure they don't buy anything at all because of all the sweet smelling vapourware on the perpetual horizon. Then again I'll blame them for most things, including a sock I lost.

That's nothing, when Vista came out I lost a pair of underpants... while I'd been wearing them!

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's another: Touch Book

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Blakey Rat]

Where to purchase: http://en.smartdevices.com.cn/Buy/

I'm not in China, Singapore, or "Hongkong".

Sorry. I should have specified "in the US." How about this: when I can get one at Best Buy, THEN post the story.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Sique]

All the netbooks I ever bought were Linux based ones, even though none of them runs the original Xandros anymore. But with Ubuntu Netbook Remix they are going strong.
Why you can't get hold of a Linux based netbook is beyond me. It wasn't hard for me. I just entered "linux netbook" in the search field of the online store of my choice, and there they were.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Go and ask 20 random people in Best Buy or Wal Mart who Archos is. If we weren't posting AC I'd send you a dollar for every one person who knows they make electronics, but you'd need to send me a dollar for every "Who?" or "What?" response. I think I'd be at least $19 richer at the end of the day.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

But then how many people here do you REALLY think shop at Worst Buy?

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[The_Wilschon]

FWIW, the story talks about "Linux Market Share" of netbook sales. Given that "China, Singapore, and "Hongkong"" have a much larger combined population than the US, availability of the devices under discussion in those markets *does* have the potential to significantly affect "Linux Market Share" of netbook sales.

To make a bad analogy, let's suppose that we had a story posted on Slashdot that claimed "In Korea, only old people use email.". Would it then be at all relevant for you to say "Show me a young person "in the US" who doesn't use email, or don't post the story?" No. Nor is it relevant now to gripe about non-availability "in the US" of a device which is purported to have some percentage of the *worldwide* market.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[c41rn]

Well, you can't buy this one in BestBuy, but you can buy it in the US. I'm planning to order one after I recover monetarily from christmas. It's an ARM based notebook running Linux, and it converts in to a tablet. http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/touchbook/

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[icebraining]

He asked for "ARM-based Linux netbook", not any Linux netbook.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[mrphoton]

I saw this windows CE netbook on sale in the UK: http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=257308 Maplin is an electronics/gizmo store, but I have seen one or two others on sale in medium sized chains. I has been on sale for a year or so so I guess it can not be doing too badly.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not a netbook.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't drop $150 on an ARM based notebook? Oh right, that thing costs $399... Not quite what we're talking about here.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[dclozier]

I don't know about you but I'm considering making a purchase.

http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p3907.m38.l1313&_nkw=smartq+v7&_sacat=See-All-Categories

Pay with PayPal and your purchase is protected! ;)

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Cyclops]

Here's one (and I have the SmartQ7 model): http://www.smartdevices.com.cn/

Where to purchase: http://en.smartdevices.com.cn/Buy/

I'm not in China, Singapore, or "Hongkong".

Sorry. I should have specified "in the US." How about this: when I can get one at Best Buy, THEN post the story.

If you had cared to search before you posted... http://www.allpmp.com/

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Mine seems to be defective. The bottom part with all the buttons is missing, and i can't fold it in half to close it.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

I bought a Touchbook made by Always Innovating. I've had it for a couple of months now. It's ARM-based and it runs Linux. I bought it because I wanted a touch netbook (to complement my tablet PC).

I bought it over the Internet, not in a store -- but I can assure you it exists.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Ant P.]

They do exist, it's just that someone bought all 10 of them and tried to sell them on eBay for 5x the price

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[hairyfeet]

Yes please! I would LOVE to pick up a couple of these sub $100 ARM Netbooks that we keep hearing about, if for no other reason to see if I can sell them to the local college kids who would probably like an ultra long battery web box that does note taking. But we hear these stories over AND over AND over again, but the things just never seem to show up? What is this Duke Nukem Forever?

Please don't get me all hyped up thinking about about profits and then to only find this is another vaporware that will be released "sometime in the future". Hell if we are gonna do the "sometime in the future" I might as well say that sometime in the future I'll have my Alyson Hannigan Sexbot with the Buffy Season 2 Leather Outfit. Of course Alyson Hannigan is a perfect being, on which even the FCC agrees, and therefor replication will take time, but come on! This is a Netbook running a cell phone chip for the love of Pete!

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[nurb432]

I happen to agree, as id love to get out of the x86 world on my laptop, just out of principle.. I did it on the desktop, but now that has become a dead end too ( thanks Steve Jobs.. grr )

And no, i don't want to buy an old Tadpole.. i want something current. Wifi, bluetooth, 8 hours battery life etc.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

always innovating touchbook

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Thelasko]

Here's another.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here you go:
http://www.kmart.com/shc/s/p_10151_10104_020W014138260001P?vName=Computers+%26+Electronics&cName=Laptops&sName=Netbooks

It costs $150, was $120 on Black Friday. It has a 533MHz Samsung ARM. However it comes with Windows CE, not Linux.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[cenc]

N900, runs linux on ARM.

Can be bought from dell and amazon to name a few

http://maemo.nokia.com/n900/

Now, everyone is going to jump on "that is not a notebook". You need to start waking up to the fact that computers are being replaced by all-in-one devices, and I say thank god as I am tired of hauling around 100 pounds of cables and crap on both long and short trips.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

You might want to start with this article:

Linux Netbooks: They're Still Out There

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Blakey Rat]

Here is what I concede:

1) ARM-based netbooks exist,
2) But the majority of them seem to be running Windows CE (which seems to disprove the article's premise),
3) They don't have substantially more battery life than an Atom-based netbook,
4) And they generally cost as much, or more, than a typical netbook (someone in this thread linked to an Nokia N900 for >$500!!),
5) And there is at least one model available in tbe US that runs Linux.

But my general point still stands: we've been reading hype about the ARM-based Linux netbook now for over two years. Most of this hype seems to emanate from Slashdot for some reason, probably because Slashdot is one of the very few tech sites that gives a flying crap about Linux.

Yet, despite these years of hype, and despite the crazy enthusiasm displayed by posters at this site, the ARM-based Linux netbook is an extremely niche device, which absolutely no advantages over Atom-based netbooks. Give the hype a rest.

Tell you what, when ARM-based Linux netbooks are flying off the shelf (as they will be Any Day Now(tm) I'm sure), then you can start up the hype machine again, ok? Deal? For right now, I'm sick of reading the same old articles and the same old comments about an item which is, for all practical purposes, a work of fiction.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Go and ask 20 random people in Best Buy or Wal Mart who Archos is. If we weren't posting AC I'd send you a dollar for every one person who knows they make electronics, but you'd need to send me a dollar for every "Who?" or "What?" response. I think I'd be at least $19 richer at the end of the day.

You need to work on your maths - you can never be $19 richer in this scheme. If he sends you $19, that means that one person said "I know what that is", which means you owe him a dollar. Which means you're only $18 richer. (I know you said "at least", but why not just say "$20" instead of fluffing about with impossible numbers?)

But more to the point, GP said

Even if I have to climb the dominating tower of Atom-based Windows netbooks to reach them.

He clearly doesn't care about the popularity of the thing, and it's not what we're talking about.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[evilviper]

A sub-100USD ARM-based portable computer with extremely long battery life, and the ability to browse the web? Okay: here you go.

The 1990's calling all /.ers...

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Menq EasyPC E790 discussed in the "as low as $80" link in the summary was on sale for $119.99 at Kmart on Black Friday (link).

Yes, I realize that's not $80 or even sub-$100, but it's the one they're talking about - or at least some re-packaging or re-labeling of the same product, I think - and it was available in the stores. It might still be, I don't know.

The price discrepancy can probably be chalked up to the fact that the $80 is the wholesale price, that Kmart might not have place a huge order since they might not be sure of the market for these things, and the copy of Windows CE.

Personally, I think that model is kind of a weak attempt, but I was still tempted. I hope that they get the specs up some (I know, I know... it's a netbook), sell it without Windows, and that retailers don't get too discouraged by limited sales of these earlier and really low spec models.

And geez, I think I remember reading up on the thing on Thanksgiving, and (found the link) they only claim a 3 hour battery life. This thing is just really lacking, in my estimation, any of the great things that would make an ARM netbook worth having for Linux. Slow CPU, not even enough RAM to run Firefox, paying for Windows anyway, and crap battery life on top of that? But hey, it's a start, and let's hope it's not the finish.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[shovas]

You're already +5, Interesting or I'd wish I had mod points...

The link you provide is an impressive tablet. It's price point is great too for what you're getting. Why can't we find that in the neighbourhood tech store??

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[JohnBailey]

Here's one (and I have the SmartQ7 model): http://www.smartdevices.com.cn/ Nice and cheap.

And if these get blister packed as MID/PDA/PMP devices for around $/£100 they will fly of the shelves. I'd happily pay about £150-200 for the model you linked to based on the assumption of it being a pocket sized competent media player with a few extra features. Even if the OS was in ROM..

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Sique]

Here we go: iView 700 NB.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, you could buy a Zipit for $50 and install Linux on it. It's definitely a netbook: screen, keyboard, small...very small...and lightweight...

http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2009/09/28/put-linux-on-a-zipit.html

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[Raptor851]

My friend owns an ARM9 based netbook (Sorry but I don't remember the model, it's probably around 3-4 years old now, I think it was just called "netbook" actually) and I own a MIPS based netbook (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skytone_Alpha-400). The newer skytone netbooks are already ARM based, and have been out for quite a while. My only two beefs with them are the default OS absolutely blows (it's easy to use, hard to modify or install ANYTHING, luckily you pretty much just need copy a tarball of the OS image you want to load onto it on a SD card to get a normal distro.) and the keyboard sucks. (though I've yet to see a netbook with a keyboard that didn't suck). I've seen a couple ARM based netbooks hanging around frys electronics the past few years as well, they're around just not pushed and advertised as hard as the x86 ones, and tend to only appear for a few months out of the year.

I recommend buying one as they become more common, the difference in battery life alone is worth it.

Re:Christ, AGAIN!?

[WebCowboy]

Please, direct me to a ARM-based Linux netbook I can buy from a store right now.

Better late than never...

Costco has had such netbooks in stock for some time, but they come with a craptacular pure-vanilla WinCE installation with a half-arsed attempt to make it useful with a handful of basic productivity software and low-quality games (it seems to be marketed as a toy for "tween" kids).

In Canada there is something called the "very personal computer" (VPC) a 7" netbook with a 400MHz embedded processor (I think it is ARM but could be MIPS--I'm 100 percent sure it isn't x86 based). A Canadian company called "fidelity electronics" has them built in hong-kong. It sells on Alibaba for US$135 currently, but is $199 retail from their website, but that isn't where I first saw it: I discovered it at Zellers (a Canadian department store very similar to, but pre-dating and not affiliated with, Target in the US), and I've heard it has shown up at Canadian Tire (I've never seen a store exactly like Canadian Tire outside of Canada actually--their scrip, "Canadian Tire money", is part of our culture) but at an inflated price. At Zellers it is on sale right now basically at cost: CA$139 if I recall. That one most certainly DOES run Linux--nothing totally standard from what it appears but it could be Debian-based. If I didn't have my HP Mini I'd have got it to check it out...

ARM and MIPS netbooks are all over Alibaba et al that "Support" both Linux and WinCE, and in N American retail they are making small inroads (as it gets harder to find Atom netbooks without Windows there seems to be an accompanying rise in the availability of ARM and MIPS cheapies, and as often (or more) than not they run Linux. The stage is set for a watershed moment for such devices: if a big-brand vendor, or several more "fidelity" sized outfits, pick up these cheap Chinese models and package/markets them appropriately they could establish themselves enough to worry MSFT. Some things that are needed for success:

1) they need to be marketed honestly by all vendors: Fidelity on their website seems to be honest but there is precious little information or knowledge at Zellers on the unit, not even a warning that it is not a Windows PC. You'd think they'd learn from competitor Walmart about improper product support and marketing in this area

2) the hardware can come from China but don't let them do the software, documentation or retail packaging for the N American market. I think an interface like Moblin2's would be ideal is given the right polish (I run Moblin 2.1 on my HP Mini and I think it is elegant enough to compete very well with Apple, but it IS still glitchy (once in a while an app will hard crash (but never had total system lock-up), I had to get my infamous Broadcom wireless going by putting in a blob-driver myself...). The stuff is there to make a Linux netbook kick butt on WinCE or even the latest WinMo eye candy is already invented--it just needs to be factory tuned and installed.

3) don't try to be everything to everyone and don't be a "me-too" product--copy Apple's strategy NOT its design. Apple "does its own thing"--its designs are not derivatives of anything. Nothing like an iPod existed until after Apple designed it, and computers were all beige boxes until Apple cape up with something off-the-wall. Despite the fact that Apple's hardware is often quite far below cutting-edge their elegant designs, brilliant marketing and polished user experience garner fierce loyalty and big profits.

Hey if one company can make billions on a bunch of product lines based on an open-source kernel that is incompatible with Windows then why not someone else?

Vaporware

[oldhack]

I hope I'm mistaken. Is there actually an ARM-powered netbook model in the market?

Re:Vaporware

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes
http://www.google.com/products?q=ARM+Netbook+-atom&hl=en&aq=f

Re:Vaporware

[shutdown -p now]

That's interesting. The very first page linked shows 2 actual netbooks (other are "arm holder" devices), and both of those run WinCE.

i want an ARM netbook, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no way I'm believing Linux has a 30%+ market share of netbooks right now. You can hardly find any to buy, and people want to run what they're familiar with, meaning they want Windows.

What I want is something Microsoft doesn't want me to have: an ARM netbook with a high res screen and a 20 GB SSD. So far the screen res is too low on all the netbooks I can find, and for some reason they all have spinning disks. Load it with a distro that doesn't suck, and which effectively supports the gfx chip and wireless network, and I'm there.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[PCM2]

My understanding is that Asia accounts for the largest portion of the netbook market. Due to price constraints, Linux comes pre-installed on more netbooks there than in the U.S. and Europe, and that's the source of the 30 percent figures you hear.

Of course, nobody is bothering to track how many of those Linux installs get wiped and replaced with a pirated copy of Windows five minutes after the boxes are opened.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[omar.sahal]

You can hardly find any to buy

I think that's why Apple opened there own stores.
Even with their longer history, higher public awareness and slicker GUI interface.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[jimicus]

Of course, nobody is bothering to track how many of those Linux installs get wiped and replaced with a pirated copy of Windows five minutes after the boxes are opened.

With the ARM-based laptops, I'll stick my neck out and guess it's "zero".

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably lot less than those Windows Installs for Linux I'd say. :p

They have already proven Linux doesn't get returned more than Windows.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[cool_arrow]

I don't believe it either. I suspect however that people buy them with linux on them only to get the lower price and then wipe and install windows.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[MemoryDragon]

Well some people probably will install WinCE then they will try to install Intel based Powerpoint and then they will give frustratedly up because it will not get in their mind why this does not work although it looks the same.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, right. Show me 1 in 10,000 people that have the desire coupled with the sense enough to do that and you might have something.

I'll be waiting.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[jimicus]

What I want is something Microsoft doesn't want me to have: an ARM netbook with a high res screen and a 20 GB SSD.

Both of these would whack the price up substantially - you'd have to pay laptop prices.

So far the screen res is too low on all the netbooks I can find, and for some reason they all have spinning disks. Load it with a distro that doesn't suck, and which effectively supports the gfx chip and wireless network, and I'm there.

The closest you'll find is an ultra-compact laptop - something like a Dell Latitude E4200.

Of course, this means you'll have to part with a lot more money.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[shutdown -p now]

With the ARM-based laptops, I'll stick my neck out and guess it's "zero".

Yes, which is why it will be interesting to watch. If uptake rate of ARM laptops will match that 30% figure, that would indicate that Asian Linux netbook users are genuinely using Linux (and hence don't care whether it's x86 or not). Whereas if the figure drops sharply for new ARM netbooks (but x86 Linux netbooks will remain steady) ...

Of course, this is all purely hypothetical, since there are no mass marketed ARM netbook devices at the moment.

Re:i want an ARM netbook, but...

[MemoryDragon]

First question people asked me when I showed them the EEE 701, does it run windows?
They were not even thinking that the screen resolution was totally unsuitable!
Believe me I am not too far off with that assumption.
Give people Windows and they think it is intel Windows as long as it looks like a computer!

See? We told you!

[Quiet_Desperation]

It's the Year Of The Linux Desktop^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Netbook!

Re:See? We told you!

[piripiri]

Well you know you can just use ^W to wipe the whole word, don't you ?

Re:See? We told you!

[Anonymous Coward]

H^H^H^H^H^H^

It's not polite to laugh at people.

Re:See? We told you!

[selven]

I believe you mean:

iIt's the Year Of the Linux DesktopESCc7hNetbook!

Heretic.

Re:See? We told you!

[Quiet_Desperation]

Heretic

And damn proud of it!

Wait, what?

Twist your ARM

[Wowsers]

I have a netbook, there are two points that would be nice. A better resolution in the more or less screen screen space, and for it to have a dual-core processor. Yes I know you can get that and more in a laptop and even for a similar price, but the size of a laptop is why I got a netbook. Dual core is nice to work on something without the computer running like it's in molasses. Would be nice to run compiz and other stuff without it bogging the netbook down.

Re:Twist your ARM

[Randle_Revar]

>netbook
>compiz

you're doing it wrong

Re:Twist your ARM

[icebraining]

Maybe you need an ultraportable. I've got a 12.1" HP DV2 (AMD Neo CPU), which is kind of an hybrid between an ultraportable and a netbook. The CPU only has one core, but way faster than most Atoms.

The main problem is power consumption and therefore battery life. With a TDP of 15W, it lasts way less than a regular netbook.

Re:Twist your ARM

[Bert64]

Why? there are low power mobile graphics cores being used in cellphones today that could easily handle compiz...

Re:Twist your ARM

[Randle_Revar]

Yes, they probably could handle it. And I could get a 70's Toyota and give it a fancy metallic paint job with flames, but I am not sure why I would.

Re:Twist your ARM

[drinkypoo]

I just activated compiz on my LT3013u so that I could use Expo. It has an Athlon 64 and a halfway credible GPU and is only nominally a netbook anyway, so I'm not sure what this proves, except that I would do it on other machines too, if they could handle it.

Re:Twist your ARM

[temojen]

Why do you want compiz? Without compiz my aspire one runs KDE 4.3.2 with desktop effects with Konsole, Kate, Konqueror, Firefox, Kontact and minicom all running at the same time, quite responsively.

Re:Twist your ARM

[cbhacking]

Modern netbooks mostly use hyperthreaded processors. While not quite dual-core, they're still a lot better for multitasking.

You can get true dual-core systems in that form factor, but not for netbook prices.

Re:Twist your ARM

[Peaceful_Patriot]

My eeepc 900 with 2 gigs of ram runs regular Ubuntu with Compiz just fine. This is the perfect device. Light and portable yet powerful enough to run all my regular desktop applications. SSD so it is rugged enough to accompany me everywhere. Tethers with my Blackberry when no wifi available. What more could you want?

Re:Twist your ARM

[Anonymous Coward]

Because he doesn't use KDE? Though to be honest, compiz runs fine for the most part on my netbook, though the effects do stutter a bit when the CPU gets bogged down.

What my netbook needs more than anything else is a faster SSD, though I can upgrade it myself when I can get a sufficiently capable on (say 2x most of the specs of the one that came with my Aspire One) for about £30 or less.

ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Share

[omar.sahal]

This is not hard to believe because 2008 showed that if a computer is cheap enough it will sell regardless of well known OS.
I would how ever like to warn against complacency. There are warts in Linux that do not get fixed, such as the flickering screen in Ubuntu boot and shut down, despite attention from distro's (others, such as suspending a computer, are only on a minority of chip sets and can be fixed when working with a Manufacturer) It seems that Linux needs a business to focus on it and ensure that the customer experience is fully taken into account (with deference paid to hackers and community organisations such as Gnome, Kde etc).
One thing to ask your self is would Apple (or other unnamed companies operating in the OS space) allow such a case of the above screen flickering, or would it be dealt with even if the X server had to be replaced (if that is the problem)

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[farlukar]

Like I heard some kids say last year, I would rather have a crap laptop with the internet than a nice laptop without (said about a Christmas present last year that was a disappointment)

And what does “having the internet” have to do with the OS?

$80 is a lot

[Anonymous Coward]

I can just heat some tap water if I want vapor and hot air. Let me know when I can buy a Linux laptop that runs 20 hours on one charge and doesn't cost more than $80.

ARM slow

[electrosoccertux]

an ARM guy came to our institute to demo their $150 ARM system, it had Ubuntu on it, and while it could play 1080p HD video, the GUI was remarkably slow for normal tasks. Responsivity matters, and my Atom netbook certainly feels faster than that ARM+Linux.

Re:ARM slow

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you for this post. It makes things a lot simpler to decide -- I went with an atom-based netbook and ubuntu, and was wondering if I was missing anything by not going with an ARM-based netbook (ie speed, battery life, etc.)

I'm no big fan of Windows but I'm not sure that I would want to leave it completely behind. Just in case I need to use photoshop (I'm a coder but we're still expected to be able to open .psd files) I configured the netbook as a dual-boot and upgraded the RAM to 2GB.

Then again, for $150, I might just buy one as a disposable machine. Last week I was on call during a pub crawl, and had to bring my netbook with me (ssh on an iphone is not great). Were it not for a friendly bartender halfway along my route, I would have never recovered my netbook the next day.

Re:ARM slow

[Anonymous Coward]

It can be slow(ish) and incompatible with Photoshop, MS Word and Call of Duty. I don't care, as long as it runs a web browser, a terminal and an email client for a full day on one charge (with headroom for an aging battery) and doesn't cost more than $200. Oh, and I have to be able to actually buy it too. That seems to be the primary problem with these things.

Re:ARM slow

[Hurricane78]

Well, your choice. $150 and slow, or $600 and fast. Or anything in between.

And nobody will argue, that having the choice is a bad thing. :)

I, for one, will just buy a dozen of those for $150, and build a Beowulf cluster and a Password Swordfish style screen out of them! :D
They will *still* have a better price/performance ratio than your PC. ^^

Re:ARM slow

[electrosoccertux]

My AO751h was $300 (after bing $50 of cashback), sports a 7.5h battery life on lowest brightness, has a full keyboard, and has a 1366x768 resolution screen.
The GMA500 in it I've gotten to accelerate 1080p video as long as it's VC.1, AVC, or WMV9 (but only in DXVA checker for WMV9).It's amazing.

Re:ARM slow

[Anonymous Coward]

And nobody will argue, that having the choice is a bad thing.

Wrong! I will, but only because I'm perpetually wound up about Choice and Competition generally being the end of all problems. There's a flip side of it: Choice is a bad thing if you don't have the resources to deal with increased complexity. More choice means more alternatives, and each alternative - by being an alternative an hence has some degree of uniqueness - come with a need of individual attention at each of its aspects: design, build, maintenance, review, handling, promotion, repair, documentation, etc.

Lack of choice is a feature. It's called common ground.

Re:ARM slow

[uassholes]

What was the session/window manager? If gnome then I'm not surprised at how slow.

Re:ARM slow

[sznupi]

Since it was able to play 1080p video, I'm guessing it was Tegra? Nvidia somehow managed to convince people to talk mostly about its HD playback acceleration (which is pointless on such device), which is handled by DSP/GPU of course.

What they don't talk about is that Tegra is based around ARM11 CPU core. Which is...a bit ancient. There are other solutions based around Cortex-A8, which is almost two times faster per clock. Even faster Cortex-A9, which can be also multicore, is upcoming.

Re:ARM slow

[Hurricane78]

Maybe you’ve heard of this concept called “trust network”. ^^

It’s very useful to weed out bad choices. :)

Re:ARM slow

[RichiH]

Please please please tell me what that system was. I need something like that!

Chrome OS

[SilverHatHacker]

With all the hype about Chrome OS recently, I think people are forgetting that Ubuntu and Debian also have ARM ports, so you can pretty much run anything on an ARM. Of course, that wouldn't be any different from the current situation, so it probably doesn't really matter.

Re:Chrome OS

[PCM2]

FWIW, Chrome OS draws code from Ubuntu, among other projects.

Re:Chrome OS

[Thelasko]

Yes, for all intents and purposes, Chrome OS is just a stripped down version of Ubuntu. For all of you wondering why Chrome runs so well on X11. Now you know why.

Re:Chrome OS

[Randle_Revar]

Doesn't change the fact that it is a non-standard distro that doesn't even have X11.
I'll stick with Debian, thanks.

Re:Chrome OS

[Thelasko]

Doesn't change the fact that it is a non-standard distro that doesn't even have X11.

It does have X11. It's just that the only interface is the Chrome browser.

Re:Chrome OS

[PCM2]

It does have X11. It's just that the only interface is the Chrome browser.

I think that's only meant to be true of the development builds. You shouldn't expect Chrome OS devices to be running X11 on actual hardware.

Re:Chrome OS

[Thelasko]

I think that's only meant to be true of the development builds. You shouldn't expect Chrome OS devices to be running X11 on actual hardware.

I beg to differ. I think Google optimized Chrome for X11 because they were planning on using it for Chrome OS.

Re:Chrome OS

[Randle_Revar]

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/introducing-google-chrome-os.html

The software architecture is simple — Google Chrome running within a new windowing system on top of a Linux kernel.

 

Re:Chrome OS

[PCM2]

Nothing in that discussion suggests Google optimized Chrome for X11. It just runs faster -- and the fact that it does so without really trying is what had everyone puzzled.

Re:Chrome OS

[MarkVVV]

Wtf is a standard distro? I thought Linux was all about customization, not one-size-fits-all...

Re:Chrome OS

[Thelasko]

It just runs faster -- and the fact that it does so without really trying is what had everyone puzzled.

How do you know they didn't try? We don't know one way or the other.

Re:Chrome OS

[Billly Gates]

"Doesn't change the fact that it is a non-standard distro that doesn't even have X11."

I do not know about you but that sounds like a feature to me.

Re:Chrome OS

[PCM2]

If the Chrome OS developers theorizing in the forum threads about why it might run faster doesn't convince you, if the official Google announcements stating that Chrome OS will not run X11 don't convince you, if the fact that Chrome OS is open source and you can download the source code and look for yourself doesn't convince you, then I don't know what I can say that will convince you.

Re:Chrome OS

[sznupi]

Oh, but it will be different.

When loading full distro on those ARM netbooks, a very cheap machine will get full featured OS. An OS that this time doesn't have the alternative to which people are used to...

Re:Chrome OS

[ultrabot]

if the official Google announcements stating that Chrome OS will not run X11 don't convince you,

They have never announced anything to that effect.

I'd love to see a citation straight from the horses mouth that X won't be used. Notably, the following says nothing about X:

Google Chrome running within a new windowing system on top of a Linux kernel.

Re:Chrome OS

[Thelasko]

if the fact that Chrome OS is open source and you can download the source code and look for yourself doesn't convince you.

While I haven't dug through the source code myself, the builds I have seen run X11. Anyone can check. Just run Chrome which ever way you feel convenient, and type "file:///" in the address bar. Click on etc and then X11. There it is.

Re:Chrome OS

[Randle_Revar]

So what does it mean? It really strains the apparent meaning of that sentence to take it to mean that it will be a new implementation of the X11 protocol (and what good would that do them anyway?). I can't even think of any other possible meanings.

Re:Chrome OS

[Randle_Revar]

A mis-feature, maybe. X is awesome.

Re:Chrome OS

[ultrabot]

It means a custom window manager on top of X.

Seriously?

[IANAAC]

Then with the advent of JS common etc for server apps and nosql databases; installing your software on your home Ubuntu Linux server will be a drag and drop exercise. i can image many people running their own Google like apps at home. gmail, documents, etc Ged

You must not have to support ANY family or friends when it comes to their PCs.

Most are not capable of doing such a thing. And frankly, if they were, they wouldn't bother. Hell, *I'm* capable and wouldn't go to such trouble. Just give me a netbook that runs what I want and I'm a happy camper.

Re:Seriously?

[hughperkins]

I basically don't bother providing non-Windows support any more. It's not that I don't want to, but if I spend all my time using Ubuntu, I know all the little 'gotchas' and workarounds to get wifi in Ubuntu working, so when someone comes to me with Windows with a broken wifi, I just kind of click around, turn the wifi on and off -> no clues.

Put in a Live Ubuntu usb key -> wifi works.

Show them the internet works just fine with my 'magic usb key'. Pull it out, walk away :-P

Or put it this way: my girlfriend uses Ubuntu on her pc, and she's just fine with it. It has an internet browser (firefox), can watch videos (vlc; flash plugin), can handle javascript, and she can read pdf files (evince) and read/write word documents (openoffice).

I kind of think this is how linux will end up in the hands of 'ordinary users': because if they want to count on the support of their geek friend they might find it much easier to get such help if they're running something that their geek friend is happy to support for free.

Re:Seriously?

[marcosdumay]

"I kind of think this is how linux will end up in the hands of 'ordinary users': because if they want to count on the support of their geek friend they might find it much easier to get such help if they're running something that their geek friend is happy to support for free."

Well, that was how Windows got there. Why not?

What about our software freedom?

[Cyclops]

Most (if not all) of those ARM devices have proprietary graphics cards, so the only way to maintain our software freedom is to use framebuffer (when possible at all).

It'll mean nothing [to dominate the ARM devices market] if our software freedom has bow before the shackles of a few companies.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[Entrope]

A lot of these netbooks don't have graphics cards at all -- they have frame buffers and graphics accelerators that are part of the same system-on-chip that contains the CPU. (That level of integration is one of the key reasons the hardware can be so cheap.) Your point stands -- if the only way to get decent graphics acceleration is through an NDA or closed-source libraries, its extensibility and maintainability are significantly impaired.

On the bright side, both TI's OMAP series of chips and Intel's Poulsbo design use the PowerVR SGX core, so if anyone cracks that nut it should yield benefits for a lot of end users.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[Hurricane78]

You are most certainly wrong here. From what I heard, they will use nVidia Terga GPUs, for which it will be pretty easy to have a driver.
Besides: What is all that talk about “software freedom”? It’s just a driver. If you really thought that to the end, you would have to only use hardware with all the specs available! And which are buildable with openly available tools, whose specs are available too, etc, etc, etc. Basically the ability do dig stuff out of the earth, to build machines with it, that build machines, that build your laptop, where you can put your free software on.

Everything else is just ignorance.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[Cyclops]

You are most certainly wrong here. From what I heard, they will use nVidia Terga GPUs, for which it will be pretty easy to have a driver.

Yeah, I must be wrong. Surely. That's why nVidia GPUs are fully supported by Free Software, and I wouldn't have to loose my rights to nVidias's proprietary software licensing. NOT! On all accounts. Nouveaux isn't really Free Software (it still carries blobs), and nVidias's drivers are as proprietary as it can get.

Besides: What is all that talk about “software freedom”?

It's my rights to run the software for any purpose, study, modify and distribute it. Software licensing that forbids any of these actions is just plain immoral and I can't accept it's terms and conditions.

It’s just a driver. If you really thought that to the end, you would have to only use hardware with all the specs available!

Just a driver, hey? Well, that just only hides that you have a horribly slow interface, perhaps not so energy efficient, without any bells and whistles! Is it still just? Not important at all?

And which are buildable with openly available tools, whose specs are available too, etc, etc, etc. Basically the ability do dig stuff out of the earth, to build machines with it, that build machines, that build your laptop, where you can put your free software on.

Please tell me where I can legally get nVidia's, PowerVR's etc... as Free Software so I can build it with openly available tools. Oh, heck... I don't need code, just get us those specs which are available as well...

Everything else is just ignorance.

And to say the best about you, you must be an ignorant.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[Cyclops]

The correct link is http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/free-sw.html sorry for the typo.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[selven]

In terms of long-term software freedom, it's better if we focus on getting market share now so more people will bother writing open source drivers for Linux in a decade.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[RAMMS EIN]

You misunderstand. Software freedom ends where the software ends. I don't really care how the hardware works, as long as I can write my own software to run on it. The idea isn't that strange: after all, we have the same thing with CPUs. I don't really know how my CPU works, but I know it groks AMD64 instructions. I'm not asking for the CPU design to be open source, it being elaborated with open source tools, etc. etc. I just want to know how to program the piece of hardware that I bought.

Of course, hardware can be useful without me knowing how to program it. In fact, there is a lot of hardware that I don't presently know how to program, yet which I still use regularly. However, it is important to recognize that not knowing how to program the hardware restricts the software it can be used with. In case of binary drivers for video cards, this means that the video card can only be used with other software the driver works with. That may be Windows, or OS X, or Linux, or even all of them, but what will it take to get the next revolutionary OS to work with that video card? The effect may be small, but proprietary interfaces stifle freedom, and therefore innovation.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[Anonymous Coward]

> Software licensing that forbids any of these actions is just plain immoral and I can't accept it's terms and conditions.

Immoral? What a fucking gasbag asshole you are. Don't accept the terms and conditions, but it's not immoral. What a shit sack you are. Please kill yourself before you spread your fat ignorant man titty loser germs on the rest of us.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[Lemming Mark]

There's a dude here: http://lwn.net/Articles/366266/
who suggests that the blob Nouveau currently downloads to the card is reasonably well understood and should get rewritten at some stage.

Another dude: http://lwn.net/Articles/366257/
Suggests that older GeForce cards don't need the blob.

I'm not wanting to contradict you, by the way, just wanted to note what the options are for people wanting to use Nvidia / Nouveau but who are wary of the blobs.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[Anonymous Coward]

SGX is cracked in a roundabout way. The Intel GMA500 is a PowerVR SGX535 (not a Intel design at all!), which is used on some of the Atoms like Mini10. SGX on ARM was supported already by some ~2 year old or so driver in Moblin, ironically it was ported FROM being ARM-specific to being platform agnostic (in particular working on the Atom.) This was ported first into a Dell branch of Ubuntu 8.04 (for Mini 10), I think with either 9.04 or 9.10 it's all merged in.

          Anyway, I also am not too interested in a Chrome-based machine. This was done SEVERAL times in the 90's, and I think there's the same problem as now... Both then and now too many people could "almost" use a browser for everything, but not quite. That said, Netbook Remix is ported to ARM, and it only needs 256MB of RAM and about ohh, 3GB to install (so a 4GB flash.) That $80 system won't run it but one that's like $90-100 could.

Re:What about our software freedom?

[tepples]

Software freedom ends where the software ends.

But where exactly does the software end? CPU microcode is software. BIOS is software.

ARM?

[Dumnezeu]

YABA
WTF is ARM?

Re:ARM?

[ColdWetDog]

Young'un - may I introduce you to this neat service known as Google?

Re:ARM?

[Xoron101]

Let me google that for you:
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=arm+architecture

Re:ARM?

[93 Escort Wagon]

Let me google that for you:

I tried that same search on Let me bing that for you, but all I got back was a bunch of ads...

Re:ARM?

[Dumnezeu]

Well... damn! I tried to search for information on "ARM" by completely avoiding to type "arm" in Google, thinking that it would only give me information about the human arm. I guess Google is a smarter than I thought and I find that frightening. Thank you for helping me out.

Re:ARM?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wikipedia is good for these type of searches, for ambiguous search terms it takes you to their disambiguation page and it is usually easy to work out which is the one you are trying to find out about.

Arm powered?

[Anonymous Coward]

After spending all that time learning to touch-type, now we're supposed to operate a computer with one arm while powering it with the other arm???

Oh, wait...

Never mind.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ceoyoyo]

That's nice. Can you even get a laptop/netbook/whatever without wifi these days?

Now, if they meant always on, if I had a kid I'd much rather give him a nice $1000 laptop rather than a crap laptop and $500+/year cellular data subscription.

Netbook World Summit, Wow

[pydev]

Now we have special world summits for underpowered laptops. Innovation!

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[omar.sahal]

Good point, my train of thought was along the lines of a cheap internet machine for many (especially the youths). At these prices (ARM processors are cheap) it could be a cheap fashion accessory.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[snikulin]

I would argue that "Internet" for kids is mostly Flash

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[cl0s]

you can get Netbooks now a days for $199 + 2 year contract. Still I would say its a waste, get a smart phone so you can tether to your laptop.

An atheist thanks the gods

[Anonymous Coward]

For my amd64 higher-res netbook, since my 17" HD Turion 2-core lap failed dead this week. As for me, testing distros, nothing will replace my sidux. If it's not 64-bit, it's s***. Let's see something that fits in a hand, can read a like a paperback book, works as a phone, connects to any network anywhere, has connectors for all my old-school devices, and takes astrophotos through my telescope. And doesn't cost a defense budget.

Get it done or you're not engineers.

Suggest looking to Japan

[HangingChad]

Linux is expected to dominate ARM-based netbooks because Windows doesn't run on ARM, full stop.

The small internet appliance market sort of started in Japan, so it might be worthwhile to look at what's happened to the trend there. The same application and comfort level issues existed there and yet the netbook and appliance market has continued to grow, and continued to poach traditional PC and laptop sales.

30 years ago I used to hear people ask,"What would I do with a PC?" 15 years ago companies would tell me they get along just fine without the internet and electronic mail. I heard the same thing about iPods and iPhones. So when average users don't see the utility of new technology, that doesn't mean you should close the book on it.

I've noticed over the years that price and efficiency eventually win out. Every time Linux netbooks break a price barrier, $150 then $100, you'll see more people take an interest.

Re:Suggest looking to Japan

[PCM2]

The small internet appliance market sort of started in Japan, so it might be worthwhile to look at what's happened to the trend there. The same application and comfort level issues existed there and yet the netbook and appliance market has continued to grow, and continued to poach traditional PC and laptop sales.

That's true, but the Japanese technology market doesn't really run parallel to that of the United States. Products with small form factors have always been more popular with the Japanese than with Americans. Personally, I love small laptops. The idea that you'd go out and buy a "portable" with a 17" screen seems ridiculous to me. But prior to the advent of netbooks, I would have to seek out a Japanese supplier to find something in the form factor I liked (Fujitsu, Sony) and I would have to pay a premium for it.

On the other hand, I am told mobile phones are now pretty much the primary means of casual Internet access in Japan. That includes not just Web browsing, but if you told someone you needed to send an e-mail and asked if they had a PC you could use, they would look at you strangely. "E-mail" means those little electronic messages you get on your phone. PCs are for games.

That attitude doesn't sound crazy to me, but my hunch says it will be a long time before Americans give up gMail in favor of doing all their messaging on their phones. Maybe Japanese are just more amenable to working with tiny devices because the high cost of real estate in Japanese cities means they don't have a lot of space store computers, but there might be cultural reasons, too. I was once told that American mobile phone suppliers could make phones as small, thin, and light as the ones you can get in Japan, but those models always test marketed poorly with Americans. Most Americans seem to equate "small, thin, and light" with "flimsy, cheap, and hard to handle."

I've noticed over the years that price and efficiency eventually win out. Every time Linux netbooks break a price barrier, $150 then $100, you'll see more people take an interest.

Here I agree completely. And price is what they keep buzzing about. But when the products are finally released, the manufacturers can't deliver. (See JooJoo/CrunchPad.)

My hunch? While yes, you can get an ARM CPU for a couple bucks, I'm betting the cost of engineering and manufacturing an ultraportable, ultra-micronized electronic device to the quality standards demanded by the U.S. market costs a decent chunk of change. Big manufacturers (as opposed to TechCrunch) have the best chance of success, not just because they are recognized brands, but they have the infrastructure in place to pass UL certification, FCC certification, etc., etc., and still make sure that every fifth device that rolls off the assembly line won't fail QA. It all comes down to economies of scale -- but there's the rub, because it's yet to be proven that there's even a market for these devices. Chicken, ponder egg.

Re:Suggest looking to Japan

[Max Littlemore]

That attitude doesn't sound crazy to me, but my hunch says it will be a long time before Americans give up gMail in favor of doing all their messaging on their phones.

I'm not American, Australian, but I already do 95% of my personal email an 20% of work email on my phone. And I haven't had to give up gmail - that runs by default on Android. It does of course pay to have something with a physical keyboard - a friend just got an HTC Magic and having played with it for a bit, that touch screen typing drives me ape shit bananas.

It took a while to get comfortable with it, but now that I am used to it I hardly ever turn on my lappy or desktop machines except for games, code and /.

Oh, and the reason I use a PC for /.? Because the bloated nightmare interface SUX ARSE on a small device. Uses half the battery to render the front page.

Re:Suggest looking to Japan

[PCM2]

Oh, and the reason I use a PC for /.? Because the bloated nightmare interface SUX ARSE on a small device. Uses half the battery to render the front page.

That's configurable, to a degree. Check your account preferences. The default index includes options for "Simple Design" and "Low Bandwidth," while the dynamic index includes one called "Small Screen."

Re:Suggest looking to Japan

[tepples]

15 years ago companies would tell me they get along just fine without the internet and electronic mail.

Internet access in an office typically doesn't cost $60 per month per device. Instead, businesses located in cities can usually get business-class cable or business-class DSL and run it through NAT.

in Japan [...] PCs are for games.

I thought consoles were "for games". Are you saying console gaming's lead over PC gaming is limited to Latin-alphabet locales like the Americas, Europe, and AU/NZ?

Re:Suggest looking to Japan

[Anonymous Coward]

The US market demands quality standards? The XBox 360 would like to say "hi".

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ceoyoyo]

So it only costs $1200 or so? That's one hell of a Christmas present.

Where to buy?

[Skal Tura]

I see tons of hype lately of ARM based netbooks, desktops etc etc. yet i cannot find them for sale anywhere. Not newegg, not local stores etc. and google results tend to produce only reviews. No one sells, but lots of reviews sounds to me like most of these devices are completely vaporware.

Re:Where to buy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you looked at pogoplug? These wal-wart size servers running linux have been selling like hot cakes ( I have one and I love it). Granted they are for a different use case than a desktop or a laptop but ARM is making in roads into people's homes. I would not call it vaporware for sure.

And of course...

[Anonymous Coward]

Intel and Microsoft will just sit still and wait this to happen. Windows Mobile works on ARM processors and Intel has their ARM-grade CPU (Atom series).

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Hurricane78]

I don’t think your argument is valid, as nobody will pay the 2000% price toll to get from a $80 smartbook with a flickering screen to a $1600 one from Apple (assuming usual Apple pricing) without that problem.

If I just have to live with flickering on startup and shutdown, and for that get a $80 smartbook... then I’ll buy a sixpack of ’em. ^^
Nobody cares about that, except Apple fanboys and art majors.

Besides: Don’t you think that when they are the manufacturer of the hardware and the software, they will get such a tiny problem fixed? ^^

are there any arm netbooks available now?

[sucati]

see subject

The best potential is in the smallest devices

[the ReviveR]

I think the breakthrough sector for Linux could very well be mobile phones/computers. This is an area where there simply isn't enough processing power to run Windows and even when there is, Linux will win hands down on battery life, ease of interface customization, support for non-desktop hardware(ARM) etc.

Platforms like Android, Maemo and Bada could very well start a landslide where most people end up using Linux daily. Once people get used to apps like mplayer and evince on their phones, moving to Linux on desktop will be that much easier. The increasing support for software development from major companies can be a huge boon. I also think that at least with Maemo we will see software designed for phones ported to the direction of Linux desktop.

Disclaimer: I've been using Maemo based N900 for three weeks now and the potential of the hardware & software stack makes me giddy. Every Linux geek should definitely try it =)

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ae1294]

Now, if they meant always on, if I had a kid I'd much rather give him a nice $1000 laptop rather than a crap laptop and $500+/year cellular data subscription.

LoL, you would give a child a $1000 laptop... You must be some kind of idiot...

2010 will be...

[awyeah]

... the year of Linux on the desktop^H^H^H^H^H^H^H ARM-Powered laptop.

MS will push WinCE

[Anonymous Coward]

How this will go over is unsure since CE doesn't run Wintel is anyone's guess.

Menards had wince arm netbooks on black friday. I would have bought one if it ran linux.

OEMs want to push kit not software.

Branding a netbook 'android' may change things since people will have heard about the droid by the time this theses reach market.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ceoyoyo]

You've heard the phrase "college kid" have you not? What's wrong, would you not trust your child with a computer to take to college? You must be some kind of idiot. Of course, you sound like you're somewhere in the under fifteen range. If so, I can certainly agree that you shouldn't be trusted with a laptop.

Netbooks

[nurb432]

The question is whether ARM-based netbooks will sell at all. It doesn't really matter what OS a netbook is running. Nobody buys any kind of computer to run an OS. They buy computers to run apps.

True, and if they are targeted to the 'cloud' marketing spin as netbooks are for the most part, then i don't see conflict or any reason for them not to sell.

If they can push portable 'cloud terminals' (tm) out the door at $100 or less, they will sell lots.

Linux is on almost all the netbooks now.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Almost all the netbooks are now shipping with preboot OS, going by names like InstantOS, QuickWeb, InstantWeb etc. They are all based on splashtop linux or its competitor. They boot ultrafast, typically under 10 seconds and offer web, skype, photos, music and video access. The GUI is totally locked down and it is impossible to get behind it to Linux. Often times it does not have much of writable space and the main Windows Hard disk partition is not writable. So it becomes super secure device to access the net from public wifi hotspots like airports and coffee shops. Viruses cant write anything to any place. So many people who are mainly net centric never boot to full Windows. They stay in preboot and quit. Only when they need to download pictures and music into the hard disk they boot to full Windows,

These preboot Linux will act like training wheels to let people kick their dependence on Windows. So pretty soon we might get a real year of the linux.

Re:Linux is on almost all the netbooks now.

[0ld_d0g]

These preboot Linux will act like training wheels to let people kick their dependence on Windows

You can get windows working in a "kiosk" mode too. The problem is you have to pay for it. Ignoring the preboot environment for a minute theres an interesting margin game here though.

Vendor A (low-volume)

With Windows : -$30 per license per device
With Linux : +$30 per device
Advantage : Stick with Linux

Vendor B (high-volume)

With Windows : -$10 per license per device
With Linux : +$10 per device
Advantage : Stick with Windows

Ofcource this is oversimplifying it. I don't consider the differences in selling price (which are assumed to be close to 0 due to corrective market forces) differences in costs in acquiring parts, differences in sales figures etc. This isn't a thesis, just a comment on a website :p

Maybe somebody can flesh this out a bit more..

Forget about ARM

[Yvan256]

I'm building a PIC-based micro-sub-netbook-mini that's going to last 40 weeks on a set of two AA batteries.

It won't have an OS or browser or whatnot, but it's going to run 40 weeks on a set of batteries, man!

Re:Forget about ARM

[red_blue_yellow]

Just don't try native compilation!

Seriously though, I believe Ubuntu currently natively compiles all of their packages for ARM ... and it takes them about 6 months.

Re:Forget about ARM

[RAMMS EIN]

Well, actually. I've always wondered if with advances in chip-making technology, we shouldn't be able to produce, say, computers with the computational power of last decade's machines, but with a tenth or even a hundredth of the power consumption. I would be very happy with a computer with the capabilities of the PCs of the late 1990s with a 20 hour battery life!

Re:Forget about ARM

[codeguy007]

Yeah whatever. If the processor you are compiling for isn't fast enough to compile it's own code, you just use a cross compiler.

Even then you can build clusters for compiling faster if you need to. Compiling isn't an issue.

Re:Forget about ARM

[Raptor851]

go dig up a old sharp mobilon, they're run off a pair of AA batteries from here till doomsday and are ARM based. (you can dump linux on a memory card and install it) AND they have a cardbus slot for expansions. (they're the size of a jornada). I picked one up for $5 at a ham radio swapmeet, makes an awesome mobile web browser/terminal/orinoco based wardriving machine.

Re:Forget about ARM

[Raptor851]

oop, sorry, i mean MIPS based, i had jornada on the brain....

Re:Forget about ARM

[Raptor851]

well...why not make a minimal OS for it? assuming you use a pic32 it has a network stack built in already anyways, toss on a 802.11b chipset and an anteanna trace, add a SD card slot you can bitbang to/from, and buy a replacement nintendo DS screen for it, and you could build yourself a portable, wifi enabled, pic based, touchscreen terminal for under $200 that can run all year.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ae1294]

You've heard the phrase "college kid" have you not? What's wrong, would you not trust your child with a computer to take to college? You must be some kind of idiot. Of course, you sound like you're somewhere in the under fifteen range. If so, I can certainly agree that you shouldn't be trusted with a laptop.

College kids love to spill beer all over their laptop keyboards or leave them laying about to get stolen because mommy & daddy will have to buy them a new one. They could never do their college work without one! (A total lie)

And lastly, I'm sorry but your logic really makes no sense. First you question if I have idiot children but then go on to claim I must be 15? Anyway, if I was in fact 15 I would be all for getting an overly expensive piece of tech.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ceoyoyo]

"What's wrong, would you not trust your child with a computer to take to college?"

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that you're not familiar with the concept (or practice) of empathetic reasoning. Otherwise known as "putting yourself in someone else's shoes."

I also didn't claim you are 15, just that you sound like it. To be clearer, your attitude towards children is reminiscent of either an insecure teenager or a get-off-my-lawn bitter oldster. Your poor manners tilted my suspicions in favour of angsty teenager. My apologies if I was incorrect.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ae1294]

"What's wrong, would you not trust your child with a computer to take to college?"

If my child wants a $1000 laptop they can save their own money and buy one themselves else they are getting a basic $400 unit that will do everything they need.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that you're not familiar with the concept (or practice) of empathetic reasoning. Otherwise known as "putting yourself in someone else's shoes."

Honestly you're still making yourself sound like a total idiot and you remind me of a very incompetent Glenn Beck...

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Anonymous Coward]

The flickering of the screen, if I understand you correctly, is fixed by using KMS (Kernel Mode Setting).

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[cenc]

ummmm, that sounds like Ubuntu's problem (likly on your particular hardware), not a problem of linux or any of the hundreds of other distros that I know of.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Dusty101]

One thing to ask your self is would Apple (or other unnamed companies operating in the OS space)
allow such a case of the above screen flickering, or would it be dealt with even if the X server had to be replaced (if that is the problem)

Actually, yes they would:

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-10329627-263.html

(Caveat: This has been fixed now. I mention this, though, because it drove me nuts on my unibody MacBook Pro for a good while).

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[RAMMS EIN]

``One thing to ask your self is would Apple (or other unnamed companies operating in the OS space) allow such a case of the above screen flickering, or would it be dealt with even if the X server had to be replaced (if that is the problem)''

Don't know the flicker you're referring to, but I've owned Apple computers whose screens flickered on startup, and Windows at least used to do that, too (haven't seen versions after ~2001).

Does that answer your question?

Get That!

[Xamusk]

Get that OLPC!

Finally a true sub-$100 "laptop". One which is not vaporware like the OLPC.

Yes, I know there are real OLPCs out there, but until I can get my hands on one, it's still vapor as far as I can tell.

By the way, not making the OLPC available for anyone but governments to buy was one (among many) of the biggest mistakes you did. You simply closed yourself to your own community.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm, didn't KMS solve this?

Some ARMs are slow, but not all

[Anonymous Coward]

There are a lot of versions for the ARM processor. Some with less power, some more.

So it's a toss up.

If you want the netbook to be fast, really fast, be ready for one with a BIG battery, or you need to recharge it more often.

There *ARE* many versions of ARM processors which have more power than Intel Atom / VIA Nano, you just need to get the manufacturer to produce one with a powerful ARM processor.

I'll rush and buy one!

[udippel]

Of course. That's what I have been waiting for since the first rumours crept up around a year ago.
My Acer Aspire One running some version of Linux is my everyday companion. Too small a screen and keyboard for long working hours, but phantastic to just jug it in my bag and carry it wherever I go, including doing presentations, conferences, reading mail, while on the go.
I understand, if there was some ARM at a similar level of performance, it'd be cheaper, consume less power, and run Linux (e.g. Debian) just as well.

If I'm wrong, correct me.
If I'm right, tell me where I can queue up and buy one.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Anonymous Coward]

It did, but the proprietary nvidia drivers doesn't suppoert KMS (yet atleast).

Frecon Netbooks

[Zero_DgZ]

Screw netbooks. When can I buy a proper PDA again? Something about the size of a stack of 3x5 cards with nice, high-res touchscreen, maybe one of those trendy slideout keyboards, Wifi, Bluetooth, decent amount of storage, and a memory card slot? That can run an actual web browser and other arbitrary apps? And with battery life that doesn't totally suck, and that's not a freaking phone tied to a contract and service agreement and which will refuse to work without a valid SIM card?

Maybe something that can run SSH and remote desktop, run a REAL web browser (not Pocket Internet Explorer, like current WinMo handhelds/phones), play a couple of games, play back video, network tasks, etc.? My old Axim does all of the above except the web browser part; Apparently nobody is interesting in making a mobile web browser that doesn't run on a damn phone. I don't need a damn phone-tied-to-PDA. I already have a phone.

Re:Frecon Netbooks

[slinches]

I'm posting this from a Nokia N900, which does nearly everything you describe. It does have phone functionality built in, but it works just fine without a sim card. Even though it's only been available a few weeks ssh, vim and several other useful apps have been ported with the promise of many more in the near future (debian based Maemo OS). Devices like this and it's predecessors (N800, N810) do exist.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Anonymous Coward]

Does said $400 laptop have enough horsepower to run a TeX app, a dvi viewer, Matlab, eclipse, firefox, and MS Word simultaneously?

As a college student, I frequently end up with all of that open at once: Firefox to get the problem set that's hosted online, Word to read it, TeX to work on writing up a proof thats on it, the dvi viewer to look at my proof so far, Matlab to work through some mathematical examples, and eclipse if I need write any actual code for the problem set.

So, there is actual academic need for me to have a decent machine.

I think you might be being too hard on college students. There are many people who are actually responsible.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[StuartHankins]

...run a TeX app, a dvi viewer, Matlab, eclipse, firefox, and MS Word simultaneously

"Which one of these things is not like the other; which one of these things does not be-long..."

It's the display, stupid

[Gothmolly]

The CPU is not the power hungry monster in a netbook, its the screen. Fix THAT problem before diddling with new CPU architectures.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[CAIMLAS]

Troll? I'll bite.

There are warts in Linux that do not get fixed, such as the flickering screen in Ubuntu boot and shut down, despite attention from distro's (others, such as suspending a computer, are only on a minority of chip sets and can be fixed when working with a Manufacturer)

This is nothing new, for anyone. XP, Vista, Windows 7? Yeah, they've all got issues with proper suspend - largely due to ATI and/or Nvidia drivers/hardware (as well as misc. wireless cards), it would seem.

Besides, we're talking about ARM systems not x86 systems, with a concerted vendor support. Those bugs are quite likely to be fixed, due to the diverse/capable suspend + power management functionality present in all ARM cores.

It seems that Linux needs a business to focus on it and ensure that the customer experience is fully taken into account (with deference paid to hackers and community organisations such as Gnome, Kde etc).

IBM? Redhat? Canonical? Novell? Nokia? Dell? HP? Or the (hundreds? thousand?) of others. They're all throwing their hats in, to one degree or another. Linux software development is hardly a "volunteer only" effort anymore.

One thing to ask your self is would Apple (or other unnamed companies operating in the OS space) allow such a case of the above screen flickering, or would it be dealt with even if the X server had to be replaced (if that is the problem)

I have not seen/noticed this "flickering" you speak of on any of the systems I've got/maintain. Are you talking about the graphical "loading with logo" boot/shutdown screens? And if so, why is this even a problem? (While I did reboot "recently", that "recently" was a couple weeks ago, so I do not have a solid memory of the event and can't say it doesn't happen with any certainty.)

If a non-quantifiable "flickering" and suspend issues (still endemic to many OSes/hardware platforms) are your biggest problems with Linux, it would seem you've not got all that much to complain about. (Are you sure you've done much more than install Linux? It doesn't much seem like you know what you're talking about, either.)

The "os==nothing, apps==all" meme is dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe, just maybe Microsoft is hoping to gently force app providers to just deliver apps done with Microsoft frameworks (C#, what not). The others will be slowly left behind.

This might be a big chance to shake out "all too independent" app providers.

Remember Asimov's The Evitable Conflict?

So what...

[voss]

The target audience of Chrome OS isnt people who own macbooks or play pc games.

The target audience is people who use gmail or yahoo mail and play
  flash games and want a cheap and cheerful internet station.

Its like trying to sell BMW and Lexus owners a Vespa. Of course they dont need it.

good luck with that

[voss]

If a netbook comes out at $99 or less, its an impulse buy like a CD player or a ipod nano.
If it sells stores will carry it regardless of what microsoft wants.

Re:good luck with that

[NickFortune]

If a netbook comes out at $99 or less, its an impulse buy like a CD player or a ipod nano. If it sells stores will carry it regardless of what microsoft wants.

Well exactly. But nevertheless, we've seen major retail chains that have somehow failed to stock the linux variations of some netbooks in favour of the windows ones; and we've seem OEMs that withdrew Linux based netbooks at the last moment before launch. Which suggests to me that MS have been active behind the scenes already.

There is a question as to how long they can keep it up, however.

Microsoft Friendly Retail

[westlake]

Last April, Microsoft argued that it controlled the netbook OS market for devices sold in certain Microsoft-friendly US retail stores, while ABI Research claims that Linux actually has 32% of the worldwide netbook market, and that its market-share is growing

The Microsoft friendly shop is damn near every office supply house or general merchandise outlet in the states with four walls and a roof.

Walmart carried the flag for Linux in big box retail for ten years.

This holiday season it is all Windows:

Entry level for a full size brand-name 64 bit Win 7 Premium laptop is $350. Acer 15.6" AS5517-5136 Laptop PC

That may come as an eye-opener for the geek.

The ARM netbook like the Google PC is still a phantom - no one quite knows quite when or where it will materialize or how much it will cost.

Chrome's value seems utterly dependent on cheap - reliable - universal - broadband. I am not sure we are there yet.

Of course, one reason why the retailer is Microsoft friendly is the prospect of significant aftermarket sales.

Hardware, software, peripherals. Inks and papers.

That helps keep the price of the Windows PC competitive - and it raises the question of whether retailers will make an all-out push for the next generation network appliance.
   

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Anonymous Coward]

Eh, you really overestimate your demands. A $300 netbook could run all of that stuff fine, except Eclipse, and even that's doable for small projects if you upgrade RAM.

Mandriva is not the same thing as Chrome..

[adpads]

The most important thing is going to be to get a full-fledged Linux desktop onto people's little ARM devices, with a Thunderbird they can configure and an OpenOffice they can run. If people have that they are going to use it, and then it's going to be fashionable.
The most important job belongs to Aaron Siego and Arnaud Laprévote here - it's make-or-break to get a proper, usable Linux onto these devices, and not some flimsy excuse for an OS. If they can get a Linux into people's hands which they can use, they will!

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[mikechant]

There are warts in Linux that do not get fixed, such as the flickering screen in Ubuntu boot and shut down, despite attention from distro's...

I thought kernel mode setting (currently being rolled out) was the fix for this?

ARM-based media PCs?

[RichiH]

I want something ARM-based that can do 1080p, has decent networking, a SATA port.

Ideally, I could throw Debian onto it, but that is not a hard need.

While being able to get DVB-T out of the box and a pretty GUI would be nice, I have no problem calling MPlayer from the command line, either.

Does something like that exist?

CE runs on ARM

[tepples]

The best thing about ARM-based netbook (and the worst thing for an average consumer) is that you cannot put Windows on it.

Citation that Handheld PCs running what is now called Windows Mobile never existed.

Re:CE runs on ARM

[buruonbrails]

The best thing about ARM-based netbook (and the worst thing for an average consumer) is that you cannot put Windows on it.

Citation that Handheld PCs running what is now called Windows Mobile never existed.

Obviously, by "Windows" in this context I meant NT kernel based version of Windows. JFYI, Windows CE != Windows NT, the are completely different operating systems and do not share code.
Not to say that an average consumer would probably find Windows Mobile even more weird than netbook Linux distro.

Re:CE runs on ARM

[tepples]

JFYI, Windows CE != Windows NT, the are completely different operating systems and do not share code.

That's what they said about Windows 9x before the transition from ME to XP. Is there a reason why a future version of NT can't have a layer to run CE apps, much like WOW on Windows NT or WOW64 on Windows XP/Vista 64?

Data plan

[tepples]

If they can push portable 'cloud terminals' (tm) out the door at $100 or less

Subsidized by a data plan commitment lasting for how many months at how much money per month?

Your screen must be this tall to run Inkscape

[tepples]

A $300 netbook could run all of that stuff fine, except Eclipse, and even that's doable for small projects if you upgrade RAM.

I have an ASUS Eee PC running Ubuntu Karmic, and I can't run quite a few apps from the repository, like Inkscape, because the apps were developed under the assumption that a screen is at least 768 pixels tall. For purposes of Windows licensing, I seem to remember that Microsoft defines an ultra-low-cost personal computer (that is, a netbook) as having a screen no larger than 1024x600 pixels. Does Eclipse work better than Inkscape on a small screen?

Re:Your screen must be this tall to run Inkscape

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's something that's rather frustrating: in Xubuntu, the standard login screen for 9.10 isn't correctly arranged for a 800 x 600 display. All the buttons that lie across the bottom of the screen, like Sessions and the system clock are all mixed up and bunched together. Don't get me started on how lousy the GIMPs UI is in this resolution. I'll take Paint Shop Pro 4 any day. (I'm personally more upset that I can't use my swish login screen layout I arranged for the old version of gdm or whatsit. I very, very rarely use the obscured buttons.)

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[dave87656]

Not just the youth. Alot of people, especially senior citizens, only use the internet. Of course, netbook screens are too small for them, but the concept of an internet oriented laptop with low power usage and a low price is very appealing to them.

"apps" means you're a Microsoft whore

[ReedYoung]

It's as simple as that.

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[Hypoon]

Whoa whoa whoa, slow down there. I'm a college freshman, in fact I just finished my first semester of classes today and have my finals on Wednesday and Friday. I take my laptop with me every day for several reasons.

First, all of my professors expect us to check our e-mail multiple times each day, and several have specific coursework that must be completed on a computer outside of class. At the college I attend, most of the students have laptops (I can't think of anyone specifically who doesn't). Although these tasks can be accomplished in the university labs, having a laptop makes it considerably easier.

Second, I never let it out of my sight (literally, with the one exception of when it's on my back), and take rather good care of it. I paid the $3200 price tag for a laptop I could get decent virtualization and CUDA performance out of, so it's not surprising that the only damage it has suffered since April 2008 is a small nick in the edge of the plastic below my trackpad (I dropped my graphing calculator).

Third, I'll admit that I have one friend whose laptop might as well be disposable as far as his parents' wallet is concerned, but that is not the norm. My best friend bought his laptop out of pocket (similar price tag to mine), and most of my other friends split the cost with their parents.

That all set aside, I strongly support giving children laptops. My dad started me on his computer when I was two years old, and I don't mean with big plastic attachments or anything, not even a mouse at that time. Sixteen years later I'm not a computer-science major because of the sheer boredom I find in taking the classes. Unfortunately the University won't let me test out of prerequisites. On the other hand, my parents barely ever bought anything for my computer. Being limited to minimal software (Windows and Office, not much else) pushed me to try out FOSS, which I quickly came to love. Being limited by dated hardware caused me to explore Linux and Unix operating systems as well as to learn how to sap the most power possible out of the hardware available to me.

Just my two cents, take it from a college kid who wasn't spoiled but grew up with computers his whole life. Really, we don't all party, many (most) of us take good care of our laptops and don't risk them being stolen, and often mommy and daddy won't buy us the first one, let alone a new one. Not technically, but realistically, we do need them to do our college work as well.

Re:Apps aplenty

[m1xram]

If Linux is compiled for ARM that means GCC and G++ have been built, which means that ever other app can be built. Therefore, every app for Gnome, KDE, and all the other desktops should be available. You'll probably see a netbook friendly desktop like XFCE or BusyBox, to reduce hardware requirements, but either will allow you to run OpenOffice. OO includes a Word Processor, Spreadsheet, Database, and Drawing apps. There are thousands of other free apps. You could run a web server, an SQL database, Internet clients for browsing, blogging, email, ftp, bit torrent, twitter, IM, etc. You could run a PIM app, several calculators, video and sound apps, hundreds of games. You could make programs in almost any language you like PERL, C, C++, Python, PHP, Ruby, TCL, Basic, multiple shell scripts, etc.

Above is a subset of what is installed on my laptop with the exception of KDE, XFCE, and BusyBox, but I have KDE apps. You couldn't install everything I have on this laptop to an ARM netbook, because it probably wouldn't fit on the storage device included, but I bet you could pick subset you find useful.

To the Linux crowd: I apologize in advance for leaving out your favorite app off the list. To be fair their are thousands.

What app do you need for your netbook?

Free BIOS and CPU microcode?

[tepples]

It's my rights to run the software for any purpose, study, modify and distribute it. Software licensing that forbids any of these actions is just plain immoral and I can't accept it's terms and conditions.

Do you also insist on coreboot instead of non-free BIOS (which means not buying a PC from a major OEM)? And do you also insist on a CPU with Free microcode (which means no Intel or AMD)?

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ae1294]

First, all of my professors expect us to check our e-mail multiple times each day, and several have specific coursework that must be completed on a computer outside of class. At the college I attend, most of the students have laptops (I can't think of anyone specifically who doesn't). Although these tasks can be accomplished in the university labs, having a laptop makes it considerably easier.

I totally agree, it is easier and better to have a working laptop to do your college work on...

and take rather good care of it. I paid the $3200 price tag for a laptop

The keyword here is I. When you pay for something you are more likely to take care of it.

That all set aside, I strongly support giving children laptops.

I think you are misunderstanding my point. I am all for giving children a desktop computers as soon as possible. Now giving a $1000 laptop to a 10 year old is just dumb and most college age people don't need anything more than a $400-$500 laptop. If those young adults are into computer games and want to chip in some money than sure, if they are responsible with computers and need the extra power than sure as well! What I laugh at is when people think their English major kids need anything more than a basic unit.

Case in point I bought four Compaq/HP Presario F500 laptops two years ago for $399 each. They where being discontinued because they came with VISTA Home Premium and didn't have the Ram/Power to run it.

SPECS:

AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core processor T53 at 1.7 GHz
15.4 inch WXGA Widescreen Display 1280x800
NVIDIA GeForce Go 6150 Video
SATA 80GB 5400rpm Hard Drive
1024MB DDR2 System Memory
Super Multi 8X DVD plus/minus R/RW with Double Layer Support
802.11b/g Wireless

I wiped them and installed XP. Gave one to my wife, mother, and daughter. The last one I kept for myself as a travel system. Care to Guess which one has had problems??? Yes the 16 year old's because she chooses not to use it responsibly. I even gave her a written list of things never to do and explained how one gets a virus and breaks a laptop but you know how that goes. Lucky I made my own restore disk so I wouldn't have to deal with most of it every month when she's managed to install some spyware. And yes I force her to use Firefox but that doesn't prevent her from clicking on anything and everything she gets from her friends. Nor did it stop her from running the unit on her fluffy bed where it couldn't breath even though I had got her a pad for it to sit on and told her it would cause problems for it. She simply doesn't care because she knows daddy will fix it or buy her a new one (preferable a NEW one). This is the point I was trying to make and it has nothing to do with my kid just with people who choose not to treat things well because they where free. After she cooked the processor I took her lappy away and forced her to use a desktop for six months and now she treats the lappy with a little more respect. Not much but enough not to let the thing cook.

On the other hand, my parents barely ever bought anything for my computer. Being limited to minimal software (Windows and Office, not much else) pushed me to try out FOSS, which I quickly came to love. Being limited by dated hardware caused me to explore Linux and Unix operating systems as well as to learn how to sap the most power possible out of the hardware available to me.

And what would have happened if they had bought you everything you asked them for? do you really think you would know anything about Linux or how to fix your computer when you have a hardware problem?

Just my two cents, take it from a college kid who wasn't spoiled but grew up with computers his whole life. Really, we don't all party, many (most) of us take good care of our laptops and don't risk them being stolen, and often mommy and dad

Re:ARM-Powered Laptops To Increase Linux Market Sh

[ae1294]

P.S. good luck with school.

I was a "comp sci" major 10 years ago but had to drop out when my mother got laid off from her job and I had to bump up my job hours to support her and couldn't handle both school and working full time in tech support.

The computer classes are boring as hell when you already know the stuff but I was taking hard core math classes at the time.

Try and set some money aside if you can. Just in case shit continues to hit the fan.

The tool is everything, the apps are indeterminate

[Anonymous Coward]

Which is the advantage of it starting as a specific appliance. When Alice doesn't have to wait to get to her desk to write that letter to Bob, her skill in writing on that 'inconvenient' piece of equipment increase. I never expected texting to take off, but some have acquired the skill to use a 12-character pad with surprising speed.

People "think" they need Windows because that's all they're familiar with. However, people can adapt*.

*Maybe one day I'll no longer get the 8 word emails of: "Hey, would you look at this? Document attached." Where the document is exclusively text.

Free netbooks, so what!

[Anonymous Coward]

I see this as giving the razor away for free, then overcharging for the blades. Sure netbooks will be under a $100, but what is the cost to connect to the internet. Intel and Microsoft bleed to death and the telco and cable companies carry the cash to the bank by the truck load. Linux and ARM change nothing.

This is a no-brainer

[apexwm]

Linux should (hopefully) dominate on more lightweight hardware, like netbooks. The reason is plain and simple: Windows is too bloated to run on these devices. Microsoft has scammed its customers by stripping away features in Windows 7 Starter Edition to make it less bloated, but is allowing the purchase of another Windows Edition for a price. Shameful. You can count on any Linux distribution installed on a netbook to run efficiently, and be full featured. http://members.apex-internet.com/sa/windowslinux