The Acer still does it for me.

Don't you think that with such an influx of all those nice shiny toys the market is getting little crowded?

Damn, once again we're spoilt by choice :)

I just wish they standardized on one Linux distro for all of them, just to stop the confusion. I suggest Ubuntu with some different theme that this shitty (literally) standard one. Why Ubuntu? Repositories and ease of use. Others haven't got there yet...

Where's the price on the atom tablet *drooooooooooooooollll*

Well, its all basically debian, innit? Ubuntu certainly is, and xandros likewise (who provided the eeepc linux distro, I do believe)

That's where the nice package management came from (apt) certainly. And gnome and kde at distro and OS independent, if you were thinking of a common look'n'feel.

I'm more curious as to why Red Hat hasn't tried to stick its oar in. Or Novell, for that matter.

I like where these form-factors are going!

Reckon there'll be more of this come November in time for my birthday?!

Also hoping by then that one of the contending firms will come out with something along the following lines: Small physical size, nice screen res, wifi, long battery life. That's all I want! No more, no less.

I really like the look of the tablet; looks to be the kind of device im after, something a little more friendly for using on the move than a laptop for when im out & about. The battery life is a bit disappointing, but I guess thats the downside to the improved screen.

... as long as the price is around £350. Second time in two days I've changed my mind about mini-laptops.

SuSE Linux is supplied on the HP Mini-Note, or whatever it is. Although I agree, since they shipped a stripped-down Suse, they could get further involved. Maybe they're waiting for IBM/Lenovo to get involved. Although you can already install SuSE on the Eee, so I wouldn't imagine there's much to getting it running on other similar devices.

Please gawd not Devian though....

This article should be censored under the UN convention for torture. Showing so many nice and shiny toys (drooooooooool) and not quoting any prices. Clear example of "cruel and unusual punishment".

Mandriva got there before Ubuntu, it 'just works' and is still king IMHO. Ubuntu is still floating on the hype, just like Gentoo before it and the distro before that etc

You'll see fan boys of all distros jump into this argument though, you'll never reach a consensus on which distro is easiest for newbies and pros alike. It's not worth even starting that debate.

Back onto the subject of the new Gigabyte hardware - any idea on the price? Are they really rivals to the original Eee or Acer Aspire One, or are they priced too high?

that screen will break off as soon as the dog walks past. let's stick to the new acer boys...

Linux and standardisation is a contradiction in terms. That's why it's still a pig to get working properly for the average Joe. Customised setups for dedicated hardware is where it's at and why linux works so well with these little laptops. I.e. some poor geek has put in the hard work to get it up and running smoothly!

Two halves of a keyboard made of tiny keys, divided by a massive gap of useless plastic? What's wrong with a "normal" keyboard with slightly bigger keys?

Any good for graphics apps, or just basic icon selecting?

I'd love something like this, if I can paint on it without plugging in a wacom.

Computers of this form factor are not new -- Fujitsu Siemens, JVC and Toshiba (to name a few) have made such machines for over a decade. But where these were typically priced at the executive segment (i.e., £1000 or more), the Eee PC is priced for personal or school use. It is those low-cost, small-form-factor machines ("Cuters" or whatever we end calling them) that are interesting -- the other ones are old hat.

We can only speculate, but my best guess is that Gigabyte's machines are priced for the executive segment. But I would love to be proven wrong. :-)

Anybody else think that Gigabyte are stealing Nokia's ideas?

wtf can you do with 4Gb local storage?!

well, at least it hasn't got a standard HD. baby laptops should NOT use standard HD's..SSD's only!

i guess you could hook up a big fat ext HD to take care of stuff, but that's not really portable.

i know SSD's are exp, but they are coming down in price and they should really have at least 20Gb or so..

btw, tracking this very active space here (you're welcome!)

http://www.eupeople.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=487

cheers,

bill

If Gigabyte et al can copy the Nokia Internet Tablet form factor and avoid the mistakes Nokia have made (poor quality software, poor hardware design) then full credit to them. After all, wasn't it Nokia that said they are not averse to copying something if it's good?

Nokia had a good idea - they just executed it poorly. They may still have a chance as they're on ARM not Intel and may have better battery lifetime as a result, but their next firmware update (aka "Diablo" or Maemo 4.1 or IT OS 2008 v4, due any week now) had better be good and their next new hardware design needs to avoid the mistakes in their previous models (dodgey touchscreen, poor video subsystem, completely wasted 3D hardware, appaling camera quality etc.).

Sorry, I can't get too excited having seen the history of these things being in the US$2500 range. To match the Nokia N800/N810s they'll have to match the price range as well as the hardware.

> WTF can you do with 4Gb local storage?!

Well, after I got rid of the KDE/GNOME "we make MS look GOOD" bloatware, I got Debian Lenny down to 2.5GB on my laptop. I use FVWM2 as my WM and it does fine. Doing "apt-get remove gdm" and saying "yes" to the ton of shite that goes with it does wonders.

With linux? Quite a lot actually and that's even despite having KDE installed. Uninstall the stuff you don't want or need and you'll have a couple of Gb to play with, which is more than enough for email and documents. The basic Eee shipped with 2G and that was more than enough for people.

I wouldn't mind a touchscreen device for MythTV, but I don't think this is it. It'll probably be priced too high and I suspect the hinges won't last 6 months of proper use.

As svelte as it looks on pictures, the M912 feels absolutely cheap IRL. Gigabyte is also offering a black version, which at least looks better.

That said, the chaps at Computex pointed out that they were still displaying a pre-production model (final due in about 2 months) and the hinge would feel more solid. As it was, after one day at Computex, the display hinge had quite a bit of play, seriously discouraging me from potentially buying the piece.

Compared to Kohjinsha's construction, Gigabyte's rotating screen still leaves a lot to be desired.

I've got an eeePC 701, and the 4g SSD has been plenty of storage. All I need the SSD for is installing applications. I just checked, and I have 1.2g free. Most of my data is stored on SD cards or my network. I keep a handful of 2g SD cards in the case, and a thumb drive to exchange data with systems without network or SD slots.

The only thing I would improve is screen size. I'd like to see 14" with a normal laptop keyboard in the 2lb range @ ~$400. I do like the looks of the Acer in yesterday's article, although my black eeePC looks fine.

"... as long as the price is around £350."

Me too, but realistically it is likely to be double that.

Considering that http://www.expansys.com/gigabyte/p_gigabyte.aspx are offering the 700 series for around the £500 mark, I don't think Gigabyte's offerings really warrant the SMC(tm) logo and they certainly aren't competition for the Eee (or the Acer).

Still, perhaps you can put OSX on it and pass it off as a cheap Air.

The Acer One, and the Gigabyte have both been announced without any new technocrumpet.

Haven't they heard - sex sells!