Submitted by Rumour after rumour and story after story talk of Google wanting a piece of the netbook pie, the only pie in the computer hardware business that still tastes any good. They are supposed to bring Android, the phone operating system based on Linux and a modified version of Java, to netbooks in order to compete with Windows. Analysts are torn about whether or not Android would have a chance.
When the netbook market first took off in the days of the 7″ Asus EeePC, Linux was the only option, and they sold well. Microsoft soon realised they needed to be part of this, and contacted Asus and together they put Windows XP on the 9″ version of the EeePC. Ever since then, Linux on netbooks has been having a hard time, with reports now stating that Microsoft owns more than 90% of new netbooks sold. In other words, Linux may have failed to gain the foothold people were hoping for – for whatever reasons.
However, there’s a new line of netbooks coming onto the market, those based on ARM processors. Despite the hopes of some people, Windows doesn’t run on ARM, so ARM notebook manufacturers will all be using Linux. These netbooks will be cheaper than Atom-based models, giving them a truly competitive advantage.
Another way Linux could gain ground from Microsoft in the netbook market would be Google’s Android operating system. This can run on both x86 and ARM-based machines, and has the backing of a very large technology company. Analysts, however, disagree over Android’s chances. “Netbooks are driven by price more than features,” Michael Cherry, analyst with independent research firm Directions on Microsoft, “If the price gap between Windows and Linux-based netbooks widens, buyers may stop caring about the operating system.”
A key factor will be Microsoft’s pricing strategy. They won’t stand a chance if they offer the pointless and useless Starter Edition of Windows 7, which can only run three applications at the same time as an arbitrary restriction. Even though all versions of Windows 7 can easily run on a netbook, the editions above Starter may simple prove to be too expensive to compete with Android and/or Linux. Microsoft can’t keep on offering Windows XP; they can dump Windows XP licenses almost for free now, but Windows 7 is a big investment that needs to be earned back first.
Another analyst, Tim Bajarin, president of consulting firm Creative Strategies, is less optimistic about Android’s chances. He believes Google won’t enter the netbook party until at least mid-2010, due to the uncertain economy now. Still, he doesn’t believe Android will be much of a threat to Windows on netbook. “I still believe that a netbook is just a smaller laptop and that the majority of them will be Windows based even if an Android version does come to market in the future,” he states.
This is a classic case of “time will tell”. Google has never been about quickly gaining lots of marketshare with a product, and the company is often happy just entering a market quietly, hoping that in the long run they will make a difference. If netbooks are here to stay, and Google wants to be part of it, then there’s no need to rush things.
I don’t understand why manufacturers haven’t started putting custom-rolled Windows Embedded Standard on these devices yet. With a one-time fee of $995 for the development kit and just $90 per-computer licensing, plus support from MS for the next 10 years, it seems like the ideal way to go for netbooks.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsembedded/en-us/products/westandard/…
I wonder if it’s just XP’s brand recognition that has kept it the OS of choice thus far?
Edited 2009-03-23 18:06 UTC
YES! finally someone else who understands that this would be the best possible move for retailers.
Read that over again and you will answer your own question.
$90 per unit for a limited OS when there are plenty of complete OSes available? Hello! Are you informed at all about the netbook market?
are you informed at all about windows embeded standard?
( http://www.microsoft.com/windowsembedded/en-us/products/westandard/… )
it has every feature XP pro has and more if you want (or less depending on how you customize it). beats Windows home edition currently on mosy of these things. “the more you know” (music playing)
It’s also double the price of XP (I think the price msft was dumping XP for netbooks was around $40).
And I doubt people will want “Windows Embedded Standard”, they just want “normal windows xp”.
Well technically, they wouldn’t even need to know it wasn’t normal WinXP. As long as it did everything XP does, and it had the Windows name behind it, most would simply accept it, as saddening as that thought is. Hell, I know some people that couldn’t spot XP vs Vista if it came up and bit them. All they kno is “it’s Windows.”
I think the main problem would be that it wouldn’t run the regular Windows apps that people want. People would see it as a broken version of Windows because it doesn’t actually run Windows software. So if Windows Embedded doesn’t run regular Windows software, it no longer ‘does everything that XP does’.
(note: I’m assuming that by Windows Embeded you mean WindowsCE/Windows Mobile. If not….then I’m probably waaaay off in what I just said
Edit: Alright, so I looked into Windows Embedded and see that it’s not WinCE/WinMo. Guess my comment can be ignored.
Edited 2009-03-24 12:33 UTC
Windows embedded does run standard Windows software. It’s just a customizeable version of XP when you cut right down to it, and will run anything XP will run.
Ah, I guess that explains it.
When’s that XP support set to run out again? Or are they really going to keep pushing it off indefinitely?
Still, it’s $90. If you plan on selling your netbook unit for $200-$300 that’s a big chunk of your cost.
Knowing Microsoft, I’m sure they’d end up cutting that price down if that was the way to remain in the market. If embedded was the way to keep their grubby little hands all over netbooks, they’d probably give it away for $40 or less.
Remember … after that $90 there is also the cost of proprieatry Windows-specific applications. MS Office, is one, Photoshop, Dreamweaver and Autocad are others that are often mentioned by Windows fans … but I can’t really see anything other than MS Office being considered for a netbook. What is a copy of MS Office going for? Oh, and anti-virus and other anti-malware. More than the cost of the netbook, probably.
Ah, but “you can get free applications (such as OpenOffice) for Windows” … I can almost hear the counter argument before it is raised. Well, if you are going to run OpenOffice and other free software, why not just run it on Linux OS in the first place and save yourself the need for performance-sapping and anti-virus and other anti-malware?
…you do know it’s binary compatible with windows XP right? therefor all windows apps that run on XP run on xp embeded. …why do people post things without even looking to see if what they are posting is in any way factual?
after rereading your comment, I believe you have windows embeded standard (the XP based one) confused with Windows CE (which is not win32 compatible, though .NET apps will usually run if recompiled and don’t have to many dependancies)
Edited 2009-03-24 14:54 UTC
Yup, I looked into Windows Embeded further and see that there is a compact version which is CE, and a standard/enterprise version which looks to be binary compatible with regualar XP. Wasn’t aware of this project before so thanks to the first person that brought it up. I learned something new today
Speaking of XP embedded, can it join AD domains? Might be of interest to me if it can.
yes it can. it can do everything xp pro does and then some.
also responding to an earlier post, there is the option to remove the boot splash screen and any reference to what version of windows it is. the customer would never know the difference.
http://blogs.msdn.com/embedded/archive/2009/02/23/fine-tuning-embed…
Edited 2009-03-23 20:41 UTC
Well, obviously Linux would be great choice too, but it seems most manufacturers are too unmotivated to put together really intriguing ideas there, and most consumers are too attached to Windows. I’m just saying Windows Embedded Standard is a better choice than XP or 7.
Yet another article about pointless analysts speculating about Android’s chances on netbooks. Are we done with these yet?
Android is for small devices – like phones and PDA. Even on very small netbooks – there’s no way it can work beter than a customized linux distro like MAEMO.
Edited 2009-03-23 18:40 UTC
Unless, it were customized for netbooks, of course. Which is exactly what the analysts are talking about: a customized version of android for netbooks.
Basically this is what all analysts predict:
In a hypothetical universe where a product that does not exist in the real world did exist, it may perform better than it does in this world where it does not exist.
How the heck do you become an analyst? It seems like the easiest job in the world. I have never ever heard annalists say anything that I didn’t think was already going to happen, have that thing happen, and be surprised by it. Which means that either all analysts make wimpy projections correctly, they are never right, or I am as president as an analyst. Or some combination there of.
The job they have is not to give accurate predictions in whatever field. Their job is to justify business decisions by others (the people that hire them), saving people’s butts if they go wrong.
If you base a flawed business strategy on your own gut feeling, you’re being blamed when it goes bad.
“Google has never been about quickly gaining lots of marketshare with a product, and the company is often happy just entering a market quietly, hoping that in the long run they will make a difference.”
no google has never created a product in the “me too” spirit of thigns and tried to shove it out to the masses as fast as humanly possible. they would never do that, thats why barely anyone knows about crome. what you haven’t heard of it? you should check out the add banner above this post I am typing
. or go to youtube and see the “have you tried chrome” links all over it.
sorry but that was to easy of an example. it would have been more acurate if you said “in the past” before that sentence. in the lsat 2+ years google has been VERY pushy and VERY quick to voice their oppinions. wait and see is no longer accurate
I learned a new lesson here at OSAlert.com, if you make a crack at google prepair to get the hell modded down out of your comment
Edited 2009-03-24 01:34 UTC
I think some people just don’t like sarcasm.
I think it all comes down to how complete the flash support for android is going to wind up. If it is good, then it’ll allow for people to have full support for the net as it is, rather than how we want it to be, on arm platforms.
Hmm, I don’t know about that. It’s certainly a factor, but I doubt flash support, in and of itself, will make or break Android’s chances. It would depend on what use a person intends, some will buy a netbook because it’s a good movie player, others won’t think of watching any video on those screens. Even without Flash Player, as long as people can play back youtube and similar video sites they’d be happy for the most part.
I can’t decide if their chances are slim or none.
ARM netbooks could bring Android out into netbooks more.
Lets see MS/Intel remove from restrictions on netbooks (resolution, HD size, graphics power, etc), and ARM’s linux based offerings with real battery life and thin designs and see what happens.
Just give me a *BSD/Debian/Android based netbook with a fanless, thin design, HD capable processor & screen, and at least 40gb of storage.
Must pay more attention to what I am writing. My god that was a terrible use of English.
I can’t believe that OSAlert is still uncritically reporting the statistic that 90% of netbooks are sold with Windows. That figure is for the USA only, and it’s almost certainly hopelessly wrong for the rest of the world. I’d expect Windows penetration to be a little lower in the rest of the Anglo Saxon world, lower again in other EU countries, and much lower in East Asia and the BRIC economies. These are all huge markets.
I don’t have any problem with the statistic being reported – the USA is an important market – but please qualify it without requiring your readers to follow the links.
You do realise that in countries such as mine, New Zealand, it is next to impossible to find a Linux based Netbook on sale; I’m sure it is the same elsewhere in the world. It has nothing to do with ‘preferences’ or being ‘aglosaxon’ and everything to do with the fact that you can’t purchase something in the shop when it doesn’t actually exist in the shop to purchase.
Someone also pointed out here, for example, how the Linux version are crippled when compared to their Windows counter part; anaemic sized storage and shoddy distributions that no one has heard of. When I hear people bemoan about Linux on the Netbook – it tells me more about the sad state of OEM’s and their unwillingness to invest money into their products than any deficiency with Linux. Linux is modular for a reason – it is up to OEM’s to come out and make a uniquely HP, Acer, Toshiba etc experience. One that differentiates their product – not based on price but how good the over all experience is by focusing on the little things that end users want made easier.
Here you go … this is a possible option for you, soon to be available from just across the pond …
http://www.linux-netbook.com/kogan-agora-netbook-pro
http://www.kogan.com.au/blog/2009/mar/17/australias-cheapest-netboo…
I’d go for the PRO version with the reasonable battery. The 160GB hard disk (either model) certainly isn’t anaemic storage.
Good specification, decent price. It is a MSI-Wind look-alike, but it comes with gOS (based on Ubuntu).
Enjoy.
Edited 2009-03-24 02:29 UTC
Also, it is interesting to note that Dell, who sell netbooks with an unconstrained, untainted version of Linux (Ubuntu) … report that they sell Ubuntu Linux with about 30% of their netbooks.
All it takes is a supplier who is will to offer an unconstrained full Linux desktop.
If google enters the notebook market with Android, I know a couple of persons who will cry tears of blood and will have a very damaged ego. In someway, well deserved.
Hint, is not from Microsoft or related to it.
My opinion is that Ubuntu is the answer for Linux. These Netbooks should ship with the latest version of Ubuntu. Not just Dell, I’m talking about every OEM here. They should really stop making crappy interfaces and choosing crappy distros. Ubuntu is one of the most if not most powerful Linux distro hands down. Also it has more potential than any other distro to go mainstream.
That’s just my opinion.
Ubuntu is coming soon for ARM, and my guess is that the main reason for this is the netbook market.
Ubuntu also has an UI that is rather similar to Windows, so it is probably a fairly easy “sell” to people who are used to Windows.
Personally, I would prefer a less Windows-like UI.
Ubuntu has a number of desktops available.
Apart from the standard GNOME, there is KDE4, XFCE, LXDE, and Netbook remix.
Using Ubuntu’s package manager tool, these can be installed by searching for and selecting then installing the following meta-packages respectively:
GNOME – gnome-desktop-environment
KDE4 – kubuntu-desktop
XFCE – xubuntu-desktop
LXDE – lxde
Netbook Remix – ubuntu-netbook-remix
Once the corresponding meta-package has been installed, the new desktop choice will be available at the next login screen under the “Session” options.
Aside from changing the desktop system, the UI is still quite configurable within these various desktop systems.
All of these desktop systems will probably be available for ARM when Canonical finishes the porting effort.
Edited 2009-03-24 08:55 UTC
Probably Ubuntu Netbook or Gnome are going to be available. Because those are the two official Canonical desktops for Ubuntu.
Hopefully we will get more options!
I don’t agree with al of your post, I don’t find Ubuntu inherently any more or less powerful than any other linux-based os. I do believe, however, that it does have the best chance at going mainstream and it does, for the most part, have a good balance of out of the box functionality versus configurability, though there is still some GUI configuration tools it does not have by default that Windows and Mac users would expect; though most of the missing tools can be installed by a quick trip to the add/remove option, a newcomer might not know that and might not no where to find out.
Which tools would these be?
Edited 2009-03-24 12:12 UTC
1. An audio configuration utility which enables you to choose the default, system-wide audio device and set up your speaker configurations.
Partial solution for most people: install the pavucontrol package, as the majority of users are usually ok with the default pulseaudio configuration. This lets you control the various volumes as well as set up the audio device, but provides no control over speaker setup. While not terribly important for a netbook, quite a few desktop users would want this type of control. This may be better in Ubuntu 9.04 with their new gnome volume control, but even though I’m running the 9.04 branch I don’t see the new volume control they talk about. Further, they should most certainly have a default device configurator that lets you set the default ALSA device. Even OpenSUSE has this one correct, but right now in Ubuntu you have to drop to the terminal and do:
asoundconf set-default-card xxxx
A desktop user should never under any circumstances have to drop to the CLI.
2. An easy way to format media such as SD cards and USB thumb drives. The required CLI utilities are present, but there’s no default GUI for tasks such as this.
Solution: install gparted, or they need to integrate a utility of their own to do this. This is something I get asked about a lot, and while the solution is simple enough, it is not obvious to many. Oddly enough, a floppy disk formatter is included by default, as if most desktops really use those things anymore.
3. NO equivalent to device manager, where users can easily deal with driver issues if any. Ubuntu’s proprietary driver manager only allows control over some drivers, this should be expanded to allow control over all drivers without going to the CLI. We all know Linux occasionally loads the wrong driver, or needs a specific driver option to make certain hardware work. This is another thing OpenSUSE gets right, it’s easy to do this in the GUI, and it’s something most people have come to expect to be there when they need it especially when coming from Windows.
The assumption they should be operating under is that no desktop user, no matter what, should need to drop to the CLI. This is one of the reasons Windows is as popular as it is, everything any average user needs is just point/click although with Vista and 7 some of it has come to resemble one of those choose your adventure RPGs.
I agree with you in everything. Except that Windows is popular for point and click. Windows is popular because Microsoft has monopolized the market.
Now back to the GUI stuff. Yes, we need GUI for every configuration possible, like a “control center” or instead of control center, add options to the “System” menu on the panel. That replaces the need for “Control Panels”
Right now the “System Tab” is bloated with a lot of options the Ubuntu team should work on trimming the menus, merging similar things. Example: Instead of having an option for keyboard and another for mouse, there should be only one keyboard and mouse option. By grouping similar stuff together the menus would be much more smaller and leaves more space for new options.
… or right-click on the volume control icon in the system tray, and select “set master channel” from the menu.
In Ubuntu … gparted. In Mandriva, it is a little more intuitively named … Mandriva calls it DiskDrake.
Both deal with formatting AND partitioning of disks. There may be a case for a GUI to format disks only.
Users get just as lost in Windows as they do in Linux when it comes to drivers … GUI or no GUI.
This issue is better answered by having available for sale Linux systems with the OS pre-installed. There should be no driver issues then.
This issue is at least partly addressed, given the current reality of the monopoly situation in the retail market for pre-installed systems, by having a LiveCD. If it works properly with the LiveCD, there should be no driver issues when it is installed to HD. This is the sort of process, and GUI level, that people can handle.
For hardware Drivers:
You go to System > Administration > Hardware Drivers after Ubuntu looks for the drivers you are a click away from downloading and installing them.
You missed the point. Their “hardware drivers” utility does not allow me to edit currently installed drivers: disable them, change their load options, substitute one driver over another (sometimes necessary for Atheros wifi chips), and other things. It is that functionality Ubuntu lacks, not a driver downloader/finder that only works with additional drivers, most proprietary. In fact, when I run it, it simply says “no proprietary drivers installed on this system.” That isn’t what I want when I say a device manager like application.
Ok, I get it! It would be nice to see more options and to be able to manage the drivers.
Funny you say that, everyone says this option should be present but… well, it just isn’t there for me. I have all the usual panel options when I right click on the volume control applet, plus “mute” and “preferences.” That’s it, nothing about setting a master channel, or a default card. I have to use asoundconf from the terminal to do that, unless it’s the pulseaudio default output I wish to set, then I can do that from pavucontrol.
I already mentioned that. My point wasn’t that they don’t have this utility, but that it is not present by default and that is what will confuse users. Who expects to be required to install an additional utility to do something as quick as formatting a thumb drive? Gparted is tiny, it wouldn’t be much hassle for them to add it into the default selection of packages, or perhaps bring their partition editor over from their installer.
Perhaps, but at the same time, I think you sell most ordinary users short. Believe it or not, and perhaps this is a sad sign, a good number of them have become relatively familiar with some basic device manager operations out of necessity, given how messy windows drivers can be. I think you’d be surprised. Even lacking that, in cases where you can’t get remote access or they can’t get to the internet, it’s easier to support a GUI over the phone than it is to explain to them how to edit a file, and there’s less room for user error. In contrast, it’s easier on forum posts and the like to show the command line.
If Microsoft decides to do so. Look in the history of the NT versions, and the various CPUs and motherboards it could run on: it could do so, because only a very small part of the OS relies on such low-level details, and is separated into the HAL (Hardware Abstraction Layer) which then only really requires that that be done specific to that system board and processor, and the rest just simply recompiled. After all, with the DEC Alpha version of NT, Microsoft had a 64-bit version many years ago.
Unless Microsoft has made the current driver model completely too dependent to make it feasible in a relatively short period of time, there’s no reason why Microsoft couldn’t come out with a non-Mobile version of Windows to run on an ARM processor, and because it’d be a completely different processor than any current desktops, they could be fairly sure that they could sell it at a lower price per license just to get that part of the OS market covered with something they get money from, and have no worries about people grabbing a copy off a netbook and running it on their x86 desktop at the same time.
The biggest issue then becomes the same one that existed for all the non-x86 mutations of Windows NT: application availability for those that don’t see that platform have a large enough user base to make it attractive to developers to do the cross-system building and testing of their apps. However good/bad/ugly the DEC Alpha or the other platforms were for running x86 code in emulation were/are, the ARM processor, while very useful for its original design goals, just isn’t up to snuff to do such a thing, because it really takes a CPU (in most cases) that is much faster in native code for the same functionality in order to emulate the other processor at a decent speed. Thus, Microsoft isn’t likely to have a remotely viable way for ARM versions of any regular Windows OS (not counting Mobile) to run existing widely available x86 applications.
The new version of Gnome now has a formatting utility and a Pulseaudio control applet.
Also, can you please not mention the Kogan netbook. Kogan takes cheap crap from Chinese factories and stamps their name on it. As an electrical retailer I know how bad the generic Chinese stuff can be. What’s the point of having a netbook that cost you $535, when it’s constantly being sent away for repairs?
Oh that’s right, I forgot: Kogan doesn’t employ anyone with the qualifications to repair any of their electronics!
Please people, I know a cheap well-specced netbook is enticing, but it’s simply too cheap to be any good.
A formatting utility by default? I can’t seem to find that anywhere, unless you’re talking about gparted and that’s not a gnome default.