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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."
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.
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.
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.
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)
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.
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.
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.
Funny may not give karma, but +5 Informative never made anyone snort coffee out their nose.
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.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
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.)
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
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/
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.
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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.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
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.
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!
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
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.
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.