A Review of the $200 Wal-Mart Linux PC

bcrowell writes "Wal-Mart's new $200 Linux PC has generated a lot of buzz in geek circles. Although they're sold out of stores, I bought one for my daughter via mail order, and have written up a review of the system. The hardware seems fine for anyone but a hardcore gamer, but the pre-installed gOS flavor of Ubuntu has a lot of rough edges."

But the real question is...

[Anonymous Coward]

...does it run wind... Never mind

it will lie to you about cake

[User 956]

the pre-installed gOS flavor of Ubuntu has a lot of rough edges.

If you think gOS is bad, you should see gladOS.

Re:it will lie to you about cake

[HalifaxRage]

Still sounds like a POS to me.

Re:Hardcore gamer?

[ozmanjusri]

"Selling a PC with Vista preinstalled is downright criminal."

Fixed that for you.

The Everex PC is designed from scratch as a low-end machine and the OS is lightweight to match its specs. You don't put tractor tyres on a Hyundai Excel, and you don't put Vista on this machine.

Re:it will lie to you about cake

[Anonymous Coward]

The Aperture Science Enrichment Centre is unhappy to hear you say that. please assume the party escort submission position, a party associate will be along shortly to bring you to your... party

The gOS has something to say to you...

[iamwahoo2]

And apparently that is "f you".

Look at the first screenshot, the "f" icon on the bottom menu bar is followed by the word "you". I guess the "you" is half of the youtube icon. They need to reorder that menubar.

Re:512M of ram?

[sgbett]

Actually, I just realised that I have legs. I use them for many things such as walking about.

I consider myself an advanced walker, and I don't need to take the bus.

In fact, the only things that it would probably get quicker for me by spending the extra money is likely the 13 mile trip to work each day, and the visit to foreign relatives 64 miles away (who I rarely go and see). I'd rather use the extra money to buy my daughter a picture of me so she doesn't forget who I am because I spend 8 hours a day comp^Hmuting.

Buy some ram dude! sure you don't *need* it, but think of the children!

Re:Available at my store...

[mh1997]

Okay, I am telling on myself here. I work at a Walmart.

After reading billions of articles/posts about evil Walmart on the internet, I have to ask a stupid question.

Which Walmart employee are you - the guy that is exploited for low wages with no benefits because of your lack of education or the guy that is destroying small town America?

Re:512M of ram?

[ColdWetDog]

You'll want to edit that video before posting it to YouTube.

From what I've seen on YouTube, it's not immediately obvious that anyone else agrees with you.

Re:Windows adverts in a Linux review ..

[Anonymous Coward]

http://search.microsoft.com/results.aspx?mkt=en-US&setlang=en-US&q=FUD [microsoft.com]

LOL!

Re:Hardcore gamer?

[meringuoid]

RAM doesn't affect just game loading, it affects all of your computing. Want those directories of fansubs to show up a bit faster? As cheap as RAM is nowadays, it's a sin to have less than a GB considering how much it improves even general computing over 512.

I was writing an explanation of why that doesn't much matter - I browse directories in a terminal window most of the time, that kind of thing - but you know what? Fine. You guys win. Because before I finished writing it Firefox blew up and everything slowed to a crawl.

You don't by any chance own stock in crucial.com or anything, do you? :-)

Re:In the long term, Vista will help humanity

[Anonymous Coward]

Your email address concerns me. Shouldn't you be adding "slashdot" to both sides to keep the equation balanced?

Re:it will lie to you about cake

[Spikeles]

Will there be cake?