Choosing a Linux Netbook - Buyers Guide to Linux Hardware

Choosing a Linux Netbook - Buyers Guide to Linux Hardware
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More questions, more answers

…..continuing from part I……

I went home. Boy was I confused. I got online and started researching.

I found out that these Linux netbooks, the ones that have “solid state hard drives”, the ones that only offer 8 GB or 16 GB, don’t spin like traditional hard drives do. This saves battery power. Saving battery power means that the manufacturer can put in a lighter (albeit less powerful) battery to make the netbook weigh less. That’s good. I want it to weigh less. I also found I could purchase an SD card (all of the models I looked at had an SD card slot) for pretty cheap. At www.amazon.com, I found an 8 GB SD card for less than $20. This was check in the ‘For Linux’ side of the argument.

The XP netbooks weighed more (and cost more) in all instances. They weighed more because they had to have that traditional hard drive to support XP’s larger OS. Now, I’m all for the larger hard drive, but I’m also all about the weight of the thing. Another boon for Linux.

Finally, I found out that if you dropped or jarred a netbook with a traditional hard drive, you’d be more likely to have a hard drive crash than if you dropped or jarred a network with a solid state drive. The latter doesn’t spin, and dropping it would cause about as much damage to the hard drive as dropping a USB thumb drive. I like that too.

Finally, I found out that the Linux netbooks I looked at also came with Open Office. Open Office is a Microsoft-compatible document, spreadsheet, e-mail, database, kind-of suite, so I would not have to buy additional software for it. Most came with Firefox too, which is a Web browser. So, if I did get a Linux machine, I wouldn’t have to purchase or download anything else to get started.

Of course all of the models came with built-in Wi-Fi, USB ports, SD card slots, VGA output, Ethernet, headphone and microphone jacks, a webcam, and more. I was almost sold. But what model, what make, and more importantly, what Linux edition?

This post is part of the series: How I chose my new Linux netbook

Choosing a netbook for traveling was an easy decision. Deciding on one running Linux was more of a challenge.

  1. How to Choose the Right Linux Netbook?
  2. How to Choose the Right Linux Netbook? Researching
  3. How to Choose the Right Linux Netbook? Purchase Decision