Linux is about to take over the low end of PCs

Linux Watch ^ | December 7th | Steven J Vaughn Nichols

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

Sometimes, several unrelated changes come to a head at the same time, with a result no one could have predicted. The PC market is at such a tipping point right now and the result will be millions of Linux-powered PCs in users' hands.

The first change was the continued maturation of desktop Linux. Today, no one can argue with a straight face that people can't get their work done on Linux-powered PCs. Ubuntu, PCLinuxOS, MEPIS, OpenSUSE, Xandros, Linspire Mint, the list goes on and on of desktop Linuxes that PC owner can use without knowing a thing about Linux's technical side. People can argue that Vista or Mac OS X is better, but when Michael Dell runs Ubuntu Linux on one of his own home systems, it can't be said that Linux isn't a real choice for anyone's desktop.

[bigdcaldavis]

Does Virtual Box allow you to run XP in a virtual configuration without even being installed on a partition?

That's exactly what it does. It's basically a free clone of Microsoft Virtual PC. What Virtual Box does is create a virtual machine and a virtual hard drive within Linux (Virtual Box is also available for Windows 2000/XP/Vista and Mac OS X), and then you start the virtual machine with your Windows CD in your drive (or you can mount an .ISO image) and install Windows normally.

[bigdcaldavis]

Almost forgot. You can also use Virtual Box to make a virtual Linux/BSD machine. I might test out Xubuntu or gOS on the Windows version of Virtual Box and see how good they run virtualized.

[bcsco]

...and then you start the virtual machine with your Windows CD in your drive (or you can mount an .ISO image) and install Windows normally.

OK, be patient because this is new to me. So, would the recovery discs that I made from the software on my recovery partition work? Because that's what I have; not an original XP disc.

If not, then wouldn't I be better running the Windows 2000/XP version and installing Linux on the virtual partition? Either way, would 512Mb RAM be sufficient?

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

.........That all be true without it being true that Linux is taking over the low end........

Of course, of course.

The issue here surrounds price. a 100 or 200 dollar computer with a 300 dollar operating system on it just doesn’t make economic sense.

And yes, there’s a huge market out there for 200 dollar computers.

So it goes like this:

“yes, you can get a very cheap and inexpensive computer that has a ton of software on it to get all kinds of work done. granted, none of that software is anything you’ve heard of but the productivity is the important part. They all run linux, but linux has matured to a point to where you don’t need to know a thing about it. Just turn it on and use it.”

The question is ‘what’s the low end’. it’s 100 to 200 dollar computers. microsoft simply can’t exist on these for purely economic reasons. And btw, linux is easy to use.

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

See the above post. It’s an economic inevitability.

[bcsco]

Well, you answered my post #63. But the more I think about it the less intrigued I am about running a virtual Ubuntu over Windows XP.

XP’s the system I want to migrate from. It’s slow & clunky compared to Ubuntu. It would make more sense to make my hard drive a Linux partition and run a minimal install of XP in order to get the few applications I need.

However, some questions come up: 1) If I’m running XP in a virtual space, do I still need all the security features like anti-virus, firewall, spamware, etc, even though I’d only be using it to port applications over to Ubuntu? 2) How does a virtual version of XP handle hardware drivers? Will it recognize my sound/video card, printers and such? I ask this because I use Audacity for music and in Windows it recognizes sound coming from the Internet; in Ubuntu it doesn’t. (But that’s another issue).

These are some things I’ll have to resolve before I go either route.

[gondramB]

>>The issue here surrounds price. a 100 or 200 dollar computer with a 300 dollar operating system on it just doesn’t make economic sense.

And yes, there’s a huge market out there for 200 dollar computers.<<

Where the cost is that high is for individuals who custom build, Apple users who want to add Windows or people who buy a version of Windows and want to upgrade - Microsoft quoted me $200+ to upgrade a Vista home PC to Vista Premium...

And yet Dell has Windows PC every day from $329 and almost always has a model on sale between $259 and $299. It happens to be $279 today.
Dell Desktops

It looks like large manufacturers pay between $25 and $35 for Windows but apparently that is enough as Microsoft gets between 60% and 70% of their revenue from new PC sales. I think the high retail Windows pricing is a payback the big PC companies to keep people from upgrading older machines and thus not buying new ones. Microsoft and Dell/HP/Lenovo etc like a 2-4 year replacement cycle and they all work to keep that happening.

Vista sales and new PC sales are strong and thus the only reason Vista is a disappointment to Microsoft is that it was late to market. If it sux then they will just sell more of the next operating system.

[bigdcaldavis]

Yeah it makes more sense to install Linux on your hard drive and then run a virtualized minimal XP (something like Windows 2000 or “Tiny XP” which is a minimalistic customized Windows XP) in something like Virtual Box.

To get your network working with a Virtual Box-virtualized WinXP, you set up your virtual machine and then on the right you will see the word Network in blue. Click on it, and checkmark the box beside “Enable Network Adapter”. For ethernet, the program emulates an AMD PCnet card.

To enable sound, you click on the word Audio in blue, and then checkmark the box beside “Enable Audio”, and then you choose what audio driver to use (Null, ALSA, OSS). I always choose Null Audio Driver. For audio, Virtual Box emulates an Intel ICH AC’97 device.

Chances are Virtual Box will not recognize your video card. For video/display, every installation of Virtual Box emulates a standard VESA card with 8 MB video RAM, but that number can be adjusted to up to 128 MB.

But on my laptop with 512 MB RAM, VirtualBox runs just fine. It runs maybe 95% native speed. I also have a desktop that has a Pentium 4 3.0 GHz CPU with 1 GB RAM with Ubuntu, and running Tiny XP on there is basically as fast as it would run natively.

And with Virtual Box, you should be able to use USB devices with it. Not sure if printers will work with it.

Just keep in mind that Virtual Box isn’t meant to be a 100% solution to run Windows. It’s made really just for the “essential” Windows apps (IE, and so on). Audacity should run fine on there.

[bcsco]

Boy, you’ve been a big help. Thanks for your input. I still want to upgrade my memory so I believe I’ll wait until I accomplish that. Then I’ll look into doing a virtual XP configuration.

You mentioned it handling basic Windows apps. The ones I really want to run are Quicken 2006 and Family Tree Maker 8.0. Any idea whether a virtual run of XP will handle such applications?

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

.............And yet Dell has Windows PC every day from $329 and almost always has a model on sale between $259 and $299. It happens to be $279 today..............

Yeah, 299 to 329. And up. Like I said, how do you define low end? There’s also another angle to this that I hadn’t thought of in the last post.

Requirements. Linux doesn’t require as much hardware to run fluidly as windows does. So not only is your floor lower(even if it’s only 25-35 dollars for the OS as you say) for the software itself, but the floor is also lower for the hardware requirements of the OS and software itself.

Essentially, “low end” is being brought even lower not only by having a cheaper OS, but also by having an OS that allows for cheaper(less horsepower) hardware.

Add into that the fact that your $199 computer comes with a full office suite as well as other productivity applications that are common with open source operating systems, and you get a huge bang for your buck in the “low end”.

[gondramB]

>>Requirements. Linux doesn’t require as much hardware to run fluidly as windows does. So not only is your floor lower(even if it’s only 25-35 dollars for the OS as you say) for the software itself, but the floor is also lower for the hardware requirements of the OS and software itself.<<

Actually I’m trying out two new Linus distributions today - slampp and siegfried2 - I’ve looking for a live CD distribution to be a network server.

My point though, wasn’t anti-Linus - it was that the cost of Windows to most people is less and $50 and I suspect most people will continue to pay it.

I’ve been trying for years to move people to Firefox and Open Office in the office environments I support there is major resistance.

Ubuntu Dapper 6.06 live CD can also install but the home Server version is text based. Im also gonna look at the Alternate Install Ubuntu but its really unfortunate that the most popular distribution chose that name...

Anyway I am not denying the advantages that Linus has - I am saying that I don’t see it adding up to the go to low end solution for non-nerds.

http://releases.ubuntu.com/dapper/

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

fair enough.

[bigdcaldavis]

I’m pretty sure Quicken will run just fine. Not too sure about the Family Tree Maker program. If it doesn’t, then you should be able to install Gramps (a family tree program for Linux) on Ubuntu by typing (minus the quotes) “sudo apt-get install gramps” and then type in your user password when asked to do so.

[bcsco]

Thanks for the reply. I have Gramps installed. But FTM provides access to data files on CD that other programs don’t provide. Without it, databases I use would not be available. I’ll just have to see how well it works (or doesn’t).

[tutstar]

gnip...