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Google Netbook Specs Leaked
Foochee noted that specs have leaked for an alleged new Google NetBook. Coupling this with the HTC Google Phone, it really appears that Google is going to be pushing into new spaces in the next few years.
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No kidding, TANSTAAFL.
Pick (at least) one:
A - All of these [rumors] aren't true.
B - You're going to be forced to watch ads.
C - It's going to be bundled with a monthly wireless bill.
doesn't mean shit. gsm or cdma
Does anyone know why there are no ARM nettops?
Is it that it can't be made or perhaps that there's almost no profit margin left if it has to undercut something like the $200 Acer Aspire Revo?
I'd love to see something like Beagleboard that I could mount on the back of an LCD.
i played with Wave and think it sucks. it's slow, it's a resource hog and no one is on it. I joined a few public waves and now my Chrome RAM usage goes up to 600MB of RAM.
I played with Chrome OS and think it sucks as well. you can't do anything without an internet connection.
even my iphone can do a lot more without an internet connection in places like the NYC subway
D - If any of these are true, I don't want one.
Though the idea sounds cool, I'm wondering what benefit having a solid-state drive with a 10" screen will be other than for those few road warriors who have to write long proposals while on an airplane flight.
At the same time, having a bundled deal so that one gets phone service with the netbook isn't that much of a benefit, IMO. You can already do this with a HTC Hero/Android device or even an iPhone.
The Kai's Semi-Updated Website Thingy
At that price point, I'd expect it to come with some kind of (legal) obligation towards Google. Can I take the device, nuke ChromeOS and load my own GNU/Linux distribution? Do I have to register the device with Google?
Maybe I'm wrong and maybe the price point is realistic in accordance with the cost of manufacturing. I'd expect that Google, effectively being an advertising company, would have some rules in place to ensure the "fair" use of their investment.
Why would a computer which only uses web applications need a 64GB SSD?
Orwellian Society was beginning. ....
User: What happen ?
Router: Somebody set up us the banners.
Computer: We get wi-fi signal.
User: What !
Operator: Main screen turn on.
User: It's You !!
Google: How are you gentlemen !!
Google: All your browsing history are belong to us.
Google: You are on the way to spam.
User: What you say !!
Google: You have no chance to hide make your time.
Google: HA HA HA HA
User: Download every 'Linux Distro' !!
User: You know what you doing.
User: Install 'Linux Distro'.
User: For great justice.
OSNews also questions why such a device would need such a large SSD. I can well believe it will be ARM based (so long as the ARM version of flash is up to the job) but that hard drive size seems excessive even if it is keeping two copies of the OS (one for restoration purposes). It will also be interesting to see if the Moblin boot time work and Kernel Mode Setting support would/could be supported in an NVIDIA binary driver...
The advantages, IMHO, of ARM are all tilted for use in the mobile space.
Being 5, 15, whatever watts more efficient than an Atom is a high price to pay for breaking x86 compatibility when you're hooked to a wall outlet, considering your choice in monitor likely has as much impact on your final power bill as your ARM/Atom choice.
No more than stupid rumors. Chrome OS main strength is the ability to run on cheap hardware, and if Google netbook will exist, it will utilize this advantage. For example, why does it need 64Gb SSD while it may store all data in the cloud? Why does it need NVidia Tegra chip? To play 720p HD video on 10" screen? - what a joke.
Will they be able to combine GPS tracking w/ browsing history to deliver the most relevant ads? Sigh.
...it really appears that Google is going to be pushing into new spaces in the next few years.
Sorry for being a smartass (blame it on me being at work for one day during the holidays...) but, really, who didn't already know that? Especially if you're even a casual reader of slashdot. It's clear that Google is an expanding company who's focused on a wide offering of products and services that are internet- and information-related. Anyone who doesn't know that Google is planning on pushing into new market segments hasn't been paying a hint of attention.
You could have said this at any point in Google's history. It's almost to the point that all Google stories should be marked dupe.
If aspiration is a virtue, achievement cannot be a vice.
Actually, when you take out windows margins (cost of windows software and also royalties, etc), it's not that much of a surprise what they are saying they will offer.
Given the existence of things like this HP thin client (1.2GHz Marvel ARM Soc, 512MB RAM, 512MB flash, DVI video, running a modified version of Debian(though they don't really like to talk about that), $199 quoted price, quite possibly less, given how enterprise product pricing tends to work) I'd say that building ARM nettops is clearly possible; but(depending on exactly how far down HP actually goes on the stated price) their may not be a whole lot of margin to work with.
This can be interesting, why:
IMHO one of the core reasons all consumer PCs come with Intel compatible processors is that Windows runs on them. Equip them with other processors and you can not sell your product with Windows. And that is an absolute suicidal business plan at the moment. Google may get this going, get non-Windows and non-Intel computers to the masses, opening up a lot of space for competitors.
And if it doesn't work, well we can always continue dreaming.
I rather see ads relevant to me than irrelevant ads.
That's true, but there is the factor that ARM chips also cost less and usually require only one chip package instead of two for cpu+gpu+io which also cuts circuit board costs.
The new Atom "Silverthorne" chips mitigate this to some extent by having the GPU integrated into the CPU package and no longer need a 6 layer PCB.
I'm trying to build a 24" digital picture frame (among other features), and I think the control computer is going to end up being an AspireRevo which seems totally overkill. I'd love to see a cheaper, more efficient option with 1080p output.
We've given up on the goal of not being bothered by commercial solicitation every bloody minute of our lives?
Because Windows doesn't run on it. I saw a piece on Google news about the netbook fad dying. The premise is that they lost sight of their original goals and are just becoming low powered laptops. IMO, this is mainly down to trying to get windows on netbooks.
This is true. We're seeing fewer with SSDs, they're becoming slightly bigger but still have shitty little atom processors.
So now they're not as portable, more expensive and irrelevant. The EEE's were awesome (typing this on my 901 in bed), cheap, ran forever (compared to a laptop) and could take some serious abuse.
Personally I believe the netbook will be another victim of the Windows monopoly.
I intend the keep my little EEE. I went to Crucial, scored some extra memory and a 64 gig ssd. It runs eveything I want just fine and has more than enough space for when I'm out and about.
I'd love to see something like Beagleboard that I could mount on the back of an LCD.
Et voila!
quote:
It's like getting a Ferrari for the price of a Mini Cooper. (...) The Google netbook will be subsidised.
Now, who will pay this device ?
The beagleboard. Capable of dvi and hdmi output. 256M ram. Linux running on it.
It looks like you're writing a letter!
Google Docs is a great tool for collaboratively writing documents. Tell me more!
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
Fear and because it is bad business.
People that sell Windows machines probably make as much from the crapware they install on each machine as they do on the machine. Once you leave the windows world you loose that money and throw in that they will have a razor thin margin and you have a high risk situation.
I am not jumping up and down about Chrome. I have seen the SDK on the Pre and I am convinced that the idea of HTML+javascript is NOT a great development platform. Yes Web apps are very cool but I wouldn't want to try and write to do any DSP or image processing with javascript and doing it all server side really pushes the cost of entry for the developer through the roof.
Web and only web just doesn't work for me.
I am still convinced that for the "Smartbook" to work you will need to have an app store. No Synaptic+Apt IS NOT AN APPSTORE. It doesn't allow you to buy and sell apps.
An apps store would allow the Smartbook maker to make a little money on the sale of a lot of software and pushes down the cost of software to the point that it becomes a why not purchase.
It also gives developers a way to make a little money and gives the average user a safe and easy place to get software. Sure allow people to side load apps but give them an app store.
Frankly that is what Linux and smartbooks are missing. To me Chrome is nothing more than a neat research project.
Think about GoogleDocs. It is great and very handy but how many people have stopped using Office or OpenOffice and gone 100% Googledocs?
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
To say nothing of being continuously watched for the purpose of being separated from our money.
If it has a price tag of less than $300, as the article says, its a real good deal. It won't be a desktop replacement at all but it'd be great as a web device.
The advantages, IMHO, of ARM are all tilted for use in the mobile space.
Being 5, 15, whatever watts more efficient than an Atom is a high price to pay for breaking x86 compatibility when you're hooked to a wall outlet, considering your choice in monitor likely has as much impact on your final power bill as your ARM/Atom choice.
I don't get this. Mind you, I first used ARM powered desktop machines (running BSD) in 1989, so it doesn't seem that new or revolutionary to me. But unless you're tied to legacy proprietary applications, what does it matter what the processor is? The ARM processor family has always been a competitive alternative to Intel, if you were not tied to Windows. And with Debian and Ubuntu available for ARM, I shall be very keen to have one of these babies as a useful mobile workstation.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
FTFA: "However, in some countries like the US, Google will tie up with one or more network operators and sell it as part of a bundled 3G plan"
I'd estimate the bloatware that manufacturers bundle with Windows based PCs will nearly off-set the cost of Windows licensing. I pick 'A'.
Very interesting points.
As I understand, Ubuntu plans to add support for paid apps in their Software Center. http://arstechnica.com/open-source/reviews/2009/11/good-karma-ars-reviews-ubuntu-910.ars/8
A revenue sharing system on Software Center sales could give computer sellers a serious reason to promote Ubuntu.
This is a good idea, I think I have to write such an app for X11, sniffing active windows and keyloggin should be enough.. :-)
I swear to fucking God this damn thing has been Coming Real Soon Now(TM) for 2 goddamn years. How fucking hard is it to cram an ARM processor into a fucking laptop and put it on the market? Fucking vaporware motherfuckers.
Behold!
From a Register article talking about Chrome OS:
You can also follow the bugs that are being worked on in the ARM native client port.
How the fuck is this insightful? Apple mods in full swing today?
How much is a company willing to pay to be able to deliver there advertisement to not only the right person, but the right person in the right place!
I'll be happy if all of those are true... and I can install my own god damn linux distro on it.
Chrome Netbook Specs Stretch Believability---Interest in Google's Chrome OS is heating up with the emergence of new rumors about specs for an upcoming . The device would supposedly have a 10.1 TFT HD-ready multitouch display; 2GB RAM; and WiFi, Bluetooth, and 3G connectivity. As if that wasn't enough, this netbook would also have a 64GB solid-state drive, according to IBTimes (more on that source in a minute). By the sound of it, the Chrome OS netbook sounds like a great device, but there's only one problem: in my view these rumors aren't very believable.
It goes on from there, and I think this "news" is moot. I for one hope the 2010's will have less of this rumor frenzy on the monkeysphere.
I want one too, something like a scaled up N800 with a non-sucky screen, a small SSD, and a real kbd. So as my N800 can run for 8 days before I have to recharge it (depending on how much I use it to play videos), a netbook with a much larger battery should be able to run for days.
It'll never happen though because, as others have said, it can't run Windows, and ain't no way that Joe and Jane Sixpack will ever become non-sheeple and try anything that all their neighbors are not doing.
Because Windows doesn't run on it. I saw a piece on Google news about the netbook fad dying. The premise is that they lost sight of their original goals and are just becoming low powered laptops. IMO, this is mainly down to trying to get windows on netbooks.
I think just the opposite - Windows (especially XP) runs great on atom-based systems, so people are buying them as a primary computers instead of secondary gadgets. (The crowd around the netbook counter at the local Best Buy certainly did not look like the kind of people with multiple PCs.)
If the netbook fad is "dying", it is because WinTel killed it to protect their margins.
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
We already know that the bios is locked down, and it only runs approved web apps. It's a welfarebook, not a netbook.
Attempting to change it will trigger a re-imaging.
But here is the "problem" with too many Linux supporters.
"I think that dropping the "store" name was a good move. One of the most important advantages that Linux has to offer end users is the availability of a rich ecosystem of free and open third-party applications. It's important to emphasize that advantage and avoid using language that downplays it."
Guess what? Windows has probably got just as much free software as Linux does. Just about every major project has ported it's software to Windows as well as Linux.
Let's take a look at some of the big names.
Firefox.
Gimp.
Apache
PHP
Perl
MySQL
Postgres
OpenOffice
Pidgin
Adium
All available for Windows
The simple truth is that you loose very little in the way of free software buy going to Windows.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Ok?
Buy a 3 beagle board and strap it to the back of an LCD. Revision 3 has pinouts for direct lcd connection, other versions have dvi output through an hdmi jack. You then have exactly what you are looking for. You could probably even do it for $200 (using revision c, a small cheap lcd and a case crafted from spare parts).
I really wish slashdot allowed me to edit posts. I swear the ability to submit without preview is almost as big a pain in the rear as waiting for preview was. remove the first 3 from the above post and replace the second one with a "c" for revision c beagle board.
Okay, let's see if I've got this straight...
#1) Google will SUBSIDIZE the cost of the netbook (aka NetPC, which was hacked out of existence).
#2) Unlike NetPC, they won't be using an intel processor, locking out Windows.
--- so when joey or jane try to download and install their favorite game or chat client, it will fail.
--- so when grandma can't load in her quickbooks document for the church, it will fail.
#3) As someone who has lurked in many a netbook forum, I can tell you the number one question will be "How do I install Windows XP on it?"
#4) Someone will figure out how to install alternative OSes on it, maybe even write some kind of intel CPU emulator, or real-time recompiler, and then hack Windows into running on it, and then the lawsuits begin.
#5) As soon as people get bored with it, into the trash heap it goes.
Google will lose money on this deal. Chrome will not take hold, in fact, most early adopters will be spending their time trying to get Chrome off of it. When the masses get it they will be disappointed by it's lack of backwards compatibility, and start searching (ironically using Google) for websites to show them how to "jailbreak" the thing into running what they want. Adblocker apps will appear as will other hacks to thwart Google, so people can feel they got a "free netbook".
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
$300 price tag due to the device being subsidized.
And since Google is not a charity organization, that means there will be other costs.
Most likely a wireless contract.
unless Google is willing to promote its new OS so hard, that it intends to sell these at loss just to gain a market share. Sounds extremely unlikely but knowing Google and its wild ideas (free 1GB email with POP3 anyone?) not entirely impossible.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
There was one called the Pepperpad. It was ~$700 and ran a java gui on top of montavista linux. It was end-of-lifed and replaced with an x86 compatible chip. It was slow, and a marketplace of apps never really surfaced for it.
Sorry about the botched link...
I was hoping for some Google Goggles.
It isn't just being tied to legacy proprietary applications, it is also being tied to proprietary drivers. Ubuntu developers estimate 70-80% of Ubuntu users are using close-source drivers and/or software. Run on anything other than x86 and your options decrease quickly.
You can do most of what you can do on x86 on ARM, but is $10 a year in power bills worth the hassle of fighting though compiling just one app which hasn't taken ARM into account? This makes desktop ARM not ready for prime-time, IMHO. Embedded (as in the picture frame mentioned above)? Sure - and there are already products to serve that role.
Being 5, 15, whatever watts more efficient than an Atom is a high price to pay for breaking x86 compatibility
What is this price that end-users would supposedly pay? Debian has an ARM distro I've used and it's equal to the X86 distro in every way. My HP all in one printer/scanner device works perfectly on ARM. SANE is a nice way to get *fully* networked scanner. Cameras mount as mass storage devices. media players do the same thing.
The necessity to be on an x86 platform is gone in the consumer's use case. Nevermind they don't know or care about X86/ARM/MIPS.
Maybe 'the price' is the effort that some peripheral manufacturers slavishly sticking to proprietary software would have to pay? Canon/Epson, I'm looking at you.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
If power usage is not limited by battery life, ARM hasn't been truly competitive with Intel (or AMD or IBM) for a long time. I don't think there any ARM CPUs that are even close to having as much performance as a dual-core Atom, let alone something based on the Core or Nehalem microarchitecture.
No, not cool. In the end it will be like getting a Mini Cooper for the price of three. You overpay for data service on a wireless (hello Verizon and AT&T), and this "netbook" will be more sluggish than the Atom based crap out there.
Athiesm is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Opening up the processor market:
I ran Debian's ARM distro on an NSLU2 a couple of years ago and running on ARM was identical to running on X86. I would argue, ARM viability has been there for quite a while. Nokia's N800 is an ARM device. Now that Google's name is attached to it (for now) it benefits from the Google Reality Distortion Field.
we could start seeing really lots of non-Intel compatible computers around, first of all of course ARM based, and maybe a revival of the PPC in the consumer market.
There are way more non-intel computers out there than people like you realize. Your mp3 player, firewall appliance, phone, TV are examples of non-Intel devices.
Remember that the processor platform is a business decision. If Intel feels they are missing a growing market, they will come in with pricing that will simply drive competitors out of business. Microsoft too. Which is why I am guessing if there is a Google device, then by the time it reaches market, Intel will probably be powering it.
Finally, ARM's cost appears cheaper, but I believe that there are additional RAM material costs that end up with a device that is more expensive to make than an X86.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
For less than $100 more you can get a much more capable x86 system. The Dell Zino HD starts at $249 and comes with a 1.6 GHz Athlon, 2 GB of RAM, 250 GB HD, and Radeon HD 3200 graphics.
Why you can't mount the BeagleBoard on the back of an LCD? it comes with a very nice acrylic case, you know.
It isn't just being tied to legacy proprietary applications, it is also being tied to proprietary drivers. Ubuntu developers estimate 70-80% of Ubuntu users are using close-source drivers and/or software. Run on anything other than x86 and your options decrease quickly.
You're making mountains out of molehills for a company of Google's size. If you're shipping the hardware to customers as well as the OS, the whole business of proprietary drivers virtually vanishes. External hardware is just USB or Firewire. Internal hardware you supply the drivers for. You lose a little upgradability, but if you produce a popular hardware platform overall, you'll have enough leverage to work around any issues with the third-party suppliers, even if it requires some give-and-take. (If nothing else, the size of contracts/opportunities on offer is enough to stop a lot of nonsense.)
You only have a problem if you're both small and insist on using open source software all the way. But in that case you should recognize that it's a feature of your situation and at least some of it is in your hands.
"Little does he know, but there is no 'I' in 'Idiot'!"
What, like an openRD client? It's like $250 currently.
If you want cheaper and don't care about lots of ports and local storage, you can use a USB video card with a Sheevaplug for $100+cost of the USB dongle.
And porting Linux/*BSD/Chrome to those architectures, if not done yet, will be relatively easy.
With high probability, it's already done. For most applications, a simple recompile should do.
See for instance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_supported_architectures and https://buildd.debian.org/stats/
You might have to write a bit of arch-specific code to get Linux running, and fix a few portability bugs in some applications, but it should be easily doable to get something going.
Always Innovating arm based netbook, based on the beagleboard.
What the hell is a nettop that does not use local storage doing with a 64gb SSD harddrive!??!??! Also what the hell is it doing with 2gigs of ram!? I'm calling bullshit until we get some real info. If these are real they could cut the cost in half by using a 16gig ssd and 1gig of ram and see zero performance hit this isnt a gaming rig ffs.
Somehow I get the feeling with Windows 7 Microsoft is ready to "swap" the platform instruction code/assembler compiler in their kernel to include support for 3rd vender, after Intel and AMD. Microsoft is simply waiting for the market response. So this hurts Intel more than Microsoft.
Remember that MS already has the experience of building a platform for XBox 360 with PowerPC yet they built a platform for game developer to port the game between PC and 360 with relative ease (dispite the fact that most major studios already built their engine to be cross platform compatible). As long as the brain trust are still in the company this should be a fairly easy fix. nVidia can only be too happy to allow Microsoft support as long as they pay. Same goes with ARM, especially CE already support ARM processor.
Well... you could always not use it, and maybe use your own netbook?
Whoa, Tex.
This WHOLE subthread is about a little board/box he can put on the back of a LCD. It explicitly is NOT about ARM as a mobile platform and it is explicitly NOT about Google's possible box.
I agree. I don't want one tied to my wireless bill or watch ads. If this means subsidized it will fail big time. And the specs are what they want to target. Doesn't mean they will be able to pull it off. Most of these start out saying they can do a through z and when you get to production they can do a through m. Hype!!! Until they have a shipping unit that someone can see, touch and kick the tires on its all speculation.
Meh. I could care less about their new version of the I-Opener business model.
Smart move using an ARM for vendor lock while allowing geeky workarounds.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
I didn't know. Do you happen to know about it's video output at 1920x1080? I heard that memory limitations might be a problem. http://markmail.org/message/ixj3lf2ebvlufs2y
I don't need it to play video, just have an X11 display that doesn't look flickery on a 24" LCD.
The ARM processor family has always been a competitive alternative to Intel
Not entirely true. This was certainly the case in the early '90s, and is again now in the portable market, but it certainly isn't in the high end (ARM has nothing that competes with the Xeon, for example, and certainly nothing that competes with something like IBM's POWER6) and not really much that competes with desktop chips (maybe a quad-core 2GHz Cortex A9, if you can find one). For much of the intervening period, ARM and Intel were in entirely different markets - Intel had nothing that came close to ARM power consumption and ARM had nothing that came close to Intel's performance.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Websites don't run on fairy dust and quite frankly I rather click a few interesting ads on my favourite sites than pay for them.
I'd rather not see the internet become cable TV.
The whole idea of this product is that you'll be doing things online most of the time if not all the time so yes ads will play a large part of the system's life even if it doesn't show ads when it's offline.
Just by a normal non-subsidised netbook and deal with the same adverts on the same websites anyway.
Yes people are still buying them but at the rate they're going I think people will view them as a scam.
For instance a Lenovo IdeaPad U350 can be had for £390 and a Lenovo 3000 G550 for £455.
The latter is only $65 more and you get a DVD drive, larger screen, faster processor (and dual core) and it'll be easier to type on. The netbook loses any energy or portability advantage by removing the SSD. It won't take that much longer until people realise they're better off with a low-end laptop which is effectively what the netbook is becoming and arguably the netbook ceases to exist at that point.
I would normally agree about the WinTel margin protection but from what I can tell MS made some really nice deals to kill off Linux on the netbook.
There are ARM netbooks, if I go into Maplins in the UK I have a choice of three for less than £150. The problem is they either run some highly neutered version of linux (Pocket Surf II for example) or Windows CE that's been skinned to look like XP. Both aren't much better than a PDA/Smartphone in specifications so they haven't really taken off.
If power usage is not limited by battery life, ARM hasn't been truly competitive with Intel (or AMD or IBM) for a long time.
Here in Australia we are yet again facing electricity price rises, making low power consumption that bit more important. Low power devices also make alternative energy supply like solar more viable.
considering your choice in monitor likely has as much impact on your final power bill as your ARM/Atom choice.
Not likely. LED backlit LCDs can consume well under a watt. OLED doesn't consume much juice either. These 10.1 inch LCDs probably consume a few more watts - perhaps 2-5 watts? I'm not sure if they're LED backlit.
So if this arm chipset uses 250mw at idle, and 1.5 watts during use, how many times more efficient is that than an Atom? 4x? 10x?
Not to mention SSD vs HDD... I'm sure all these changes will have a big impact.
Now that the Skype client for Linux is going open source, there's not much left to scuttle a "cloudy" netbook based on ARM.
Put identity in the browser.
D - Google brings Third World pricing to the First World.
I've looked at netbooks in Malaysia, a 7" netbook goes for MYR 800 easily in Low Yat Plaza, a locally built desktop with no OS (off the shelf components) fetches as little as MYR 450. Now, a few comments on your points,
A - Chances are that these spec's (or the price) are false or at the least exaggerated.
B - Google has a large presence in advertising but is not abusive like the others, many said there would be enforced advertising on Android but this is yet to be the case.
C - Google has not had any direct dealings with mobile carriers but I wouldn't rule this one out.
However there are a few considerations here which can affect price,
1. The SSD could possibly be an SD card mounted in an internal reader (a la the Nook).
2. ARM processors are slightly cheaper then X86.
3. Off the shelf bluetooth, WiFi, 3G transmitters are dirt cheap. Same with 10.1" screens now that demand has increased and they've been produced for a while.
4. No OS license fees. Even the Linux based EeePC's had to make concessions to the Windows based versions. MS's hands will be kept well away from this one.
5. This is a mobile phone in a netbook form factor, so a lot of cost is reduced by being able to spread out components (cooling, can use larger cheaper batteries and so forth).
I wouldn't be surprised if this did approach near the US$300 price point, considering that an Asus 7" EeePC can be purchased for A$300 if you shop around. Also many are pegging a rise in the US Dollar, you'd be getting 10.1" netbooks for US$300 if the USD was at pre 2007 levels today.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
I think you're right that the markets are converging, but prior to the netbook taking off, a $400 laptop was a boat-anchor. There weren't many 4lbs ULV laptops in that price range on the shelves six months ago.
There's something to be said of the sex-appeal of a 'purse-sized' computer too, so I'm not sure if people are totally ignorant of the tradeoffs.
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
"it really appears that Google is going to be pushing into new spaces in the next few years...."
As someone who has had a colonoscopy done, I for one, welcome our new "pushing into new spaces" overlords.
Why did I post this? Ask me now!
Not entirely true. This was certainly the case in the early '90s, and is again now in the portable market, but it certainly isn't in the high end (ARM has nothing that competes with the Xeon, for example, and certainly nothing that competes with something like IBM's POWER6) and not really much that competes with desktop chips (maybe a quad-core 2GHz Cortex A9, if you can find one). For much of the intervening period, ARM and Intel were in entirely different markets - Intel had nothing that came close to ARM power consumption and ARM had nothing that came close to Intel's performance.
So put more processors in the box (or possibly on the die). Sheesh, how hard is that? As you say, for the price or the electrical power consumption of an Intel chip you can have half a dozen ARMs.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
What about the Efika?
http://www.genesi-usa.com/products/efika
Based on the i.mx515. Not sure about availability or pricing.
Nokia has been shipping Flash on their ARM based internet tablets (N800, N810) and also on their new smart phone (N900).