One of the biggest problems when it comes to running Windows on netbooks has to do with the type of storage medium the cheaper models prefer: solid state drives. SSDs need to be treated differently from normal, mechanical hard drives because SSDs don’t like small write and delete operations. For Windows 7, Microsoft promised performance improvements when using SSDs, so the guys and girls at TweakTown decided to do a preliminary benchmark between Windows Vista SP1 and the Windows 7 beta. The results are clear.
The test rig is a powerful machine, and they used fresh, updated installations of both the Windows versions. They did not apply any SSD-specific tweaks, nor did they install specific drivers to further improve the performance of the SSD drives; they used the stock Windows drivers in both cases.
The results show that when it comes to reading, Windows 7 beats Windows Vista in almost every test, but the results do come in close. TweakTown believes that when Windows 7 reaches RTM, the gap will be widened. When it comes to write speeds, Windows 7 is also ahead of Vista on all tests, but the gaps are a little wider here. Windows 7 also uses less CPU power during SSD operations than Windows Vista.
These were just preliminary tests on beta software, without specific drivers, so the situation may get better. TweakTown does say that it’s clear that Microsoft made improvements in this area.
This has always looked weired to me. Who pays €40 for Windows on a netbook that cost less than €300?
Unless the netbook you want is only available with Windows (why this happens is beyond me?), what is the point? It’s not like you are going to play the latest games or edit large pictures with Photoshop. Maybe Windows 7 is a bit faster than linux on some models, but is that worth €40? Do you feel a real difference that justify that cost? I would rather buy a model with more powerful batteres or a better screen…
On the photography forums that I frequent, there are many who use netbooks for on the move edits. I don’t really see the attraction myself since I would rather edit photos on a fast machine with a huge monitor. Nevertheless, if forum traffic is anything to go by there are quite a number of people who would like to run photo editing tools on netbooks.
Its worth the extra to have a well-supported, stable operating system. I think most consumers would agree.
No-one. Certainly not the OEMs anyway. I’ve heard rumor that, in some cases, Microsoft may even have payed some manufacturers to ship XP rather than Linux on their netbooks. True or not, they certainly aren’t paying much for the old OS.
That certainly matches with the behaviour of the OEMs. When netbooks first appeared, they had 7-inch screens, tiny keyboards, small SSDs, small batteries and a constrained version of Linux with an easy-to-use interface. Windows (any form) wasn’t an option.
There was a customer desire for slightly bigger screens and keyboards, and to have an unconstrained version of Linux (with a full repository). What actually happened is that the netbooks got 9 or 10 inch screens and bigger keyboard and battery all-right, but they also got a hard disk, XP installed and no unconstrained version of Linux in sight. They also doubled in price.
In my country, one cannot buy a Linux netbook from retail stores. Dell Australia won’t even bring a Linux netbook into the country. This is how much the local retailers are under the thumb of Microsoft.
Ouch….. That’s nasty.
I’m “across the ditch” in New Zealand and there is a reasonable selection of Linux netbooks here.
I’m so jealous.
I was in New Zealand a few weeks back, and I had a quick look in a store there to see if the situation was better. I saw only netbooks with WinXP pre-installed, and the prices seemed very high … almost $800 NZ for models that were $550 AUD locally.
According to a currency converter, the current rate is this:
550.00 AUD = 685.631 NZD
… so perhaps I am not quite as jealous as I might otherwise have been.
New Zealand is a very beautiful country.
Have you considered the possibility that the retailers might know a little better what their customers want than you do?
If they could sell Linux netbooks and make money, they would.
Maybe he is their customer? And Maybe he knows better than them what he wants?
Customer != customers.
customers = customer + customer + customer + …
Not all customers are the same.
At least one of those customers want linux, therefore customers don’t want Windows. A part of customers may want Windows, but there is another part that want linux.
The retailers know it and just choose to ignore some of their customers. Original post gives a hint on their motivations to do so.
Edited 2009-01-20 12:43 UTC
And how much market research have you done to substantiate such a claim?
I’m not contesting it, it’s just that I think retailers know full well what sells and what doesn’.
No need to do a market research. It’s pure mathematics. If one customer want linux, then there is a part of customers that want it, and I know there is one.
The R&D is done, as the Ubuntu version is sold in many countries. There is no reason not to sell them in Australia unless there is a presure from a big corporation that sells operating systems.
Precisely so.
Open source adoption is relatively high in Australia … take a look at the Firefox usage figures as evidence.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080427-all-the-rage-in-europ…
This figure is arguably indicative of how accepting of open source solutions the Australian people would be … where they are given the choice.
Worldwide, the rate of purchasing Linux is about 30% of netbooks … and it is as low as that only because all of the netbooks which include a hard disk are not offered with Linux pre-installed.
There is no reason to think that this 30% figure would be lower in Australia if people were given a choice … and there is even a reasonable chance that the figure would be higher than that.
It almost certainly would also be higher than 30% worldwide if one could buy (anywhere in the world) a netbook with a hard disk, with a proper unconstrained version of Linux pre-installed, and with access to a full set of repositories enabled.
Edited 2009-01-21 01:18 UTC
lemur: Look in your local Officeworks. That’s where I got my Acer Aspire One with Linpus. The Good Guys also have/had them. Unfortunately, the version of Linpus they have is so badly constrained that I had to install Ubuntu just to get a non-broken package manager.
If you’re looking for anything except the Aspire One, you’re out of luck. I wish Dell had the Ubuntu-based Mini.
I did see an Acer Aspire One in OfficeWorks with Linpus Linux, now that you come to mention it.
What I personally was looking for, however, was a 10″ model with Bluetooth. I have bought two models … an MSI Wind U100 and an ASUS 1000H … both had 80GB hard disks and Windows XP.
Dumping XP was not a problem, nor was dual-booting either of these. What to put on them though?
On both models, the only current Linux distributions that has all required drivers by default is Mandriva. Mandriva doesn’t play well with Unetbootin or other methods of installation … so I had to cobble together a temporary external CDROM drive via USB to get it installed. Unfortunately with Mandriva, I had trouble with the repositories.
For Ubuntu, there is a special kernel, called the array kernel, that works, and there are a few websites (eeeubuntu is one) where one can pick up a modified version of Ubuntu that will work on a ASUS EEEPC.
http://www.geteasypeasy.com/
http://www.eeebuntu.org/
Only GNOME or XFCE are available though with Ubuntu, however. I had to type the following to get what I wanted:
sudo apt-get remove mono-common libmono0
sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop
All of this rigmarole is way beyond what most people would be prepared to go through, however, meaning that for most Aussies, getting a nice complete Linux desktop on a capable 10″ netbook with hard drive is next-to-impossible.
http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Docs/Installing_Mandriva_Linux
Install grub from Windows: https://gna.org/projects/grub4dos/
Download the free CD1 or the dvd, mount it with -o loop -t iso9660, copy the vmlinuz and all.rdz files to your hard drive, add them to menu.lst
Boot your new mandriva installer from the hard drive and select the iso file. This will launch the Mandriva installer.
I must be a bit slow today or something … but I have encountered these instructions a few times before, and they do not hang together.
Assumption: You start with a netbook with XP, and a working Internet connection.
OK, then you can do the following steps:
(1) Install grub from Windows: https://gna.org/projects/grub4dos/
(2) Download the free CD1 or the dvd
… but then it goes south at the next step
(?) mount it with -o loop -t iso9660
There seem to be a few missing steps here, or perhaps an assumption of another machine equipped with a CD or DVD drive with Linux installed.
I’m not sure. Perhaps you can mount the .iso file from a prompt in grub for dos after a reboot?
As I said … I’m a bit slow today. I haven’t been able to follow these steps, as they lack sufficient detail.
Sorry I didn’t explain very well.
You don’t have to mount the iso file at all (difficult on Windows).
Here are all the steps:
1/ Install grub from windows (there are several ways to do it but https://gna.org/projects/grub4dos/ is a good way to do it).
2/ Download the iso file of Mandriva free (easy to find on mandriva web site)
3/ Download the vmlinuz and all.rdz file from a Mandriva mirror: here is one from a german mirror:
ftp://ftp.join.uni-muenster.de/pub/linux/distributions/mandrakelin…
4/ Put the vmlinuz and all.rdz somewhere on your hard drive and configure your grub C:\menu.lst to boot these
5/ reboot
Mandriva installer will ask where you put the iso file and install Mandriva.
This is all explained here:
http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Docs/Installing_Mandriva_Linux
look at the chapter titled:
‘Booting the installer direct from a hard disk – Windows method’
What a shocker, the updated version of Vista (Windows 7) is better optimized than the original.
finally windows7 outperforms xp… oh. wait..
that was two weeks ago http://www.osnews.com/story/20720/_Windows_7_Outperforms_XP_Vista_
I see nothing significant here. a few percent means nothing. Considering the power of cpu’s these days, even going from 3 to 4% usage to 1% means little, and could be a fluke, as it was noted that it looked odd.
For notebooks, who is going to have such a fast SSD anyway? No one. flash will be treated as memory, not a hard drive, because there is no SATA interface.
Sorry, but this looks like a wash. If we saw a 25% improvement in most areas, then I’d say that it mattered, but not this.
Windows 7 outperforms Vista (on SSDs)? So what?
Everything outperforms Vista everywhere.
Edited 2009-01-19 23:47 UTC
just install this patch http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960735/en-us
and your SSD in Vista will perform like Win7
The only thing that makes the results significant is that Win 7 beta was consistently better.
That said, it doesn’t seem that any of the results were statistically significant.
And, as someone pointed out, you can tweak or patch Vista to perform about as well.
Try harder next time, TweakTown and thanks for playing.
Edited 2009-01-20 16:34 UTC