Hardware Archive

NVIDIA's aspirations to enter the general purpose processor market may never have been clearly spelled out by the company before, but it was getting more and more obvious as each week passed by. Now, it's pretty much official: NVIDIA says it's not a question of "if", but "when".

We have found the device of your dreams. Make no mistake: this is what OSNews readers have always wanted. You are going to buy this device, in droves. Trust me, as far as geekness goes, this is pretty much the best it'll ever get. Fully open source (from hardware to software), easily servicable, runs Linux, has an ARM processor, accelerometer, powerful 3D capabilities, 10-15 hours of battery life, touchscreen, and internal USB ports. And you know what? I didn't even mention the best part: the keyboard of the Touch Book netbook is detachable, leaving you with a 8.9" tablet. And all that for USD 299!

Long-time OSNews reader Kaiwai has written down his experiences with his Acer Aspire One, Linux, and Windows. He concludes: "After a hectic few weeks trying to get Linux to work, I am back to square one again - a netbook running Windows XP SP3 as it was provided by Acer when I purchased it. I gave three different distributions a chance to prove themselves. I expected all three distributions to wipe the floor with Windows XP - after all, these are the latest and greatest distributions the Linux world have to offer. There has been at least 7 years since the release of Windows XP for Linux to catch up to Windows XP and from my experience with Linux on this said device - it has failed to step up to the plate when it was needed."

The time is finally here: the first VIA Nano-based notebook! As promised, Samsung is the first to use VIA's Nano platform, but contrary to expectations, the NC20 isn't a netbook. It's a normal laptop, albeit small. Still, this is the first VIA Nano laptop, and therefore, deserves attention.

Like so many other manufacturers, Dell has entered the 10" netbook market this week with the launch of the Dell Inspiron Mini 10. Despite the machine being fairly standard in its hardware specifications, it does make a few peculiar choices - especially when it comes to its resolution.

Asustek is going to start shipping only 10-inch and 7-inch Eee PCs, reports have claimed. Separate reports have also revealed how the manufacturer is contemplating putting the Android operating system onto netbooks.

We already knew netbooks were popular, but according to new data by research firm IDC, they are even more popular in Europe than we anticipated. The firm says that in 2008, netbooks sales accounted for 30% of total consumer portable sales in Europe, the Middle-East, and Africa. A big contributing factor are the telecommunication providers in Europe who subsidise netbooks.

Earlier this year, Freescale announced it would enter the netbook market with its own set of chips based on the ARM architecture, claiming they would yield better battery life than the Atom-based netbooks of today. The company gave a little more info today, and among other things, they want to support Google's Android on their netbooks.

It's not as if nVidia really needs Microsoft's stamp of approval to go ahead and sell their upcoming Ion-based PCs as people would certainly buy them anyway, but it certainly helps for us to know that they are tested to be certified for Windows Vista. Of course, we can't exactly trust just because a computer is "certified" for Windows Vista that it'll be a pleasant experience after previous events involving the system's specifications. However, the small form factor Ion-based machines showcased in the videos on Hot Hardware are rather impressive (if you're willing to wait through an annoying 'online scuba lessons' ad), playing 1080p HD video fullscreen without any dropframes, running Vista without hiccups, and even playing 3D games with equivalence to a mid-tower, mid-range quality. These little buggers are expected to roll out Summer of 2009, the cheapest of the lot reaching a delicious low of $299.

Netbooks have been heralded as the foot in the door for Linux. With the launch of the earliest Eee PC models, Asus made a bold move by only offering them with Linux pre-installed; Microsoft soon responded by working with Asus to bring Windows XP to the next generation Eee PCs. Since then, Windows XP gained market share in the netbook segment rapidly, casting doubts over whether or not netbooks would really turn out to be that foot in the door. HP has today announced that its new HP Mini 1000 netbook will not be available with Linux pre-installed in Europe.

In a classic case of kicking in open doors, research firm Gartner has concluded that software will not be able to keep up with the ever-increasing number of cores in modern processors. "By Gartner's reckoning, the doubling of core or thread counts every two years or so - and for some architectures, the thread growth is even larger with each jump - will affect all layers of the software stack. Operating systems, middleware, virtualization hypervisors, and applications riding atop this code all have their own limitations when it comes to exploiting threads and cores, and Gartner is warning IT shops to look carefully at their software before knee-jerking a purchase order to get the latest server as a means of boosting performance for their applications."

Late last week we informed you on the official revealing of the 10" Acer Aspire One, the successor the immensely successful 8.9" Aspire One. We couldn't yet confirm or deny any possible Linux model or SSD option, but we can now: Acer has stated that while during the initial launch there will only be a HDD/Windows version, it will soon be followed by an SSD/Linux model. The SSD will be 16GB in size, and the Linux distribution will - again - be Linpus. The Windows version will launch mid-February.

The Georgia Electronic Design Center recently produced a working wireless chip that transmits data at 60 GHz signals. Scientists at the center achieved speeds of 15Gbps at a distance of one meter, 10 Gbps at two meters, and 5 Gbps at five meters-- and if those aren't blazing speeds even for a relatively small area, then I'm Mickey Mouse. The applications for the 60 GHz chip are endless for both consumer and IT markets, to add to our already vastly wireless lives. The ISO standard will be published later this year, and this new technology is predicted to be on the market in just a few years afterwards.

The Register has posted a hands-on video review of the Sony Vaio P, Sony's take on the netbook lifestyle PC. There's not much more to say, so just watch the video and tell us how you feel about it.