couldn't believe my eyes yesterday at Mediamarkt: a quite solid netbook with 1 gig RAM for only 300 CHF. People on the net report quite good build quality, and Ubuntu running out of the box:
http://www.pctipp.ch/news/hardware/50348/media_markt_angebote_top_oder_flop_...
Acer eMachines eM250 Preis: Fr. 299.– Bildschirm: 10,1 Zoll (LED), Auflösung: 1024 x 600 Bildpunkte CPU: Intel Atom N270 (Takt: 1,6 GHz, 512 MB L2-Cache) Arbeitsspeicher: 1024 MB Festplatten: 160 GB Optisches Laufwerk: nein Grafikkarte: Intel GMA950 Sound: Stereo-Lautsprecher Akkulaufzeit: ca. 3,5 Std. (geschätzt) Gewicht: ca. 1,2 kg Weitere Ausstattung: 2 x USB 2.0, LAN/WLAN-G, Webcam Betriebssystem: Microsoft Windows 7 Starter
looks like I can leave my heavy notebook at home once in a while :)
Hoi
2010/1/31 Stanislav Sinyagin ssinyagin@yahoo.com:
The price looks great, but I have one concern with the intel graphics; See here: http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/how-kick-your-friends-face-gma500
Grafikkarte: Intel GMA950
A Google colleague of mine has been trying to get this to work accelerated, without much luck. His blog entry about it is here: http://credentiality2.blogspot.com/2009/08/accelerated-video-on-dell-mini-10...
but note: this may be a different card - I'm pointing it out because Intel graphics has seen a lot of criticism in the past, so if Windows is not your target OS, perhaps this can be considered as a gentle warning :)
groet, Pim
Am 31.01.2010 um 13:09 schrieb Pim van Pelt:
Yes you noticed, that it says GMA950 here, not GMA500? The chip is actually a GMA945GSE, and not one of the US15 or UL11 variants (which would be GMA500 based).
Warning, warning the sky is falling, we are all going to die.
Seriously, read up on the differences in architectures! There is this thing called the Internet where you might find some information.
Short version: All GMA cores except GMA 500 are designed by Intel; they are documented, and drivers have been written for almost all of the functions available in the chipset. The GMA 500 is a PowerVR based core from Imagination Technologies. And this company sucks at releasing information on their HW, hence the driver-nightmare.
Cheers, -daniel
So, it's a pretty great value for money. Ubuntu Netbook Remix 9.10 installed smoothly from flash drive, and everything works out of the box. Skype, Adobe flash, video codecs were downloaded smoothly and worked like charm. I was pretty surprised by the quality of a modern Linux UI. At the back of my mind I still considered it as a server platform :)
Completely friendly interface for a simple user, unless you want some crazy stuff like iTunes :)
few minor annoyances so far:
-- built-in microphone didn't work. Probably it's a physical wiring problem and needs a warranty replacement. External microphone works fine.
-- SD card slot is so inconvenient to use, and requires applying some physical force. I actually forgot to test if the OS sees the SD card :)
-- A little switch that switches off the Wifi antenna doesn't switch it back on :) You have to reboot in order to get wifi back. Probably some BIOS problem, will check that out.
Thus, for 300 Francs, you get a perfect toy for traveling, and it's not too much trouble if it gets stolen or broken :)
----- Original Message ----
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yeah, and then the new users will write "Linux experience" in their CV's with zero knowledge what Bourne shell is :)
UPD: the internal microphone works fine, but Pulse Audio driver does not see it. Hence, Skype cannot use it either. Also that wifi switch is a driver problem which seems to be resolved in newer kernel patches.
* on the Thu, Feb 04, 2010 at 12:25:11AM -0800, Stanislav Sinyagin wrote:
yeah, and then the new users will write "Linux experience" in their CV's with zero knowledge what Bourne shell is :)
Actually, most Linux-users do have zero knowledge about Bourne shell.
And thus the world is full of bashisms, because people tend to use constructions which work on the Bourne Again shell, but not the Bourne shell.
But the Bourne shell (As seen in FreeBSD ;)) IS of course a bloody nuisance.
Cheers Seegras
-
Claudio Jeker -
Daniel G. Kluge -
Per Jessen -
Peter Keel -
Pim van Pelt -
Stanislav Sinyagin -
Stefan Rothenbuehler -
Steven Glogger