NetbookTech

MSI Wind owners who want or are running OS X on their respective netbooks have one more reason to celebrate. Official drivers for the Realtek Wi-Fi card have finally emerged although they are not available directly from Realtek. The drivers are currently floating around in the MSIWind.net forums and also available for download here and here. Cool stuff.

[Check it out via SlashGear]

A new review of the Dell Inspiron Mini 12 is out – this time from the folks at Stuff.co.nz. While there’s a lot going for the Mini 12, there’s also a couple of annoying features. The system supports a max of 1GB of RAM, has a slow, pokey hard drive, and comes with Windows Vista (not Windows XP or Linux like other models out there). Here’s a snippet from the review:

“For all that, the Inspiron Mini 12 isn’t as good as it could be.”

NotebookReview takes a look at the new HP Mini 1000 netbook here on their website. The Mini 1000 is HP’s second generation netbook featuring a larger 10.2 inch display, and the Intel Atom processor. I recently played with the Mini 1000’s keyboard and I must say, it’s quite good. Here’s what NotebookReview thinks of the Mini 1000:

“The HP Mini 1000 is a clear winner on the netbook front, offering a great design and being very user-upgrade friendly. It offers the best keyboard out of the entire netbook crowd, only matched by the earlier Mini-Note 2133 which uses the same design. “

Finally, DailyTech reviews the MSI Wind U100-483JP netbook here on their website. Here’s a snippet:

“Although the Eee PC 1000H is a solid choice for portable computing I think the MSI Wind U100 is the better pick.”

Enjoy!

Just in time for the holiday season, MSI has released a new Cherry Red version of the MSI Wind U100 netbook. Unfortunately this model is only available in Taiwan to celebrate “IT month” (what the heck?). Spec wise – there’s nothing different with the Cherry Red edition but hey.. the red color is more than enough right?

And finally, in other news, MSI will be displaying the upcoming MSI Wind U120 netbook at CES 2009 (We’ll be there folks!). The three pound Wind U120 has many of the same features as the U100 but also comes with an updated look (white with black accents) and WiMAX or HSDPA compatibility. The U120 comes with an Intel Atom processor, 1GB of RAM, three USB ports, a 4 in 1 card reader, a 160GB HDD, and even comes with an external mouse. No word on pricing or availability as of yet.

While we may not see an actual Apple branded netbook system anytime soon, this certainly hasn’t deterred folks from installing OS X on a netbook system. However, at least one person has taken this a step further by not only installing OS X but also physically modifying an MSI Wind netbook – making it look like what a possible Apple netbook could look like (if they would only make one of course). The end result? Say hello to the “MacBook Nano”.

The transformation process from an MSI Wind to the “MacBook Nano” also happens to be documented pictorially on Flickr.com. Very cool stuff though ..I can’t say that I will ever spend the time to do something like this.

[Check it out via eWeek, MacRumors.com]

Best Buy has cut the price of the MSI Wind netbook (also known as the Q2 on the Best Buy website) down to $349.99. This particular system has the 10.1 inch WSVGA display, an Intel Atom 1.6GHz processor, 1GB of RAM, 120GB SATA HDD, a 1.3 megapixel webcam, a digital media reader, 3 USB 2.0 ports, Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and Windows XP Home OS. On the downside, this particular system only has the three cell lithium-ion battery. However, at $349.99, this is well below what other retailers are selling the Wind at. If you’ve been sitting along the sidelines for the Wind, this might be the time to dive in and get the netbook.

[Check it out via Wired.com]

While you’ve seen us install the pre-beta build of Windows 7 on a Lenovo IdeaPad S10 netbook, other adventurous folks out there have decided to try out the new OS on their respective netbook systems.

Joanna Stern of LaptopMag installed Windows 7 on her ASUS Eee PC 1000H netbook and had this to say about the system.

“So how is Windows 7 on an Intel Atom netbook? Two thumbs up for the new wireless manager and the new visual cues that are incorporated throughout the OS. We wouldn’t give up Windows XP just yet considering the video playback, but the OS is still in beta and it is our hope that final version will be even better for Atom-based PCs.”

Liliputing posted up their impressions of running Windows 7 on an MSI Wind netbook system here. Here’s what they had to say about the new OS:

“All in all, Windows 7 is even more enjoyable than Vista was, and it’s not going to be disappearing from my Wind any time soon.”

Another adventurous fella posted up a view clip of Windows 7 on the MSI Wind on YouTube:

He had this to say:

“Anyways, it runs ok (it’s still in Beta), but if you have a Wind, just stick with XP or Vista for now.”

Finally, the folks at the HP Mini Guide.com installed the M3 build on the HP Mini-Note netbook and said the following:

“Overall it does seem a bit faster than Vista and things are looking really good for this pre-beta.”

All very positive results thus far. Add in a few more features, clean up some bugs, and Windows 7 could definitely be a winner.

[via SlashGear]

Found another review of the MSI Wind netbook – this time it’s by Matthew Miller of ZDNet and the article is entitled “Review: MSI Wind netbook doesn’t compromise on the keyboard”. Here’s what he thought of the netbook:

There are many choices in the still growing netbook category today, but I was very pleased with the MSI Wind as far as functionality and quality.

You can read more of the review here at ZDNet.

[Check it out]

Here are a couple of new reviews for you to check out today. First up, the folks at AfterDawn.com have a new review up on the MSI Wind U100 netbook. While there’s no verdict, the site does list several pros and cons for the netbook. For pros, the U100 has “pretty fast start-up, good keyboard and touchpad, extremely powerful and longlasting battery”, while the cons include “Wi-Fi range, no scrolling on the touchpad, size, and hiccups in high load browsing”.

The second review comes from the folks at TrustedReviews where they managed to get their hands on a Toshiba Satellite NB100 netbook. Here’s what they had to say about the NB100:

Thus, if you want a no frills netbook at a no frills price, the Satellite NB100 could be a very good option.

The MSI Wind netbook finally made its appearance at my local West LA location of Best Buy. Above is a super grainy shot of the Wind (you can thank the graininess to my wonderfully crappy iPhone 3G camera!) which as expected was listed for $399. Now if you can’t seem to find the Wind on the Best Buy website it’s because the netbook is listed as the “Q2 – Netbook with Intel Atom Processor N270 – Black”. Now here’s the weird thing – the netbook is listed at $479.99  - not $399 as found at the actual store. Unfortunately I can’t tell if there’s anything different in the specs between the $399 store front version and the $479.99 online version. Hopefully there is!

One other note, Best Buy is selling the Celeron version of the ASUS 1000HD for a price of $379.99. An Atom based ASUS 900A is selling for $329.99

It’s been interesting to see the public and media reaction to Andy Tung’s statements earlier in the week about how return rates were four times higher for MSI Wind netbooks running Linux vs netbooks running Windows. Yes - definitely fuel for good debates and of course, good flame wars. Here are some of my own thoughts and impressions about all of this. If you agree or disagree - awesome - I’d love to hear your thoughts!

So first off - remember NOT to generalize this. These are statistics coming from a single vendor for a single flavor of Linux with a limited distribution channel. Don’t start applying this statistic across the board to all vendors. We have absolutely no idea how Linux is selling for other vendors so please don’t start generalizing this as being a problem with Linux netbooks across the board.

Secondly, these are statistics.. and the problem with statistics is - it’s easy to come up with conclusions without taking a deeper look at the data. Case in point - sure the return rates are higher for Linux vs. Windows… but has MSI considered where these netbooks are being purchased from? Are the majority of the sales coming from places like Amazon.com? Or are they coming from places like Newegg.com or mwave.com? I’m willing to bet that the average consumer shopping at Newegg is perhaps a bit more technically savvy than the average consumer at Amazon.com.

Thirdly.. how is the netbook being marketed? Do consumers realize they are getting a netbook system with Linux? If so, is it perhaps the flavor of Linux being distributed with the netbook that’s the problem? What exactly are the problems people are witnessing? Are there not enough bundled applications for the netbook to make it useful out of the box? Are return rates different for different aged groups? Do older consumers return the netbook more often than younger consumers? 

The question of how the netbook is being sold is certainly an interesting one. Consider the way Dell sells the Inspiron Mini 9. With the direct sales approach, consumers get the chance to pick what components go into the Mini netbook. When you’re choosing the best model for your needs, it’s very apparent that you’re either choosing between Ubuntu Linux or Windows XP Home.

Now look at how MSI Wind is sold on Amazon.com. The fact that the system runs Windows XP vs Linux is buried in the title of the system. This is a sample title for one such MSI Wind netbook “MSI Wind 10″ Mini Laptop (1.6 GHz Intel Atom Processor, 512 MB RAM, 80 GB Hard Drive, Linux Novell SUSE, 3 Cell Battery) White”. For the casual consumer, it’s easy to overlook the Linux mention in the product. They see a system that’s pretty darn cheap - that’s what they’re seeing! They then receive the netbook in the mail, start it up and find an OS they’re not familiar with. Guess what- RETURN!

So.. is this a failure of Linux? No of course not. In many ways, it’s a failure of marketing and education. 1) Consumers are often not realizing they are purchasing a Linux based netbook and if they are, 2) they don’t realize that Linux is indeed a viable alternative to Windows. 

The educational piece is perhaps the most important part of it all. Consumers need to know that they can probably get almost all of their work done on Linux as they could on Windows. The same marketing campaign that Apple does with the Mac and OS X is in fact what Linux needs for the average consumer. This is why Apple succeeds in selling more and more Apple systems.. consumer education through savvy commercials and advertising.

Thus I repeat - this is NOT a failure of the Linux OS as much as it is about marketing and education. However the Linux community shouldn’t be completely left off the hook here.  If they (and “they” here means developers, hardware manufacturers, anyone out there who wants Linux to succeed) want the consumer world to accept Linux as an alternative to Windows, they need to make it far more friendly to the average consumer. Take a look at Apple and see what they’ve done with OS X. A pretty sweet and powerful OS yet simple enough to use for the average user. Linux is getting there with flavors like Ubuntu but it’s NOT there yet.  Thus the Linux community needs to see this as an opportunity to reach out to average consumers and say - “Hey everything you do on Windows, you can do on Linux, except it’s for free. It’s just as easy to do this on Linux”. Perhaps it’s mostly education than additional software development.. but there’s clearly something that needs to be done.

With that said, I think it’s great that manufacturers are bundling Linux with netbook systems. I don’t think you’ll see this option go away - especially as long as Microsoft continues charging for Windows XP Home or Windows Vista. For the ultimate power users out there, the best alternative would be a hardware purchase only - no software installed on the netbook. Take this a step further by truly passing the cost onto the consumer. Bundle both Windows and Linux install DVDs and then have the consumer pay Microsoft directly if they want to unlock Windows on their netbook. THEN perhaps consumers will begin to see the “costs” of running Windows vs. Linux.. and for those that still want Windows.. well then they want it (the same goes for Linux).

Just my 2 cents of course…

Here’s a list of other articles about this story…

• “What’s wrong with Linux netbooks?” - InternetNews.com
• “Bad marketing undermines Linux netbooks” - Tectonic
• “Have consumers spoken and said: “Linux sux”? - iTWire
• “Linux Netbook Returns: Not Surprising but likely Avoidable” - OStatic
• “Linux ready to replace Windows? Not yet..” - ZDNet
• “Linux netbook returns higher?” - eWeek
• “Consumers might not be ready for Linux netbooks, but we are” - ZDNet