It's basically a Geode machine. I downloaded a recent ubuntu desktop distribution, booted it under VMWare and installed it to a disk. Popped the disk in the machine, it starts up.
Using Ubuntu's server variant was a bit more painful, as the kernel build assumes PAE or something; I needed to switch to a generic 32bit kernel. Not too bad.
The wifi driver that ships with Ubuntu didn't work very well with it, so I had to compile and install a new one. There was some oddness with the ifup scripts and I had to have it start up, shut down, and start up again to intialize properly.
I am largely happy with the device; it's just a small, slightly strange PC.
I am also using it with one of those $80 32gb Transcend SSDs. They are not blazing, but neither is the machine.
Also remember to divide Atom clocks by 3 when comparing to Core 2 (as a rough estimate, I choose Core 2 because most people are familiar with them). A single core 1.6GHz Atom might compare to a Core 2 at 500MHz using only one of its cores.
Reviews of Atom-based boards I have seen show that it doesn't do HD content well at all. 720p is hit and miss, and 1080p is just a no-go.
So it'd do DVDs and divx/xvid for you, but to play Blu-ray and mkv files you'll probably want to wait a bit and snag the new Nvidia ION platform, which pairs an onboard Geforce 9400 with an Atom CPU, and does full 1080p video with only 20% cpu utilization.
Full-featured is right. These things have an HDMI port with 1920x1080 resolution, an IR port, and an SSD makes them almost noiseless! Sounds like a great device for a media center PC. Load Boxee on there and call it all good. Very cool.
EDIT: Looks like the SSD option doesn't have pricing available, but it'll likely be > $500
The thing that amazes me is that these tiny devices (the netbooks too) come standard with 1GB or 1/2 GB of RAM. 10 years ago or so that was a huge amount of RAM -- you could have a big Sun or AIX box running an industrial-grade Oracle instance on 1/4 GB RAM or so.
Aside from a media center, any ideas what this class of devices could be used for at home (or as a portable device)? It seems like an awesome solution, but to what?
Augmenting laptop CPU (compilers, 3D apps, etc)? Mesh wifi? Better routers/firewalls? An alternative to VPC software (i.e., just remote desktop in and take it with you)?
I'm betting there's a cool startup that could be formed around a device like this...
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Unlike most esoteric kit, you can buy these on Amazon.
I've been thinking of buying this for a while:
http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=43
but the Fit-PC2 has good enough specs to make it worth considering instead. It's also smaller!
Anyone know where I can buy this in the UK?
http://www.fit-pc.co.uk/meet-fit-pc-II.html
Using Ubuntu's server variant was a bit more painful, as the kernel build assumes PAE or something; I needed to switch to a generic 32bit kernel. Not too bad.
The wifi driver that ships with Ubuntu didn't work very well with it, so I had to compile and install a new one. There was some oddness with the ifup scripts and I had to have it start up, shut down, and start up again to intialize properly.
I am largely happy with the device; it's just a small, slightly strange PC.
I am also using it with one of those $80 32gb Transcend SSDs. They are not blazing, but neither is the machine.
I'm planning to combine the latter with Boxee to create my home entertainment system.
So it'd do DVDs and divx/xvid for you, but to play Blu-ray and mkv files you'll probably want to wait a bit and snag the new Nvidia ION platform, which pairs an onboard Geforce 9400 with an Atom CPU, and does full 1080p video with only 20% cpu utilization.
EDIT: Looks like the SSD option doesn't have pricing available, but it'll likely be > $500
Infact, since it is networked nicely, it should be easy to control it from a wifi enabled handheld device
Augmenting laptop CPU (compilers, 3D apps, etc)? Mesh wifi? Better routers/firewalls? An alternative to VPC software (i.e., just remote desktop in and take it with you)?
I'm betting there's a cool startup that could be formed around a device like this...