Community Chromium and Google Chrome on Eeebuntu Netbook

As I have mentioned before I'm testing these two browsers alongside each other to check what , if anything will change between them, and there are a few things that have become apparent. The downloads of the Google version are significantly smaller that the community version, almost half the the size. Why? I can only conclude that they must be removing some parts of the code or using a more efficient compression.

The second thing is that the community version is always ahead of the Google verision, and is offering more features more quickly. This is because the Google version is based on the community Chromium version, so not that surprising, but it means the community version is more interesting.

An example of this is in the current releases - Chromium 3.0.190 and Google Chrome 3.0.189 - I can change my default search engine in Chromium but not Google Chrome, which means I'm using Chromium to type this while in France, but with Google Chrome I would have to be doing it in French. For those who don't know, Google detects what country you are in and without asking you , puts all you Google apps in that countries language. Not very useful when you travel around Europe a lot, but need to work in English. I have had the same problem with Firefox, but you can work around this by installing another default search engine from mozilla.org.

I have to say on an Asus 1000 running the latest version of Eeebuntu 3.0, that both versions absolutely fly along. This can not be underestimated as an extremely useful feature on a netbook. They are much quicker than the version of Firefox 3.5 I'm also testing which is itself much quicker that version 3.0. The Chromium interface also suits the netbook genre very well, which is why I have made my installed version of Firefox look very similar.

Unfortunately neither of these versions is feature complete yet, so no flash etc, but they are great for a whole host of other functions, like typing on my blog so I will use both of them alongside each other until Chromium fully comes of age.

Turning Firefox 3.5 into Chromium on Ubuntu

Well I like the look of Chromium, and while it is making great headway at the moment with it's development, it is not a browser on Linux that you would trust to do your banking. So while I wait for the final release, I have decided to turn my firefox appearance to look like chrome, with one minor twist.

I have added these addon's to the latest daily build of FF3.5beta5

Chromifox Extreme
Chromifox Companion
Firefox showcase - just use f12 to see the thumbnails
Hide menu - which is also great on your netbook for more screen real estate.

All of these can be easily installed from the addons menu.

The minor twist is that I like the little Google search bar at the top of the screen, and I would be lost without it.

Anyway here is a snapshot of what it looks like.

It works really well with the latest release of eeebuntu on my Asus netbook.

Ubuntu 9.04 on a flash disk on my Asus 1000

I have to do a lot of testing on my Asus for the latest releases of Eeebuntu, and at the moment I needed to test the latest netbook specific kernel from array.org, which has been reworked for the netbook format.

One of the nice features of Ubuntu 9.04 is the way you can easily install it onto a flash drive in your netbook, and the ease with which you can create a live USB drive.

Well as normal this was very straight forward, and this post is coming from that installation with the new kernel installed. It offers many advantages, but one of the key ones is improvements in the touchpad.

I have also installed the latest build of the Chromium browser as I feel that once this has been fully developed it will work very well on the netbook format , as it has a real performance advantage.

So if you would like to try ubuntu 9.04 on your netbook, there has never been a better time to try it out, just follow these easy steps:
1) Download the Ubuntu 9.04 iso and burn it onto a USB drive
2) Boot from the the USB Drive
3) Install Ubuntu onto your test flash drive
4) Install Adams kernel Jaunty kernel install

Then once the netbook restarts, just make sure you boot from your flash drive installation.

Microsoft's malaise

Unless you have just returned from Mars you will have heard about the massive drop in revenue for the once omnipotent software manufacturer, with the inevitable sacking of 5,000 staff and 15% of it's temporary/contract staff, my heart goes out to those guys.

I have be discussing this with friends for a long while, and this is not remotely surprising to me, just the length of time it has taken for the adjustment. I will caveat everything else I discuss here with the facts that in the last quarter, Microsoft still made 3 billion, so it is not even vaguely likely to be going bust any time soon, but the rate of descent is going to accelerate.

However, it has become apparent for several years that they have stopped innovating and are constantly late to the party with every product. Vista, was five years late, and what a mess, it couldn't have been more out of tune with the hardware paradigm shift that was taking place in 2008.People wanted greener, smaller, compact machines, that did just enough web stuff to make them useful, with excellent battery life. What were the people at Redmond doing to have missed an entire market that last year should millions of units, not very much obviously.

Cloud computing has been around for a while, and to be fair MS had a simply offering in the early days, namely Hotmail, but they just didn't develop it or move it forward at all in any meaningful way, so along comes Google and steals all their clothes. Again they are now trying to play catchup again. Where are all the bolt on apps and services that you now get with Google?

Internet Explorer, through it's monopoly installation on every machine sold, held a 95% market share once, that is now down to under 70% and falling rapidly as Mozilla,Opera,Safari and Google Chrome all take large chunks out of the pie. IE7 was a bad copy of Firefox, and people have just been moving away in their millions. According to spread firefox, today will see 800,000,000 downloads of the Firefox software.

They have released Office 2007 , without really talking to the customers and again there has been a lot of negative feedback about thee new ribbon look. Customers who use 10% of the functionality of this product have started asking why do I need a new version, what is it offering me for all the time and effort required to change. Many have moved to open office, and are now very happy knowing they will never be forced to upgrade.

Recently we have seen yet another round of nasty worms and viruses hit the base operating system, causing businesses lots of expenses on upgrades, checking their defenses etc etc. No operating system is free of problems, but if you use Microsoft products, the problems are relentless and continuous.

When you role all of these issues up, they do start to show the picture of a very large company who is starting to do things by committee, and all of these symptoms reflect that. As IBM before them, I now fully expect them to still be around but slowly move into the technology background. As many people have invested heavily in their technology, you are not about to throw that out, but they have become less and less relevant as a technology innovator.

The future is with the open source, and as more and more companies shift away from the Microsoft proprietary lock in, and the costs savings that spring from that. The cost savings with open source virtualisation being offered by companies like Amazon and Google show us clearly where and how the shift is happening in the cloud. With Netbooks costing £150 , why would you possibly want to spend £350 on Microsoft office? The desktops will go the same way, with massive energy savings and cost savings on applications. With the current economic problems, businesses will take no FUD while their competitors are making use of those massive cost savings.

The IT landscape is definitely changing and the role that Microsoft are going to play in that will change. The role for open source is increasing on a daily basis in every area, and that snowball is only gaining momentum.

Six months with my Eeepc 1000 and still very happy

Yes, it's been that long since I upgraded my netbook, and I can honestly say there has not been one second of regret. Looking at the prices you can get them for today, it might have been worth waiting until after Christmas, but that is always true of all technology , and you would probably end up getting nothing.

In my previous post on this great little machine , I mentioned that I had upgraded from my original 701 model to get a couple of issues sorted, screen size and keyboard size being the main ones. These have proved to be successfully cured and are now a none issue on this netbook. One major added bonus is the increase in battery life , which really does deliver 5.5hrs after every charge.

The operating system that came pre-installed worked effectively enough , Xandros, and had all the applications one could possibly want in a netbook style computer. It would make sense for most people who just want a netbook to get some work done effectively and without much fuss to leave it at that.I however have now switched all my machines over the last twelve months to using Debian derived Ubuntu Linux, and I really wanted to install this on my 1000.

After much searching of the web and playing with various versions, I have now become formally involved with Eeebuntu Linux for the eeepc's and I have to say it really makes this little PC shine. I think one of the unsung heroes of the efforts to successfully using Ubuntu on this platform is Adam, who has put in a considerable amount of effort to make sure as much as possible works out of the iso.

To be fair , the main Ubuntu project has also made our lives over at Eeebuntu HQ much easier with the introduction of the USB key installer with the latest release of Ubuntu, 8.10. This utility makes trying out as many distro's as you like on the Eeepc as simple as possible. I would certainly recommend people to test drive the new environment from a USB stick before installing to make sure they like it.

Have I found any problems with this netbook? Well not with the unit itself, but with the fact that the very latest netbooks now have 3G capabilities built in, rather than having to use a USB modem. The 1000 works perfectly with them, but it does make it so much tidier to have the SIM card internal to the device, but thats being really picky. Apart from that, I can't think there is much I would change. The black case can show your figure marks from time to time, but nothing a cloth can't rectify in moments and I'm really straining here to make that point.

So in conclusion, I'm very glad I bought this unit, use it regularly and will continue to do so until someone comes up with a netbook that has everything this one does , plus some features that make me take notice. That hasn't happened yet, and I suspect it will be a complete technology refresh from the underlying components, like a new more efficient Intel processor that will cause this to happen. It could be a touch screen, although I'm not convinced that would be that useful on these machines, but I would be prepared to take a look.

Happy New Year Tux

I read a blog by a long time Linux supporter , Stephen J Vaughan, and he made a statement that in his opinion the year of the Linux desktop had already come and gone. Well I have been mulling over this thought for a few days and I have to say I agree with him.

I'm currently posting this from my Eeepc running Eeebuntu Linux, and I haven't used anything on my desktop/laptop computer since 1998 that wasn't a version of one kind of Linux or another. As I work in the IT industry and have to communicate with other people who use Microsoft, it is obvious that it is perfectly possible for them to co-exist, as I'm doing it on a daily basis.

I'm also a big user of virtual environments, and I have an XP virtual machine on my works desktop, but I honestly haven't powered that up in long time. I tend to use the virtualisation software, KVM at the moment, for testing new operating systems, like Opensolaris etc.

Yes I do agree with you Stephen,the perennial question no longer needs to be asked, it is as irrelevant as asking if this is going to be the year of the laptop.

I think a far more interesting question, is when will Microsoft deliver a decent and relevant operating system since the release of XP seven years ago? Linux is delivering today on a whole range of products, including multiple processor types. I can get the same command prompt on everything from an IBM z90 mainframe to my Google phone, seemless. Same Bash, same commands, no new interface to learn and assimilate.

I also use firefox, which is a great broswer, but more importantly it also runs on every operating system I need to use, again no need to learn another application, just because I have to work with Solaris today. Can you say the same about IE. Suddenly their technological silo concept looks very dated and very last century.

I think the ball is firmly in Redmonds court to deliver, the view from planet Tux is looking decidedly rosey.

So my new years question has to be , "When are Microsoft going to deliver anything Interesting".

Eeebuntu - latest version has been released

I work with a team of like minded people to deliver a really good looking and useful version of Ubuntu specifically designed for the Asus Eeepc netbook computer.

Well we have just released a new version for your Eeepc, which comes in three flavours:

1) Standard - which comes with a good base of pre-installed applications.
2) Base - which comes with the bare minimum, so you can add the applications you want
3) NBR - which uses the new Ubuntu mini computer interface

Jump over to our web site Eeebuntu web site and download the iso and have a look.

The easiest way to try it first is to install the iso file onto a USB stick. The easiest way to do that is to use another machine with Ubuntu installed as it now comes with a built in USB key creator application. If you don't have that, then use the unetbootin application.

Have fun , and post your comments etc on our forums.

Why do I use Ubuntu?

I just read this meme from Jono Bacon, and he asks all users of this operating system to say why they use it. I thought that was a decent challenge and one worth taking up.

I have been using Linux for over a decade now, thanks to someone called Paul Branston, who I worked with at Freeserve in Leeds. Paul had been using Unix/Linux since birth I think, and a person whose gravitas when he spoke about Operating Systems was definitely important to take notice of. I was working at Freeserve mainly on Firewalls and networking but also did work on the Microsoft clusters they used, really buggy and unreliable things, but thats another tale.

I used Windows as a desktop system, simple because like most other techies it came on the PC I was given. I experienced many problems with it, and it kept crashing , but I hadn't been inclined to look for anything to replace it. Paul recommend I give Linux a go on my laptop and see how it got on. Well it was a Toshiba laptop with Red Hat 5.0, and getting it installed was like wrestling with a snake. Laptop hardware then was not the same as todays.

I have used Sun OS for years, and had learned the command line in University, so I roled up my sleeves and kept at it. I eventually got it all working, even the built in modem, and just stuck with Red Hat , and after Redhat changed, just moved onto Fedora Linux. They offer a great Linux distro, but Fedora does have some drawbacks for new users, mostly media support. So when I had an issue upgrading from Fedora 8 to Fedora 9 I thought I would give Ubuntu a try.

Well I have to say I'm glad I did, as moving to Ubuntu is worth the effort just for the package manager. It is a well rounded Linux distro that currently does everything you need to get up and running quickly and efficiently. I have installed it onto every machine I own, and every friends and family machine that I look after and it has been extremely reliable. I do use an Ubuntu derivative ,Linux Mint , where I feel the user doesn't want to do any work after installing.I have bought several machines from Dell with Ubuntu pre-installed and they have been extremely reliable and useful.

Today I work on an Ubuntu distro, Eeebuntu, release for the Asus Eeepc netbooks, so I've now installed it there as well. It works extremely well on these small footprint machines.

As I sit and type this post today, I think that for an all round desktop Operating System , this sets the bench mark. I still keep an eye on what the others are doing, and Fedora 10 has received good reviews, but I don't feel the need to move back at the moment. I have installed it in a virtual image, and that is were it will stay for now.

So yes I'm glad I moved and I would recommend it to anyone wanting to give Linux a try.

Ubuntu

When is a netbook not a netbook?

Well the rumoured new Dell 12" netbook appears to be on it's way to the UK with a nice new shiny 12" screen and an extremely attractive price. It has everything that the Asus 1000 does, but the CPU speed does look a little odd, but that could well be how the price is being kept down. It's hard to see if this model won't have the function keys like it's smaller brother, but counting the rows of keys on the photo, it would appear not to. The size is obviously increased to house the new screen , and this then raises my question, what are the properties that really define this new genre.

What if Apple launched a 17" version, with the same general internals, a minor tweak here and there, it would appear that it is not the screen size, but the components inside that are defining the standard. Low power usage, battery efficient, enough horsepower to write your blog, this is being done on my 1000, and surf the web, but not enough to play very heavy games , compile new programs or act as a music studio.

It is clearly not the size of the unit that is defining what and where these great little machines will be put to use, but the solid state disk drives and the Intel Atom processors. This is great news for people who have been sitting on the fence waiting to see where this market moves, as I fully suspect we have not seen anywhere near the end of the morphing that can and will occur.

Another positive affect of all these new releases is that the original units prices are only heading in one direction, which makes them more affordable for everyone, and gives Linux even greater exposure. It also raises a nasty spectre for microsoft, as who is going to want pay them £300 for office, when the entire machine only costs £100, their pricing model just doesn't work in this sector.

It also gives Linux one of the best platforms it has ever had, as every netbook sold worldwide now supports Linux guaranteed, no worrying about drivers, they will all just work. This has worked really well for MAC's, and will work just as well for Linux.

The Link to the Tesco Site

Lenovo annoucement is hard to read

Having just read several articles on the fact that Lenovo are changing their strategy towards Linux , the reasons given just don't make any sense to me. The overall argument seems to be that the cost of supporting microsoft on their platforms has been an extremely heavy burden to bare, and they didn't want to duplicate that with another new system. Surely the argument to that is to stop supporting microsoft, and push those support costs back to where they belong, unless there are yet more illegal activities and arm twisting going on than normal. The other glaring hole in this argument is that with Linux you can push the support towards to the community, who will be more than happy to help, or more likely have already fixed any issues that a new user would experience. This appears to me to be very muddled thinking and not much of a strategy at all.

They have though simultaneously announced extra support for Linux across a range of products that will be available to large organisations, plus the launch of their new netbook. This netbook is to go head-to-head with the other Intel Atom suppliers in this ever expanding market, but they are only offering it to certain markets. This is again yet more muddled thinking, from them. Why would you possibly not want to sell units in Europe and North America, surely business is business? With Asus already telling us that they are on course for their 5 million units shipped by the end of the year, and Acer saying their sales are better than expected, it would appear they have got this wrong yet again.

I think the one thing that I can take from this information is that their Linux strategy is in tatters, and they are thrashing around to find a real vision for the future. There are many other companies that have a much better Linux strategy, and they would be the companies that I will be dealing with in the future.

This probably explains why I have never bought anything from this company, and probably never will.

Disappointing launch of new Dell netbook

Like many others with an interest in the mini laptop market, I have followed the rumours and gossip around the new Dell inspiron mini 9 with a watchful eye. So last week is was announced and I nipped over to the Dell web site to order one with Ubuntu pre-installed. I know I have an Eeepc 1000 which I love and am using now to enter this blog. However, I wanted to have a look at this new Dell, and if the rumours were true, then it would only cost me 200 UK pounds.

Well what a disappointment was waiting for me at the Dell site. The only units that were for sale had windows XP home, which is next to useless, even if you love windows. The price was also a real shocker in to the bargain, they wanted 299 UK pounds for this unit, which is only 60 pounds cheaper than my Eeepc. That is a lot of money for a machine that offers nothing over the Asus unit, has a smaller screen, no function keys, a much smaller internal solid state harddisk (16GB as compared to 40GB), and no decent productivity software pre-installed.

I suppose they would argue that they are selling these in competition to the Asus 901, which has a similar specification , but then I found that the argument for the 901 didn't stack up against the 1000 unit either.

I like Dell machines, and bought one of the XPS1330n with Ubuntu as soon as they were released. However I have always believed you should tell it like it is, and I think they have really dropped an opportunity here, and could pay for it. Time as always will be the judge of that one.

If you are looking to get yourself one of these little netbooks definitely do yourself a favour and check out the Asus 1000 if you want the best size screen in the class or the Acer Aspire one if you decide on a 9" screen version. The former offers you a much larger machine for you money and the later offers you much better value for money with the same specifications.

Linux netbooks selling extremely well in the UK

Having checked the latest bestseller charts on Amazon over the last two weeks there is one obvious fact that jumps out at you, and that is the rise and rise of the Linux netbook computer. Only this morning, the number one selling unit is the Acer Aspire One with Linpus Linux, and 50% of the top 10 have Linux pre-installed. I also think that Acer have got their pricing spot on, and are making a few other competitors, Dell, look very flat footed.

I think this market is very well suited to Linux, as the crippled version of windows XP home that is supplied on this machines is far less compatible with a modern working environment than is Linux. The powerful facilities offered by Linux , like a built in full feattured office suite, and much better connectivity to a corporate network bode well.

It is refreshing to see this change in the UK, as Britons are conservative by nature, and have had microsoft products stuffed down their throats for so long in school and work, that they seem almost joined at the hip. It is always amazing to me to see the surprise on peoples faces when they see just how powerful and user friendly modern Linux is.

It is good to see choice has broken out in this sector, which is excellent news for everyone, including the microsoft lovers, as they are now going to have to innovate in this sector to stay competitive, as XP is not going to be around for ever, and vista is deader than the dinosaurs, which it truely resembles.

The Eeepc 1000 - what a great machine

Well , when the whole idea surfaced of mini-laptops , netbooks, UMPC's or whatever your favourite description is for these little PC's is, I thought they could have a great future. Like most people who have worked in IT for many years however, I have heard enough hot air and vapourware announcements to power a hot air ballon around our Galaxy for several millennium. Caution was definitely the order of the day.

It was then with delight that the initial Eeepc 701 that I bought proved to be so useful, and became an immediate favourite. It did have a few limitations, which while not show stoppers, could definitely be improved upon. It was not therefore much of a surprise when Intel and VIA announce new CPU's designed specifically for these new type of machines, they would offer increased battery life for the unit, one of my initial limitations. The other two important things I thought would make these machines a real winner for a much wider audience , were a larger screen and a bigger keyboard.

So about the turn of the year the announcements started, with everyone in Asia it appeared about to launch such an improved device. I looked at all of them with a keen eye, to see if they could offer me the improvements I was looking for. If you looked around, with the likes of HP, MSI, Dell, Acer etc etc, there was a large array of Linux machines going to be made available. I have to say that the Acer Aspire One and the Eeepc 901 both came close, the price being one very important consideration. However, if I was going to replace the original 701, then the new unit had to offer everything I wanted.

Well, Asus then announced their new 1000 series units, with 40GB SSD disk space, 10" screen, Intel Atom processor that seemed to run on fresh air compared to the previous Celeron. A larger keyboard was also something that I would appreciate, and when the price was announced, they were not that much more expensive that their smaller brother the 901.

I have to say the extra expenditure was well worth it, and this new unit has offered the extra facilities that I wanted. Time will tell if there are any little issues that will come out of the woodwork to annoy me, but in the first three weeks, everything I have found out about the unit has been very positive. The increase in battery life is truly exceptional, and delivers 5.5 hrs without fail. The suspend and resume just works with the wifi just reconnecting and the ability to just identify a T-mobile 3G USB key and connect was very impressive. The unit is a little heavier than the 701, but the extra facilities more than compensate for that. Browsing the web and writing documents on the move is a breeze, reading my many digital books is also a real pleasure with the extra screen size. There must be several large laptop manufacturers ripping these little units to pieces in their labs to find out how the heck they do it for this price point. One of the nice new features of this unit is the small row of extra function keys just under the screen. They allow you to change the power usage of the machine, turn off the screens backlight , zoom the screen and start Skype, with just a push of a single button. The two on the right are user definable and can be changed with a built in utility. The addition of bluetooth functionality will be useful to some, but I have to say I have yet to find a use for it.


The software has changed a lot with this release, and Open office has been replaced by Sun's Star Office, which is basically Open Office with some template and filter additions. This move does puzzle me as Star Office is not normally a free item. It could have more to do with the good publicity these units are receiving, so millions of users will get to see Sun's offering. Only Xandros and Sun would know for sure.There have been more games added and I particularly like Mahjong, one of my favourites. Asus have done a deal with Yostore for on-line file storage, which it appears is only available to 901/1000 users. This is again though a service I have never up to now found that useful, but time will tell. It would have been nice to see the version of KDE be bumped up to 3.5, as I use the advanced desktop, when not running Ubuntu from a USB key. It would be really useful if everything worked with Ubuntu, but as I write this it doesn't, and that is one of this units strong points, so I will wait until it does. I have added a few Xandros repositories, which allows me to install some new applications, so all is not lost in the mean time.

I also feel that in the weeks to come with the new Dell 910 Inspiron machine about to be launched that the competition for Linux netbooks that just work is going to intensify. This is excellent news for people who want to start using machines with a low price point of entry and an even better price point for the software they want to run on them. There is no doubt that this choice can only be good for the consumer, as there is now a genuine third way to use an Intel PC. I have felt for a long time that Michael Dell has been totally fed up bowing to the demands of Microsoft, and would have loved the opportunity to use Apples OSX on a line of Dell machines. Being the logical and sensible person he is, it was obvious for selfish reasons, Apple were never going to allow this to happen. Their premium priced hardware is part of their strategy, and it is not something they will give up lightly. He has however discovered a new and better way to achieve this, and Linus Torvalds gave him the answer in the form of Linux. He now has a new and very powerful bargaining chip , and it will be interesting to see how this gets used. The other netbook manufacturers are not going to just give their market share to Dell, but competition can only be good for the products that get produced.

Microsoft's current software strategy is bad for the environment

Microsoft software development for as long as I can remember has seemed to work on the basic principal that computer hardware speed and performance will grow infinitely to accommodate their sloppy and wasteful programming techniques.

I have read article after article about the latest software offerings from Microsoft, which have all increased in installation footprint, but have only offered performance increases if you use the latest hardware. Vista is a particularly apropos example of a machine resources hog, with a requirement for at least a multi core processor and at least 2 GB of RAM and 10 GB of harddisk space, just to run the operating system.That is a computer that uses a lot of energy, your money, just to run the basic system that would allow you to do anything. The days of ignoring this are gone, just look at your fuel bills and you will see why. So these machines to run Vista are more expensive to buy , to run and cost the environment more in manufacture.

This seemed to be the way things have always been , and would continue to be, until Intel and Asus combined to create a whole new breed of PC, the netbook or mini laptop. This post is coming from an Asus Eeepc , and with the plethora of other manufacturers jumping on this hot bandwagon, you will be able to get one of these diminutive devices in laptop or desktop format. The intel Atom units have very good battery life, and consume little power compared to a 15" Vista Behemoth laptop.

This however is the crux of this post: The Intel Atom processor and it's VIA counterpart use a fraction of the power of the older generation processors, work perfectly with Linux, require far less internal memory to have the operating system to function properly, and work with solid state hard disks. They are basically green computers, and the more people who use them, the less the environment suffers. Microsoft has got it very wrong for the energy requirements of a modern IT departments demands, and is beginning to look like the General Motors of the software world, building products for a previous age. If I were a CEO of any large company, and my CTO was not investigating the use of low power workstations running Linux, I think I would be looking for a new CTO.

Apple saw this coming, thus the Apple Air and their new mini laptop, so why has Microsoft got this so wrong? I think it tells you a lot about the company, that they always seem to be on the backfoot, technologically, and it is only the lack of action by corporate buyers that keeps there money machine turning.

Microsoft has no software in this arena apart from it's five year old XP, so yet again they have been caught cold when a market changes quickly, and I doubt Windows 7 has currently been designed for this market segment either. I fully suspect that will change, or they may modify their mobile operating system upwards, but they will be playing catch up yet again.

You can also wonder why you might waste money on a super powerful machine, that you then need to spend a small fortune on software for, after your initial purchase, just for it to be vaguely useful. While you can get one of these new machines with everything already installed and ready to go for £250-£300. Yes there are games players and power users who will always need the extra power of a true workstation, but I suspect that 90%, if not more of net users just do not need that type of machine anymore. The prospect of cloud computing with all your applications being supplied on-line, will also drive this market.

So save the environment , do yourself a financial favour and buy a small energy efficient ,useful mini PC with Linux installed.

Eeepc addons will spark even better Linux supported hardware

While going through my daily technology feeds, I noticed a news item on the new TV adapter that Asus has launched, it's called the ASUS My Cinema-U3100Mini. Now if you look at the operating systems it supports, it includes Debian Linux, which you might know is the basis for a lot of the modern Linux distributions we all use today. These include Xandros, the operating system that comes standard with the Epc , the ever popular K/X/Ubuntu range of operating systems, Mint Linux, and Mepis. All of these are in the top twenty of Distrowatch, which gives a reasonable idea of what people are using.

Now it becomes obvious, even by Asus's conservative projection of expected shipments of Epc's this year, we are looking at a global market of several million customers for these new addon devices with Epc's alone. If you add in all the additonal customers who already use Debian based distro's, which include now the Dell customer base, there is a real market for hard nosed business people to make some serious money, as Asus is displaying on a daily basis.

It also doesn't take a lot to realise that the open nature of Linux development will enable most if not all of these add-on devices to be ported fairly easily to the non-Debian Linux Distributions like Red Hat, Fedora, Suse, PClinuxos etc.

I think that this technical development has several benefits for two groups of people. The business people looking to supply new markets and make sure their products are in at the forefront of a booming new IT sector. You only have to look at the success of the new Ultra mobile laptops from Asus to see what can be achieved. The second group of people who will directly benefit from this are the users of Linux who will now have access to a wider range of add-ons than were previously available.

As I have both an Epc and a Dell XPS m1330 with Ubuntu, I can't wait to get one of these new little devices to watch TV on the move. Those commute train journeys can be so drab on cold winter mornings, so a little light mindless TV can help make them slightly less boring.