How Cheap Can A PC Be? 1152
geoff lane writes "Ballmer wants a $100 computer. OK, can we build a reasonable PC for just $100 and a copy of Linux? The rules are: It's assumed that a monitor, keyboard and mouse are already available. Ethernet connectivity must be provided. All components must already have Linux support. All components must be new and currently available. The result must be electrically safe for the home. Is it possible?"
No (Score:2, Interesting)
This is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
If we didn't have a major manufacturer behind it, we're talking old stuff which. Not quite as fast, not as efficient, and more liable to breakage.
Re:the Xbox (Score:5, Interesting)
Reasonable Computer (Score:5, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Xbox Linux (Score:1, Interesting)
Not so cheap when you consider all the crap you'd need to make it usable as a PC.
Newegg shopping (Score:4, Interesting)
$41 - AMD Athlon 1.33 GHz, 266MHz FSB, 256K Cache Processor - OEM
$10.75 - POWMAX 320W Power Supply for Intel and AMD systems Model "VP-320ATX"
$14.50 - Artec Black 56X CDROM, Model CHM-56, Retail
= $102.25, ignoring hard drive or anything else.
So no, probably not.
Re:This is easy. (Score:3, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
You know, we did word processing before... (Score:3, Interesting)
Kids these days...
Not for under $200 (Score:4, Interesting)
power supply motherboard
CPU
CPU fan
CD drive
RAM
hard drive
case
You can get cheap motherboards with attached video/sound/LAN. You can technically build the PC without a floppy drive or CD/DVD burner to save more money. Looking for the lowest prices around (via Froogle), for new parts, you'll find:
motherboard-- Asus A7V8X-X, $48
CPU-- AMD Sempron 2200, $45
CPU fan-- Anything, $5
CD drive-- $15
RAM-- DDR-266 256 MB PC-2100, $40
hard drive-- Samsung 40GB HDD, $45
case-- $29, includes 300W power supply
Grand total: $227 (not including tax/shipping/hassle of ordering from a bunch of places)
Some stores, depending upon where you live, have some really decent deals on packaged systems. I'm in San Diego, and my favorite Chips and Memory [chipsandmemory.com] (yes, I hate their frames too), has a nice package for $239. [chipsandmemory.com]
AMD Sempron 2200
256MB RAM
80GB Hard Drive(7200RPM)
52X CD-RW
Onboard AGP (Up to 32 MB) and Sound & Game Adapter
Built-in LAN and Fax/Modem Module
52X CDRW (Yes CDRW Included)
1.44MB Floppy Disk Drive
Med Tower ATX Case, 300W UL/CE approved ATX power supply
1 Year Parts and Labor Warranty
To get the price lower, you'll need a used hard drive, CPU, memory, or motherboard. Then you might squeeze in closer to $150.
Re:Cheap PC? (Score:3, Interesting)
Xbox port to USB converter - $8 x 2 = $16
Xbox off Ebay - $120 (seems to be average going price)
Xbox VGA box - $65
Renting MechAssault - $7 ? haven't rented in a while so I could be wrong here.
That makes it $208 and it assumes that the Xbox can be modded to boot Linux without buying a chip and you can find the right version of MechAssault.
Mind you, that's a hell of a lot closer than you'll get with almost anything else.
Re:A computer for half the price of Windows? (Score:5, Interesting)
the problem, is you're talking about a 300MHZ Geode, and a 8GB HD, with 64MB RAM, and an integrated video/sound/ethernet.
but, it can be done, and it can be done "profitably"
Right now, can't be done... (Score:3, Interesting)
DIY computers got more expensive than bargain-basement Dell boxen about 2 years ago...I bought the Dell that I'm typing this on for about $300 shipped with a monitor and a copy of XP. I did it through a deal on Ben's Bargains [bensbargains.net] when I realized I couldn't build my own system for less than the price of the Dell. Now, my gaming system is homebrew, and I have plenty of homebrew systems around, but those are mostly application-specific (a music jukebox machine, a server, a game emulation machine) and a labor of love rather than practical "do-it-all" cheapie boxen.
If you want a PC for less than $100, your only option right now is really to head on over to Craig's List [craigslist.org] and find somebody who needs to get rid of their old Compaq for $50. In that sense, the sub-100-dollar PC is possible, but it's still a loss-leader for the guy who's selling his $2000 system for a fraction of the cost when new.
Now, could it BE done? Is it POSSIBLE? Of course. But, again, only by a company like Dell or IBM or whoever can afford to buy old Duron chips by the truckload and stick 'em into bargain-basement mobos for inclusion into home computing applicances. It will happen at some point. It just hasn't happened quite yet.
Re:No (Score:5, Interesting)
You may not be able to find a decent PC for $100 today but it won't be long until it will go for $100.
Re:Dump... (Score:5, Interesting)
With this you can throw together a linux router on the cheap, like you said: $0.00. With the free software and hardware we put together Cisco 2600 comparable routers for free, MP3 servers and have created various other uses.
We even got a Mac G3 once.
We plan on moving our operation over to a ricer part of towns dumps to see what we can find.
Hardware is NOT the problem (Score:2, Interesting)
With the steep discounting of hardware, the cost savings is in software.
A $100 dollar machine will just make software vendors than do NOT reduce prices even richer.
An information appliance with reliable software that doesn't need patching every week would be the cheap option I think is likely.
Something like a Apple 2 with os & sw in a small package with an monchrome lcd
Put the os software on rom & rom cards and data on the memory cards & floppy.
O wait this sounds like an X-BOX , never mind.
Train everyone to use & program Linux in high school, then we can all use the cheap
hardware that is being surplused.
Like 486's & Pentium 1,2,& 3 systems.
Re:This is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Honestly, if some inexpensive Taiwanese motherboard manufacturer wanted to, they could do a 1ghz C3 EPIA platform, and really cut it down. One IDE channel. No floppy, serial, parallel, or PS/2 ports. Kill IrDA support. Basically, give it only the following:
1x VGA
1x IDE
4x USB
1x audio line out
The CPU and RAM chips could be soldered onto the board. Bundle it with a cheap mass-market OEM hard drive, a case with a 40W power brick, and you've got a PC.
Rather than VIA, one could use Transmeta Crusoe or AMD Geode. This could be done for $100, but the margins would be razor-thin. Hell, I'd pay $100 for one of these sans hard drive with a smaller power supply -- I'm a big fan of LTSP.
Re:Case? What Case? (Score:4, Interesting)
I was bored one day....
Re:the Xbox (Score:3, Interesting)
- Yolego
Computers are FREE (Score:1, Interesting)
Link to Free Computers [paladin-press.com]
The second half of the book describes very basic assembly proceedures for building a computer from scrounged parts and should be of no use to the hardware-savvy /. crowd. But the first half describes the business of getting parts and whole computers for NOTHING. Like it says in the blurb, I bought my first computer back in '90 and I've never bought one since. No lie.
These words are being typed on a P4 1.5ghz, 256megs memory, 60gig hd. Cost NOTHING. Maybe you won't do that good, but ANYBODY can get a free machine that will do just fine for writing, posting rubbish on /., or any other simple task.
The book also assumes you're gonna be running Windows. (Your free machine will invariably come preloaded with Windows. 98 is free and XP is rapidly getting that way.) Don't like Windows? Fine. Run Linux. THAT'S FREE TOO.
Canadian Prices... (Score:2, Interesting)
Free - PC as Loss Leader (Score:2, Interesting)
Perhaps streaming banners, perhaps AOL like marketing, perhaps whatever we'll find useful and that can be profitably provided for free. How about giving away a PC that is designed to automate your personal finances; That knows what sort of mutual funds you might want; That prompts you through financial planning?
Yeah, there's privacy. But then there's convenience too. And if it comes from a trusted source then perhaps you won't care. That trusted source could be Google. But, it's more likely that a new company will be born that will follow a consistent series of messages, actions, and product lines that will garner your trust. Such a company could knock Google from the roost.
There's certainly room for a company that you'll trust more than you'll trust the typical mortgage company, the typical bank or (oh my) the typical credit card company.
Re:the Xbox (Score:1, Interesting)
They be £8 at the second hand shop.
sure its possible... (Score:5, Interesting)
Its all about a small and efficient OS to bring life back to old hardware. Neither of which linux or windows is.
And it even has standardized user friendly level IPC, of which neither windows or linux yet has.
But AROS is currently lacking developers contributing to it.... and it is FOSS...
Re:End of the MS tax? (Score:4, Interesting)
A small-time shop, or independant builder, can pay retail and warehouse parts on components (read: NewEgg, GameVE, etc.) build the same PC that one of the major OEMs are selling for $2000 for about $800, add WinXP Home ($70, OEM) and Works Suite 2003 ($50), throw a 50% markup on top of that, and make a very nice profit for myself, as well as make the buyer quite happy with the $500+ savings.
I can only imagine how cheaply I could do this if I had Dell's volume discounts on parts, I'd be making a killing.
Re:Sacrifice hardware for the good of software? (Score:4, Interesting)
And it includes a pretty good spell checker.
Re:cheap harddrive (Score:3, Interesting)
Have a very optimized Linux distro booted via Flash ROM. It automatically mounts your internet storage space on boot up. Let's say the data is stored remotely using an encrypted file system to satisfy the requirements of all those crypto geeks.
Here's some flash memory prices at TigerDirect [tigerdirect.com].
Note: 256MB CompactFlash memory by Kingston, $23.99 before rebate ($10 mail in rebate).
Install the 50MB Damn Small Linux distro? 200MB for basic file storage. All your music could be listened to streaming...
Yeah - I'm just giving out some ideas
I did it. (Score:3, Interesting)
I think it can be done. This machine isn't fast though.
Re:Consider the parts you need... (Score:3, Interesting)
It didn't have to last, it just had to be electrically safe
Re:Sacrifice hardware for the good of software? (Score:2, Interesting)
Microsoft has really managed to sell this concept. They subtly play it up in marketing literature (despite the fact that Office is not backwards compatible, and it's forward compatability isn't any better than, say, OpenOffice). Any singly major supplier (especially, say, the US Government) that puts it's foot down and insists that all documents be available in some format that isn't Office (honestly, rtf is more than sufficent for pretty much everything these people ship back and forth. The main reason it's in .doc is because people can't be bothered to save it as something else) will change the landscape. This is why Microsoft will get down on it's knees if anyone important looks seriously at ditching Office.
Re:End of the MS tax? (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, I do have the ability to do it myself, but too many times I've ended up re-buying parts trying to figure out some silly incompatability.
Obviously, this is less of an issue now than 5 years ago, but it is still a concern of mine. I guess, to me, it's worth the price.
Re:Dump... (Score:4, Interesting)
Assuming $1/W/yr (which seems pretty reasonable), and assuming it uses 75W, 24/7, that's $75/year. Or you could get a $15 linksys router which would do it all nearly, and pay $10/yr in power...
Re:End of the MS tax? (Score:3, Interesting)
Back in, say, 1982, when what passed for a decent PC went for $5,000, paying Microsoft's juice money for what passed for an operating system wasn't such a big deal, but times have changed. Linux certainly has a lot of appeal to the Dells, HPs and Gateways of the world, and in anything resembling a free market Linux would already be a mainstream desktop OS, but Microsoft really really really doesn't want them to go down that road.
Re:Sacrifice hardware for the good of software? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:No (Score:3, Interesting)
The firewall (GQ 50042) was purchased in March 2003 for $179. It is 800MHz, 128Meg RAM, with a 40Gig HD. It's currently running RedHat 7.3 with a boatload of patches. I had to spend $20 for an extra NIC
The boys' computer (GQ #escapes me right now) was purchased in July 2004 for $179. It is a 1.2GHz, 128Meg RAM, with a 40Gig HD. It's running a legal copy of Win98SE because, well, because our school system pretty much requires Microsoft products to do homework. I also bought one of those cheeeep $20 (after rebate) CD burners so they can take their PowerPoint homework to school.
They're not bad computers. My ultra-nerdy friends give me grief about having a "Great Quality" brand computer, but I didn't spend a ton of money (or a ton of time to build it), and they are both great workhorses.
Re:This is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Fair enough about your statement with the RAM chips, although if bought in big enough batches, stuff like PC2100 DDR is already absurdly cheap and isn't fluctuating too much.
And yes, you do save on the connectors. If the volume is high enough, you can design a southbridge that doesn't have the legacy support. Or, you could go the route that nVidia went with the nForce3 -- no southbridge. Just one chipset with everything integrated. With no legacy stuff, that just means you need an ethernet MAC, and audio CODEC, IDE (or better, SATA -- fewer traces), video, memory controller, USB and FSB. That's it -- it can be a pretty small and cheap chip. Use PCI express for everything -- you only need like 16 rails -- 8 for the video, 2 for the SATA and 6 for the gigabit NIC. Or better yet -- no PCI type bus -- just have everything tightly integrated with local like nVidia does thier ethernet, and offer open-source drivers.
The board could also be small with no legacy stuff -- smaller than ITX form factor.
Re:A computer for half the price of Windows? (Score:5, Interesting)
it runs slow as molasses on a Geode, and firefox is exceedingly slow to start up on the Geode, but runs "ok" once its up and running. If you give me an 800MHZ VIA, things work much more gooder.
OpenOffice? its a bloated piece of crap. work needs to be done on that front. I dont think that i can get it going in less than 256MB.
Why x86? (Score:4, Interesting)
Considering that the weight (if one could call it that) of WinCE is behind ARM, the use of WinCE for this product is pretty dopey.
These Geode tablets have been promoted since Nat Semi owned Geode (a few years back). Geode has pretty much gone nowhere and does not look like it will change. I'm quite suprised that AMD didn't rather put their effort into their MIPS device or license ARM and make an ARM device.
It is interesting to note that AMD is one of very few major CPU vendors that does not use ARM for their mobile/low-power 32-bit stuff.
Re:Linksys shows it can be done (Score:2, Interesting)
The consoles are sold below-cost (many), and make up for it on licensing fees. That's like saying cell phones are now free.
I suggest a "kiosk" type system to be more affordable. all you need is the mobo/processor/usb card/IDE hub/ram/ps and a cdrom. Boot off a linux cd-rom and use USB memory sticks for different users. I think in this low-end of a system with low-end parts, a cd-rom boot might be more reliable than a HD. In all of my computers, the HD is always the first thing to go.
Of course, this solution doesn't provide $$$ to MSFT, so it's not the solution ballmer is looking for. However, it would be the perfect solution for small communities that can't afford computers. Everyone buys a $20 USB card and can use the local community computers as if they are their own.
There's no substitute for having your own computer to learn on, but this isn't a bad solution until everyone has one.
Re:$112 Or bust. (Score:3, Interesting)
Quick glancing at Pricewatch, You can probably get a 20GB hard drive for under $30 and a really generic CD-ROM Drive for under $20.
On the upside, we could probably get away with 256 MB of RAM. That will work for most people just browsing the web, sending email, or using a text document once in a while. So we're still probably looking at something around the $150 mark.
Now, this takes care of the hardware. What about the wonderful (*cough*) Microsoft software?
Windows XP Home: $199
Microsoft Word 2003: $199 ($499 if you want full office suite)
Nearly $400 for software on an PC that costs around $150! This is, unless MS really is going to start offering crippleware versions of Windows and Word in the US market.
Re:You know, we did word processing before... (Score:3, Interesting)
I also remember getting my first hard drive fitted to that thing. Connor Peripherals 30Mb and I thought that was all the space in the world. I thought it was way cool that I could boot off the drive and install all my favourite games - F15 Strike Eagle II, Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF), and Zeliard. (Not to mention all the other small games like spacewar, elevator, frogger, yahtzee and boulder dash). I also coded in Turbo Pascal 6.
Like you I was in love with that machine, and that machine taught me most of the basics of computing.
It worries me somewhat that the technicians who are coming through the ranks now are not even aware of the heritage of computing, and have no inkling of anything past a GUI and a mouse pointer. Obviously the older readers will point out that before the XT there were things like TRS-80 and CP/M (neither of which I've had the privilege of using (although I would dearly of loved to have had that experience)) but all I'm saying is that computing around that time in the early to mid eighties (and before that of course) was raw and unfettered by the masses of clueless gumbies and spyware and spam.
I for one feel very privileged to have seen that era of computing and I can only hope that some of todays young geeks may stumble across an old dinosaur and decide to play with it to further their knowledge.
Re:A computer for half the price of Windows? (Score:2, Interesting)
Firefox, Mozilla, OO.org all run just dandy on it, though OO takes way too long to load. I can even run Firefox and OO.org at the same time, but task-switching between them thrashes the swap partition for a few long seconds.
As I write this I'm running Firefox, Gaim, a system monitor, XMMS, a Gnome Terminal (bloated!) with three terminals, and two BitTornado windows, all on Gnome 2.4. It's using a modest 70MB RAM and 131 of swap. That's running stock Debian i386 binaries: just imagine if I was running Gentoo and all those apps were compiled for k7.
So the answer to your question is, yes, it'll run fine even without stripping anything down, and even better than you'd expect if they have the sense to recompile the key apps for that specific hardware.
Re:End of the MS tax? (Score:4, Interesting)
The simple truth of low income countries is that when they are faced with unaffordable medical systems (including medicines and medical procedures etc) they simply die.
Re:Sell decent PC for $100 (Score:1, Interesting)
Piracy was an intended business strategy (Score:3, Interesting)
> But lower prices have become part of Microsoft's strategy for gaining market share in developing nations.
For over a decade, in the early years of Microsoft, they have been making piracy of their OS and Office software easy. This was a vital and intended strategy for them in order to firmly establish a marketshare dominance.
When the average user gets accustomed to (pirated) Microsoft products, this encourages businesses to use Microsoft products since most employees already have the skills in using Microsoft products. Microsoft then proceeds to enforce BUSINESSES to have legal copies of their software while still encouraging private users to pirate their products.
As you can see, their strategy worked. They are basically doing the same thing now with developing nations. And they will be successful unless the respective governments intervene.
Especially if we're talking Longhorn... (Score:3, Interesting)
Try getting that for $100
Re:End of the MS tax? (Score:3, Interesting)
Some day there will be a low cost computer, based on Commodity chips, software, etc. So it's better to make $5 a year from the billion people who will have that computer, than to make nothing.. and an extra dollar per computer is an extra Billion...
Why A Billion? About Billion have computers now.. and until it gets to that low price level ($100), most could never afford it. But my theory is that @ $100 only about 1 Billion more can, leave 3+ billion people on the Planet without.. Of course if you count by FAMILY rather than by person and you factor out some of the older population you do get a deeper world wide penetration.
Non-handheld Palm computer? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Agree (Score:5, Interesting)
www.ikonpc.com [ikonpc.com]
or
www.tigerdirect.com [tigerdirect.com]
among many others
2) price lowest barebones case that comes *with* mobo, power supply, CPU
3) add hdd and one memory stick (as well as CD player if needed), do not add MS operating system, aftermarket software, video card, sound card, or other overpriced extras
4) pay between $120 and $150 with free shipping
5) recieve components and assemble your ultra low price computer (~2 year out of date)
6) ????
7) profit or something similar
Not quite at that $100 price point, but pretty close these days, and even closer if you are willing to pick slightly less recent CPU, mobo, and memory. And no, i am not an employee or in any way affiliated with these or other barebone PC manufacturers.
To make a very cheap machine (Score:3, Interesting)
The idea here is that by putting everything on the motherboard you reduce your cost to put the whole computer together.
Now many of the slashdot crowd would not want such a fixed computer for their main workstation, but it would be an ideal system to give your kids etc. Or for a massive install.
Re:No (Score:3, Interesting)
Case in point, my girlfriend (there goes my /. credibility) bought a P-IV 2.4HT with huge flat-planel screen, DVD burner, 512Meg RAM and I'm surely skipping things. Her brother bought something similar (but slightly lower-spec) at the same time. Now, well, they bought this before she knew me.
So, I find out they didn't throw away the old machine. I ask her to show it to me, expecting a later P-I or even a P-II (it was running slow after all). My eyeballs nearly fell out! The fucking this was a P-III 500MHz, 10Gig harddisk, CD-Burner, 64Meg RAM. You can already guess why this felt slow...
Anyways, a 256Meg RAM stick later (which I always have lying around somewhere) and a 10Euro 10/100NIC later, I have it back up on full-speed. Nice little machine, really...
Oh, and you want to know what she does with her über-PCs? Surf the web, write letters in Word and ehm, burn the occasinal CD. That P-III would have done for the years to come.
So, in the end: look out for people that have bought new PC's and check out what they have in store. Anything from a P-II on is worth collecting. I have made P-II desktops for people without money from spare parts (which I collected from people thowing away "crap machines").
Pricewatch Scavenger Hunt (Score:2, Interesting)
These are all-new, retail prices. Shipping + taxes not included.
CPU: 700 Mhz Celeron $18
MB: Intel 810 MB, with sound/video/USB/ethernet $10 (!)
RAM: 128MB PC2100 $15
DVD: $12
Case+300Watt PS: $24
HD: 3.5GB EIDE $17
Heatsink/Fan $1
2 IDE cables: $1
Total: $98
This even includes a DVD, not CD.
The hard drive was the surprisingly expensive part. The motherboard was the surprisingly cheap part.
Nintendo Gameboys and DVD players and TIVOs. (Score:3, Interesting)
Dump the LCD, it's too small for reasonable work. Replace it with TV out. Yes TV is sucky but most can (barely) manage readable text in 640x480 for simple wordprocessing and browsing. I'm betting someone in the next 10 years *cough*china*cough* will develop a digital TV cheap enough to penetrate the 3rd world markets, which should improve things dramaticly. But for now, TV out would suffice, and removing the LCD would probably save at least 20% on the price per unit.
Add a USB port. Just has to be at least one. You can always daisy chain a keyboard and mouse like apple was often fond of. GBA's already have a link system, and wasn't firewire co-developed by apple and nintendo?
Add ethernet. I doubt you could do wireless in the price range, but eventually it'll happen. Generic 100M cards go in 99 cent bins these days. You can even find gigabit cards on sale for under $20. 802.11 cards will follow, though it's not necessary either way, just convenient.
Now someone out there is saying "Wait, what about the disk?" Ok now, repeat after me "There is no disk." Wait, what? You heard me, no disk. How? We centralize the disk on a NAS, and use a bootstrap flash rom similar to a GBA cartridge. This way, you can distribute disk cost among many clients, which is FAR more efficient per GB. Consider a 160GB disk costs barely more than a 20GB disk these days. It's not even twice as much! (seriously, pricewatch has cheapest 20GB @ $33, 160GB 7200rpm @ $66!) By using ROMs with individual user keys, they boot up and request a specific user directory on the NAS, so data can be private, even encrypted. Also, assuming 802.16 really delivers on its promise, consider how many clients even a modest disk and router could serve in the 3rd world. Assuming we use a very light distro (possibly fitting everything but the apps on the boot flash!), what's the average user disk use in the real world? Exclude multimedia files. Hmm gee, those business documents and emails aren't all that big are they? A 160GB disk could probably serve at least 100 users if you restrict the kind of content they can store (just restrict the apps they can use), and that's being pessimistic. Plus disks will continue to grow, so adding more capacity is easy. Ok fine, you don't want to be draconian about file storage. So give each user a reasonable space, say 16GB. Figure it formats down to about 13GB. That's still enough for 3GB of apps and 10GB of files. Say that again, 10GB of files. Can you imagine telling someone from 1994 "You can only store 10GB of files"? Because that's the kind of data storage we're looking at here.
Don't like gameboys? Too much modding work? How bout a DVD player? Ever seen one of those under $100? Umm yeah. Does it have TV out? Yeah. Could it have USB? I don't see why not. Networking? Oh come on, ethernet cards are almost literally a dime a dozen. Processing power? It can decode mpeg2. My pentium 2 300 could barely manage that. And that's minimum spec. I'm betting modern DVD players have all sorts of fancy stuff that takes more CPU anyway.
Yeah I bet you don't like my distributed disk idea either huh? Ok then, how's this work for ya: My old DSS reciever died last week. I went around pricing a new one. Turns out Circuit City is having a sale. They've got an RCA DSS reciever WITH AN 80GB TIVO BUILT IN for $99.95! What ISN'T this machine? Does it have display? Yes, to TV, often to multiple formats. Does it have storage? Hello! 80GB! Does it take media? Hooking a DVD reader to it would probably be trivial, considering it has an IDE disk inside. Networking? It already recieves digital video over a coax cable! It's a cablemodem for all effective purposes! Keyboard/mouse etc? Most of them already have USB or firewire anyway, again trivial.
The HUGE advantage linux has over windows in the 3rd world is PORTABILITY. When you can run the OS on virtually ANY hardware with a recompile, it means you're not constrained to an expensive platform designed for high performance. The only way MS will threaten this is with ports of the CLR virtual machine that
$100 PC... and some great old ideas (Score:5, Interesting)
The only idea that goes a little bit in this direction is modern BIOSes that have a built-in Web browser that doesn't need an OS.
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Re:In Asia, maybe (Score:2, Interesting)
400MHz is fine (Score:3, Interesting)
I still use a machine with a 350MHz Pentium II chip for almost everything I do, and I do a much wider variety of things than your average user would do.
Unfortunately, I don't have a word processor installed so I can't do what I wanted to do and load an "average user"'s set of software and see how fast it runs, but suffice it to say that currently I have a bunch of text editors, my web browser, a VoIP client, an IM client, my email client, an IRC client, a whole tonne of terminals running application-wise, and in the background Apache and mySQL running, occasionally serving requests from other users of my network.
The thing all of these pieces of software have in common is that they are interactive: they don't do anything unless the user is actively using them. The ones I'm not currently looking at are using a minimal amount of CPU perhaps processing the occasional packet, or whatever. The foreground application might occasionally have quite an intensive task to perform, but it's usually over within 30 seconds tops, and the scheduler ensures that the other apps get a chance to run anyway.
It's applications like games, video playback and so on that beat the CPU constantly that become a problem. Having said that, I regularly play back video files from over the network fullscreen in mplayer and with the use of some cache and the hardframedrop option there's no discernable degredation apart from the occasional sound stutter or decompression artifact where a key frame gets skipped. Realistically no action game since Quake III Arena would run on this machine, which is its only real downfall. I don't generally play computer action games, though, so it works well enough for me.
The hard part, of course, is finding a 400MHz CPU to buy new. Second hand could work (and that's how I got my CPU three years ago), but new you'd probably be looking at a lot more than something a thousand MHz faster just because there are no economies of scale attached to such a CPU anymore. If people became interested in a low-cost PC to the point where there was a demand for such CPUs, I'd assume that today with the lessons learned from the faster CPUs companies could make a much leaner, meaner "slow" CPU that runs a lot cooler and with much less power consumption than the Pentium 2 family did. The CPUs on the fanless EPIA Mini-ITX motherboards are a good example of this, but you can't buy those separately of course.
Re:No (Score:3, Interesting)
I use a 900 mhz Athlon, 512 MB RAM, 20 GB HDD as my main machine at the moment, but come the end of the year I'll be laid off from my current job and intend to invest in an ex-business laptop as a replacement since my current box is dying - the monitor is on the blink, sound card doesn't work, and I don't have the time nor resources to put into a 4-year-old computer anymore - yet, if it boots (which it does) and is connected to my network (which it is) then it'll be a perfect solution as a firewall/router/file server - despite its "high" spec.
Go further. The key is integration (Score:3, Interesting)
No, I'm not going for "Funny" mod points. Bear with me. I'm trying to make a point.
The point is that you want to minimize the number of chips and the PCB complexity to the maximum.
It's not even a new idea. Back in the day, ZX Spectrum computers were very cheap because of the "ULA" chip. Basically Sir Clive Sinclair had invented the north-bridge. With integrated graphics, no less. No, again, it's not a joke.
Instead of having a ton of smaller chips, the ZX Spectrum basically had one custom designed chip with all the needed functions. It cut the price a lot.
For a more modern point for it, look at the PS2 vs XBox. The PS2 went and integrated pretty much everything it could into the CPU. The XBox went with a traditional PC design. The PS2 is a lot cheaper to produce. And the XBox loses money hand over fist because it's expensive to produce.
So basically that's the way I'd go. Take an idea from the AMD K8: it already integrates the memory controller on the CPU. Aside from saving traces on the mobo, it also gives it awesome latency on memory access.
So I'd take that idea and run amok with it all the way: integrate _everything_ possible on the CPU. Including ATA controller, a simple 2D graphics core, etc.
Of course, I'd probably not base it on the K8, which uses too much power and is large anyway. I'd want something like a P3 made in 90nm (yes, it's called a Dothan) and with a minimal cache. Say, 256K will do just fine.
That leaves lots of space to pack the other goodies around it. Again, the idea is to pack both "north bridge" and "south bridge" and sound card too on the same chip as the CPU.
I'd probably go for a Kyro 1 graphics core. Yes, it's old, but it does just fine even in simple 3D games, on very little memory bandwidth. And since it's gonna be an integrated graphics solution, bandwidth is what it won't have.
So basically at the end you'd have a motherboard which is the size of a graphics card, and looks much like a graphics card. A central chip, some 8 RAM chips soldered around it, a big cooler and a couple of connectors.
Re:That's exactly what Balmer wants! (Score:3, Interesting)
I remember an incident in 1981... (Score:5, Interesting)
...when I worked in a computer store in West Perth called Computer Choice, for a chappie by the name of Ed O'Connor-Smith. After watching him sell a computer, one friend of mine took to calling him Ed O'Conman-Smith which was a tad unfair even though he could indeed sell ice to eskimos or charm a starving baby away from the breast. He once sold a million-dollar mainframe on someone's petty cash.
Ed sold an Osborne 1 to a lady called Pauline Winter (no relation to the actress AFAIK) of Maritana Typing Services, of which I can find no trace on the Web. Pauline had a top-of-the-wozzer Olivetti electric typewriter which would do a steady 75 WPM and had a 16,000 keystroke typeahead buffer. She beat it. Easily.
The Osborne 1 scanned the keyboard in software in its spare time, using its (at the time) grunty 4MHz 8-bit Z80, with pretty much inevitable results. So Pauline brought it back.
Instead of refunding her, Ed upsold her to a KayPro II, which was built like a lab instrument and had a separate microcontroller in the keyboard and guaranteed 3-and-a-half-key rollover. And 400kB 5.25" floppies in place of the shiny new recently-doubled-in-size 192kB floppies in the Osborne, and a full 64kB of RAM in place of the Osborne's 48kB. Your keyboard probably has considerably more storage than everything in the Osborne added together. (-:
Pauline sat in the shop for a few days, using the Kaypro to make sure everything went well. Her typing was like rain on a tin roof, there was no way you could hear individual keystrokes, but the funniest part was watching WordStar.
WordStar is a little priority-driven time-sharing little universe of its own. It had an event loop decades before Bill knackered the one in OS/2. If it has time, it prints stuff. If it doesn't, it at least updates the display decorations. If it has no time for that, it keeps the current text looking good; and if not all of the current text, then the current line, followed by the lines above and below outwards towards the top and bottom of the display. And if not even the current line, it echoes the characters as you type them, and the last-ditch response is to just store the characters and echo nothing.
With Pauline at the keyboard, WordStar was able to echo two characters out of 3 if it was lucky. Printing happened for a few minutes some time after the start of coffee break, and for maybe 25 minutes of a half-hour lunch break, and for many hours after she'd finished for the day. She was typing at least as fast as a top-shelf Ricoh daisywheel could, and that's fast. She started with a blank data floppy every day (two drives, one for programs and one for data), and usually filled about 3/4 of a 400kB floppy by close of trade, so I'd guess that was a sustained 110-120 WPM.
Re:That's exactly what Balmer wants! (Score:2, Interesting)
Cheap PC, or more efficient setup? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's interesting the way a lot of these threads are going here. A lot of what I'm seeing is, "Well, if you just need a word processor, then..." This makes me wonder if we should be focusing some effort in a slightly different place.
Maybe what we need is an operating system that "just does" word processing, web surfing, and e-mail. It would be a bit of a throwback to the old days of typewriters and workstations, but was that era really wrong?
Sun seems to be trying to encourage one mode of doing this - the blade terminal. But, I think there are a lot of companies who are very worried about taking such a big step toward this setup. Not only do you have to spend a bit of time getting the networking for that system right, but if you don't like it later, you suddenly have all of this hardware that is completely useless to you.
I think that if you could get the same setup running on the x86 machines that are already in place in most companies, and also show them how they could buy cheaper versions, that would still work perfectly if they ever chose to go back to their Windoze platform, then you would really have something killer.
I'm sure that there are now a few zealots screaming, "This is exactly what XYZ linux does!" I'd argue, though, that even linux in its current state is a bit more than what is needed. I'm really talking about a very non-general purpose machine that literally only does word-processing, web browsing, and e-mail. And, of course, the qualifier here is that it does these three exceptionally well and extremely intuitively. I think there are ways to start with a linux distro and write some extra application code to make this system happen, but it's not there yet.
Sigh, back to my current Windoze business life. Counting the hours until I can get home to my nice, debian-loaded UltraSPARC. :)
I've just sold my old K6 (Score:3, Interesting)
I've just sold my old K6-II 500 for R$ 100. I used to run Slackware 9.1 with no problems. My wife used to run WinXP + OfficeXP, and also some games like Half-life (ok, I used to play HalfLife).
It's a good machine:
Soyo Motherboard
RAM: 256 MB SDRAM PC133
Diamond Stealth III S540
SoundBlaster AWE32
It's a good option for those who only wants to use office suites.
Re:Why x86? (Score:2, Interesting)
The reason for x86 is economy of scale makes
it cheap. I've priced out others and they aren't
nearly as inexpensive.
Re:To make a very cheap machine (Score:3, Interesting)
What is needed is relocation. There's lots of people in the rich world throwing/giving away $100 computers. That is for individuals. If I were a major institution in the third world, I'd make a deal to purchase the outdated computers of a rich world insitution/firm for a symbolic price + shipping.
Besides, computers are still moving too fast for such a "platform" to standardize. CPU, GPU, memory, interconnects (PCI express, SATA, DDR2, CPU sockets, USB2, GbLAN etc.) What you're looking for then is most bang for the buck, not standardization.
What you're asking for has actually happened a bit with the SFF market. But those are mostly high-end, because people see they can get lots of power in a small box (I have an Athlon 3500+, DVD burner, 2x160GB HDD in mine), not low-end. Low-end is driven by volume, and then you have a mid-sized beige box that offends noone and can be expanded to do most everything.
Kjella
Re:the Xbox (Score:3, Interesting)