Monday, May 19, 2008

BYO(OS)



So here I am, a proud new owner of an Asus 4G 701 Eee PC. It is a 7" laptop that is about the same size as a travel DVD player. It has a full keyboard, three USB 2.0 ports, ethernet, VGA out, and a Kensington lock when needed. I have been using it for about three weeks and other than my latest BlackBerry Curve and iPod it is possibly the greatest tech buy I have ever made.

It allows me to be online at any given time (with WiFi availability) and is the size of a hardback book but it's not just the portability that is special about it. I'll give you a hint. It runs Linux. While there is an XP version and others have installed Windows on the Linux versions there is no way I'd even entertain it. Even if I didn't work at Red Hat.

This operating system lets me do anything I want to do while not getting in my way. No de-fragging, no anti-virus, no spyware, and NO multiple rebooting after software is downloaded and/or removed. This open source operating system that is written and maintained by a Linux community is perfectly ubiquitous and transparent all at the same time. The value I find is that this PC is a true tool that I can use and not spend most of my time maintaining and protecting it from the big bad WWW.

Open Source: 1, Proprietary: 0

No comments:

Post a Comment