$150 Linux Laptop for the Masses

Xemu writes "Inspired by Negroponte's laptop for children, the Swedish company Medison is now taking orders for their US$150 Linux laptop, the Medison Celebrity. The laptop is a 1.5 GHz Celeron M 370 with 14 inch screen, wireless network and it comes with Fedora Red Hat pre-installed." Update 2035 GMT by SM: As many readers have pointed out, the more you dig into the details of this company the more fishy it starts to seem. I would suggest any potential buyers be wary on this one.

The fine print

[Anonymous Coward]

"Pricing is based on the value of US Dollar and may therefore vary between countries and may also change without notice.

Specifiactions on the laptop can change without notice. The specifications can not be lower technology, though.

Availability of the Medison Celebrity model depends on how many orders we get per day. It might take one or two weeks longer to get the laptop.

Terms (date and price) of offer may change without notice.

Taxes vary from country to country and from state to state. Medison is not responsible for paying any additional taxes in your country or state.

Fees taken by our authorized partner 2CO are U$6.45 + 5,5% and extra on the price. Some smaller fees might be taken by your bank and varies on what bank and card you have.

Shipping and handling is taken care of by our partner MK Electronics.

Smells fishy...

[Da_Biz]

See comments from Engadget:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/07/25/medison-celebri ty-150-of-linux-laptop-for-the-people [engadget.com]

This one looks particularly concerning:

Johan Löfgren @ Jul 25th 2007 12:02PM

Hello fellas. I came across this site, when searching for information about this computer. With that pricetag, it would be a brilliant surf & chat computer for me.

I'm a swedish student, and I found an article in a larger web-newspaper in sweden and was amazed..

Sadly though, when reading comments all over, at swedish sites, this thing starts to smell very very rotten..

The speculation is about this beeing a scam, in the same way that you've mentioned above.

There's bankrupcy issues, lies at the homepage, weird and incomplete messages from the people behind this "madison" company. The screenshots of the computer, has been found at other manufacturers. Companies, that Madison claim to work with, hasn't heard of the connection..

The things above, has been discovered by many people, at different swedish sites. Even more than that.

The 4-6 week delivery time, sounds perfect to grab as much cash as possible and run.

No-one can find anyone with an example of this computer. People doesn't believe this thing even exist.

I recommend all of you, to wait and see how everything turns out here in sweden, before you buy this. As most swedes do right now.. Wait and see if the first computers arrive at all.

I hope that this isn't a scam. I'd love to buy one. I'd love if the promised "future generation" will arrive.

But this thing doesn't feel safe.

Cincearly
-Johan Löfgren. Orebro, Sweden

Re:The fine print

[cryingpoet]

The FAQ says that it will take more like 4-6 weeks to ship your laptop. I doubt that they are in production yet.

I think I will wait to see if any laptops ship before laying down any of my money.

Re:Wish it had more details

[fifedrum]

I'm having a hard time believing it's a real product, just seems to good to be true

summary: seems like a decent box, upgrade ram to 1 gb and you got a deal. pricewatch says the 200 pin sodimm is going for $80ish

begin copy/paste from their specs page:

        * CPU - Intel® Celeron® M Processor 370 (1.5 GHz, 90nm, FSB400, 1 MB L2 cache, uPGA478)
        * DISPLAY - 14.0" WXGA (1280x768) TFT
        * HARD DRIVE - 40 GB
        * DIMENSION - 333(W) x 243(D) x 24/33.(H)mm (front/back), 2.2Kg with 6 cells Lithium-lion battery

        * MEMORY - 64-bit wide DDR data channel, One 200-pin SODIMM socket, supporting DDR 333/400, 256 MB Expandable up to 1GB, based on SODIMM Modules
        * STORAGE - One changeable 2.5" 9.5mm(H) HDD, Supporting Master mode IDE ATA-33/66/100/133 (Ultra DMA), One changeable 12.7mm(H) CD/DVD Combo
        * VIDEO CONTROLLER - VIA PN800 integration, Shared Memory Architecture up to 64MB, 128 bit 3D graphic engine, Support analog monitor pixel resolution up to 1920x1400, Support two displays dual view
        * KEYBOARD - A4 size keyboard, Built-in Touchpad with scrolling function

        * SOUND SYSTEM - AC'97 2.2 Compliant Interface, 3D stereo enhanced sound system, Sound-Blaster PROTM Compatible, S/PDIF Digital output (5.1 CH), 1x Built-in Microphone, 2x Built-in Speakers
        * I/O PORTS - 3x USB 2.0 ports, 1x External CRT monitor output, 1x Headphone jack, 1x Microphone jack, 1x S/PDIF output jack, 1x RJ-45 port for LAN, 1x Line-in jack, 1x DC-In jack
        * PCMCIA - 1x Type II PCMCIA socket
        * COMMUNICATION - 10/100BASE-TX Fast Ethernet on board, 802.11g MiniPCI Wireless LAN
        * POWER - Full Range 65W AC adapter - AC input 100~240V, 47~63Hz, DC output 20V, 3.25A, Removable 6-cell Smart Li-ion battery pack, 4000/4400mAh
        * SECURITY - Kensington® Lock

Laptop specs

[AncientPC]

* CPU - Intel® Celeron® M Processor 370 (1.5 GHz, 90nm, FSB400, 1 MB L2 cache, uPGA478)
* DISPLAY - 14.0" WXGA (1280x768) TFT
* HARD DRIVE - 40 GB
* DIMENSION - 333(W) x 243(D) x 24/33.(H)mm (front/back), 2.2Kg with 6 cells Lithium-lion battery

* MEMORY - 64-bit wide DDR data channel, One 200-pin SODIMM socket, supporting DDR 333/400, 256 MB Expandable up to 1GB, based on SODIMM Modules
* STORAGE - One changeable 2.5" 9.5mm(H) HDD, Supporting Master mode IDE ATA-33/66/100/133 (Ultra DMA), One changeable 12.7mm(H) CD/DVD Combo
* VIDEO CONTROLLER - VIA PN800 integration, Shared Memory Architecture up to 64MB, 128 bit 3D graphic engine, Support analog monitor pixel resolution up to 1920x1400, Support two displays dual view
* KEYBOARD - A4 size keyboard, Built-in Touchpad with scrolling function

* SOUND SYSTEM - AC'97 2.2 Compliant Interface, 3D stereo enhanced sound system, Sound-Blaster PROTM Compatible, S/PDIF Digital output (5.1 CH), 1x Built-in Microphone, 2x Built-in Speakers
* I/O PORTS - 3x USB 2.0 ports, 1x External CRT monitor output, 1x Headphone jack, 1x Microphone jack, 1x S/PDIF output jack, 1x RJ-45 port for LAN, 1x Line-in jack, 1x DC-In jack
* PCMCIA - 1x Type II PCMCIA socket
* COMMUNICATION - 10/100BASE-TX Fast Ethernet on board, 802.11g MiniPCI Wireless LAN
* POWER - Full Range 65W AC adapter - AC input 100~240V, 47~63Hz, DC output 20V, 3.25A, Removable 6-cell Smart Li-ion battery pack, 4000/4400mAh
* SECURITY - Kensington® Lock

Limit on RAM upgrades - 1GB

[billstewart]

The specs say it can support up to 1GB of RAM. That's enough for most people, but some people will find it limiting. (It comes with 256MB, so you'll need to spend some cash to make it more useful.)

Shouldn't be any reason there's a problem with upgrading disks. I don't know if there's any antique 137-GB limitation in the BIOS - if there is, then you might be limited to 120GB.

1 PCMCIA slot, 3 USB, built-in 802.11g, S/PDIF sound. Because it's 802.11g, you won't need to burn the PCMCIA slot immediately for wireless, though if you're doing .11n you may want to.

Re:It may be fraud

[albalbo]

The content is a complete rip-off of:

http://www.clevo.com.tw/products/M540V.asp [clevo.com.tw]

They say that they manufacture in Sweden, but that's a Taiwanese firm. Definitely stinky, and I wouldn't buy one.

Re:It may be fraud

[dmitrygr]

But feel free to call the main guy behind all this, and ask. His mobile number is "[phone]", as seen on his personal website: http://www.ken-erik.com/ [ken-erik.com]

Re:It may be fraud

[hendridm]

Plus, they are using 2checkout to process credit cards, which I would consider odd for a decent size company supposedly selling revolutionary laptops. It's pretty obviously a scam, but they got our attention!

livna, of course.

[Anonymous Coward]

I use fedora/livna. The media apps are in livna, but it is seamless.

When I upgraded from FC4 to FC5 to FC6 to FC7, the drill is:

rpm -U fedora-release*rpm livna-release*rpm
yum update

Fedora/Livna is often more current than Ubuntu.

Re:It may be fraud

[orkysoft]

The Visa and Mastercard logos and popup windows are fake. I'm not sure I should post the details on how they are fake, because the scammers might be reading this too, and I don't want to explain to them the weaknesses of their website.

Unless they send me one of those laptops (1 gig please, kthx) ;-)

Don't buy or leave your credit card data. Scam.

[Qbertino]

It's a scam. Editors, please extend the story accordingly.

Re:Wish it had more details

[GiMP]

Uh... from the website:

POWER - Full Range 65W AC adapter - AC input 100~240V, 47~63Hz, DC output 20V, 3.25A, Removable 6-cell Smart Li-ion battery pack, 4000/4400mAh

Just got a text from the owner/ceo/whatever

[CaptainTux]

As his website says, he is on vacation in Thailand but he will consider doing an interview when he returns. He claims he knows nothing about the rampant fraud/vaporware suspicions all over the internet about this.

Almost certainly a scam

[unicron02]

Medison Europe United was incorporated less than 2 weeks ago: http://wck2.companieshouse.gov.uk/02f0dac25c029c53 8688518e70982ba3/compdetails [companieshouse.gov.uk]

Also, take a look at the address provided

27 RUFFETS WOOD
GRAVESEND
KENT
DA12 5JQ

My my, Nordic Multimedia Distribution Limited is listed as having the same address: http://www.ukdata.com/company-credit-reports/NORDI C-MULTIMEDIA-DISTRIBUTION-LIMITED.html [ukdata.com]
GI Finance Limited is located here as well: http://www.simplycreditreports.com/company-number/ 05905858.html [simplycreditreports.com]
La Vida Art Limited: http://www.companiesgate.co.uk/LA+VIDA+ART+LIMITED .aspx [companiesgate.co.uk]
BYGG Invest Limited: http://www.ukdata.com/company-credit-reports/BYGG- INVEST-LIMITED.html [ukdata.com]
HG Shiprepair Limited: http://www.companiesgate.co.uk/HG+SHIPREPAIR+LIMIT ED.aspx [companiesgate.co.uk]
Also, Ken-Erik Limited is listed as having the same address: http://www.companiesgate.co.uk/KEN-ERIK+LIMITED.as px [companiesgate.co.uk]

I checked google maps to see if I could locate the address: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2 7+ruffets+wood,+gravesend,+kent+england&sll=37.062 5,-95.677068&sspn=49.71116,81.738281&ie=UTF8&t=k&z =16&iwloc=addr&om=1 [google.com]

Looks a lot like a residential area, either house/condo/apartment, definatley not a corporate or even industrial location.

Nothing adds up.

[kd5ujz]

On their contact information, they list their address as:

Medison Europe Limited
27 Ruffets Wood
Gravesend, Kent
DA12 5JQ England

But this looks to be a residential area.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2 7+RUFFETS+WOOD,+GRAVESEND,+KENT,+DA12+5JQ&sll=37.0 625,-95.677068&sspn=32.66491,59.238281&ie=UTF8&ll= 51.411728,0.377553&spn=0.000785,0.001808&t=k&z=19& om=1 [google.com]

This Business Credit Report site ( http://www.ukdata.com/company-listings/No-27.html [ukdata.com]) has that Address for several companys, Including:
NORDIC SALES GROUP NORGE LIMITED
NORDIC MARKETING GROUP LIMITED
NORDIC MULTIMEDIA DISTRIBUTION LIMITED
NORDIC PICTURES LIMITED

There are possibly others, but those are the ones I found with a quick search.

Re:Smells fishy...

[boldie]

Well the founder of Medison Valdi Ivancic lives in Brazil according to IDG.se [www.idg.se]. If the company is registered in Brasil as well the Swedes are smoked too. The legal info on their page [medisoncelebrity.com] is a rip off from apples [apple.com]. Well they could just be lazy...I don't know.

Mmmm FISH!

SLASHDOT IS ENABLING SCAMMERS

[glindsey]

Change the article to note that this is a scam.

Yes, this is redundant, but I don't care. Every minute that Slashdot keeps this "story" up on the web page is another minute that they are providing free advertising for scam artists.

I'm sure that Slashdot's sponsors would love to know that they are accomplices to fraud.

Change the article, or take it down.

Mr. Ivancic

[Daniel K. Attling]

After some light diggin thru public registers this is what I've found out about the owner of Medison.

Valdi Ivancic, born 1970-03-26, has a filed residens on Holmgatan 16F, 37138 Karlskrona. However he is also listed as living on Lundenvägen 24, 56134 Huskvarna. The Huskvarna listing also has a cell phone number for MR Ivancic, [phone].

Whois information for medisoncelebrity.com refers to the Huskvarna address but lists another cell phone number [phone] and also states the mans email address to be [e-mail].

Also residing at the Huskvarna address is one Ljubo Ivancic, born 1947-08-14, listed with a land line number of [phone] and a cell phone number of [phone].

Neither Medison or Medison Consulting seem to be registered trademarks in Sweden.

medison.se was registered 2007-02-09 and medisoncelebrity.com was registered 2007-04-11.

Re:It may be fraud

[alexgieg]

Sure, in an ideal world. My understanding is that these are going to be made and shipped from Brazil, Maybe they aren't current in their abilities?

I'm not sure whether this is generalized or not, but I live in Brazil and work at a small company that resells data acquisition and process control systems imported from USA and Europe to other Brazilian companies, and these delivery times are pretty standard for us. Now, admittedly we don't sell directly to end users (prices for these systems are too high), only to other companies, but it's really common for we to take up to 90 days to deliver a system. And the reason is simple: we rarely maintain goods in stock, only importing what has already been purchased (and paid) by our customers, and as such, to minimize shipping costs we must include in a single shipment as many purchase orders as possible.

Is perfectly possible that this company is scamming, yes. However, as you pointed out, if they aren't scammers, there are in fact good reasons for them to have these long delivery times. Not all countries, much less all companies, meet the conditions required for almost instantaneous delivery times as are common in USA nowadays.

Simply put, it's not that such delivery times are "a thing of the past", as many other posts say. It's more that the USA are years ahead of everyone else in this regards.

Re:The fine print

[TClevenger]

That's okay. Their credit card merchant account provider has to cover any chargebacks, even if they don't get a dime from the merchant.

Re:Sure looks like a scam. Pull up a whois on it

[mazanoid]

Registration Service Provided By: Surftown Domains
Contact: [e-mail]
Visit: http://www.support.surftown.com/ [surftown.com]
Of course if you're too lazy, I've already pulled one up.
The three key points:
1) Domain name registered in april 07, for a term of ONE YEAR, how many hardware companies do you know who put up a domain for 1 year? Obviously only the companies that don't expect to be in business for a second year.
2) The contacts are at hotmail. Okay, that's not good. Usually a hardware company would register itself with a DBA company name instead of a "Valdi Ivancic [e-mail]", leaving
human name contacts for administrative and technical contacts.
3) The site hoster.... Surf-net charges .99# / year....with low setup fee, smells fishy....someone's going the cheap route about their corporate site.
4) company can't afford a fax? Interesting.
at least the scammer hasn't used anonymity services during registration.

My two trollish cents.

Domain name: medisoncelebrity.com

Registrant Contact:

      Valdi Ivancic ([e-mail])
      +46.707572858
      Fax:
      Lundenvagen 24
      Huskvarna, 561 34
      SE

Administrative Contact:

      Valdi Ivancic ([e-mail])
      +46.707572858
      Fax:
      Lundenvagen 24
      Huskvarna, 561 34
      SE

Technical Contact:
      Surftown A/S
      DNS Administrator ([e-mail])
      +45.70200776
      Fax: [phone]
      Lautrupsgade 9, 1
      KÿFFFFF8benhavn ÿFFFFD8, 2100
      DK

Status: Active

Name Servers:
      ns1.surf-town.net
      ns2.surf-town.net
      ns3.surf-town.net

Creation date: 11 Apr 2007 19:04:10
Expiration date: 11 Apr 2008 19:04:10

Some background

[erixtark]

Here's a link to an email conversation with the founder:
http://www.sweclockers.com/forum/showthread.php?s= e0a49aad6aaa76aa2abfe67cb4d4ec44&postid=7539927#po st7539927 [sweclockers.com]

The founder also has a column in a small Swedish paper:
http://www.jnytt.se/Read__7981.aspx [jnytt.se] (Swedish.)
He writes about life in Sao Paulo.

Here's an interview with the largest Swedish business paper, Dagens Industri:
http://tinyurl.com/38ju9l [tinyurl.com] (Swedish.)

A couple of months ago they launched a laptop for 3000SEK (~$450), the same model now being sold for $150:
http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.100914 [www.idg.se] (Swedish.)

Could be fraud, could be simply bad business, could be an attempt to gain market share by calculated loss. No matter what, it could definitely have been launched in a more professional way. Bad karma on the founder. I'm waiting (at least) 6 weeks to put in my order.

Re:Sure looks like a scam. Pull up a whois on it

[nnm.one]

Organisationsnr: Företagsnamn(firma): Företagsform: Firmatyp: Län: Status:
19 700326-2016 1 Medison Consulting E Firma 10
556525-1096 Medison Data AB AB Firma 10 Konkurs avslutad
916575-3832 MEDISON Handelsbolag HB Firma 04 Avregistrerad
969622-6852 Medison Handelsbolag HB Firma 06 Avregistrerad
969627-7657 Medison Inlärning Handelsbolag HB Firma 06 Avregistrerad
969628-2749 Medison Media Handelsbolag HB Firma 06 Avregistrerad

-----------------

Let me translate that:

Organisation Number: Company Name(firma): Företagsform: Firmatyp: State: Status:
19 700326-2016 1 Medison Consulting E Firma 10
556525-1096 Medison Data AB AB Firma 10 Bankrupt
916575-3832 MEDISON Handelsbolag HB Firma 04 De-registered
969622-6852 Medison Handelsbolag HB Firma 06 De-registered
969627-7657 Medison Inlärning Handelsbolag HB Firma 06 De-registered
969628-2749 Medison Media Handelsbolag HB Firma 06 De-registered
--
https://snr3.bolagsverket.se/snrgate/default.jsp [bolagsverket.se]
(Search for 'medison')
--

http://www.mufjonkoping.se/medisonVSclevo.JPG [mufjonkoping.se]

Pictures stolen from a company named "Clevo" that is based in Taiwan. Yet they claim that they are assembled in Brazil and that they
will continue to do that until they have their manufactoring facility ready there.

--

It's a scam, nothing more to see here, move along now.

P.S
Their demand that they are/will be getting (as pointed out by a member of some other forum) will surpass the ones on Apples MacBooks, it is highly unlikely that this company from out of nowhere will be able to supply.

Re:No phone number!

[Anonymous Coward]

I checked the company record for this company and:

(company secretary) BATH, HARPREET, 37yrs old (Indian National) with an address in CHANDIGARH, India
(director) IVANCIC, VALDI, 37 years old, (swedish national)with an address in HUSKVARNA, Sweden

from Companies House WebCheck [companieshouse.gov.uk]

Name & Registered Office:
MEDISON EUROPE LIMITED
27 RUFFETS WOOD
GRAVESEND
KENT
DA12 5JQ
Company No. 06312373


Status: Active
Date of Incorporation: 13/07/2007

Country of Origin: United Kingdom
Company Type: Private Limited Company
Nature of Business (SIC(03)):
None Supplied
Accounting Reference Date: 31/07
Last Accounts Made Up To: (NO ACCOUNTS FILED)
Next Accounts Due: 13/05/2009
Last Return Made Up To:
Next Return Due: 10/08/2008

Re:It may be fraud

[Eivind]

• Because it's a domain registered in april, for one year.
• Because same guy has 5 earlier "Medison something" companies registered, 2 of which are bankrupt, rest of which are "dissolved"
• Because the privacy-notice is cut-n-pasted from Apple (and poorly done at that)
• Because the images of the laptops are photoshopped variants of a Taiwanese laptop. (and these claim to manufacture in Brazil)
• Because they claim to charge ridicolous amounts for advertising on the site ($15K - $2 million) for a site with (if you believe their own claims!) 10K hits/month or thereabout.
• Because the only way to contact them is a -hotmail- adress to what appears to be a private individual.
• Because even their phone is "temporarily disconnected"
• Because they have no adress, no contact-info whatsoever in any of the countries they claim to operate in ?
• Because they (claim to) sell at about half the price of the nearest competitor.
• Because they claim it's cheap becaus they "see it from a democratic point of view" which is crap.
• Because there's around 20 other fishy-smelling things, but I'm tired of listing them. :-)

If, after all of this, you still want to order one. Go for it. Oh, and I have a bridge to sell ! Send small unmarked notes :-)