Novell, the company that markets SUSE Linux, an enterprise-oriented commercial Linux distro, has a lot at stake in the coming netbook wars. After all, the little machines are overwhelmingly running various flavors of Linux (with the notable exception of Eees pre-loaded with XP and the like), and if Novell can get in on the ground floor, that’s not only cash in hand but a hugely increased presence in the market. Others, like Red Hat, are also trying to join the game, and they’re finding it relatively easy since the machines are suited to their flavors of Linux.
Plus, this way, consumers will only see the friendly and usable face of pre-installed, pre-configured Linux and not the freaky underbelly that scares so many people off (including yours truly). Good for business!
I’ve bought a couple netbooks.
I’m not a Linux user.
Given the choice between an under specced Windows netbook and and over specced Linux netbook, I’ll take the Windows machine. I’m willing to bet there are, literally, millions of people that agree with me on this.
I think Linux on netbooks is going to be short lived, at least on mass marketed netbooks, anyway.
I think that people are hanging onto windows for sure, but if you’re someone who is ‘OS-agnostic’ i.e. ignorant and walking the halls of Best Buy, it’d be really easy to sell someone on the merits of the free operating system – with the OPTION to “upgrade” to windows if they really want to. But the capabilities of these little things are so limited that the best parts of windows are unusable. IMHO.
I’ve got a Dell Mini 9 on order with Ubuntu on it instead of Windows. I was hoping that the Linux OS would make the lower hardware requirements of Linux would make this device relatively fast. I’m thinking that people are going to be disappointed with netbooks unless they think of them basically as PDAs with large screens.
As I said mine is on order, but I did a little utility test run with the “Made for Dell Timbuk2″ sling as I walked the halls of large university hospital complex for about 4 hours. I loaded it with a book and iPodTouch. By the end of the day I realized that I was willing to sacrifice some computing power over my 15″ laptop and case I’d normally carry for mobile computing. Had I had the Dell netbook I think I would have been happy.