Netbook OS alternatives abound
If you’re feeling a wee bit adventurous with that brand new netbook of yours, why not go ahead and try out a different (and free) operating system other than the bundled Windows XP OS that’s probably on your system? Why even do this you ask? Well ask yourself this question. Do you do anything on your netbook that specifically depends on Windows XP? Do you spend the majority of your time on the web, checking email, socializing with others on Facebook, tweeting on Twitter, playing with Google Docs, or just working with one web service after another? If so, then you have plenty of OS choices to consider OTHER than Windows XP.
With that said, here’s a quick rundown of available choices for you to play with.
If we’re going to go Linux – why not opt for the Netbook Remix version of Ubuntu. You get a nice customized user interface designed specifically for netbook screen sizes and you have access to all that is Linux.
If you’re all about cloud computing and widgets galore, then you’ll want to check out the gOS. gOS is a desktop OS built on top of Linux with a very Google centric feel to it. If you live in a Google dominated world, then why not give this OS a whirl.
Moblin is another take on a cloud-centric OS. This OS, sponsored primarily by Intel, features a user interface that’s social networking heavy. There’s a primary dashboard that presents the latest status updates from friends etc on networks such as Twitter. Moblin is promising – especially with boot up times of around 20 seconds or so on a netbook. Fast.. very fast but still buggy.
But wait.. there’s more. That’s right – there’s Jolicloud – yet another spin on a cloud-oriented netbook OS. News.com actually has a quick preview of Jolicloud here on their site. I don’t have much experience with Jolicloud but it certainly “looks” impressive from the user interface perspective.
And I’m sure there’s plenty more out there that I can’t think of (oh yes.. there is the looming Google Chrome OS for netbook systems next year.. but that’s not here today as of yet).
BUT – the big takeaways is – we the consumer have many more choices than ever before when it comes to alternative operating systems for our computers – especially for netbook systems. Of course there are challenges in moving to a new OS – particularly in the hardware support front. Whether you try out a new OS ultimately depends on whether the new platform makes you more productive than your current platform. If you’re into trying new things, then by all means try it out. If you’re more along the lines of the straight and narrow, then you’ll want to see if you can do everything you need to do within a Linux-based OS.
Enjoy!
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Netbook OS alternatives abound | NetbookTech » NetbookBlog — August 18, 2009 @ 3:28 am
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August 18, 2009 at 3:28 am
[...] OS alternatives abound | NetbookTech Source: NetbookTech - Tuesday, 18th August 2009, 4:28 GMT ...