Disqus - Latest Comments for Korgmeister

Re: MSI Wind smiles and says cheese

Korgmeister — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 07:04:31 -0000

I don't care if you call them liliputers. The name doesn't stand a hope in hell of catching on, but I know what you mean. Anyone who really has a bug up their ass about your term is going to go apoplectic at your URL and storm off in a fit of pique anyway.

I am most curious to know what the MSI Wind's keyboard is like. I was previously very enthusiastic about the HP 2133, I was even willing to overlook the sluggish VIA processor. But releasing the thing without a proper set of Linux (or even XP) drivers suggests that either A: HP rushed a half-assed product out to market. B: They really don't give a rats ass about the consumer market.

In which case their launch model has lost all attraction for me. Maybe they'll take it in a direction I'll like, but right now it looks like HP is being the company I know and loathe.

So far the MSI Wind looks interesting (albeit MORE powerful than I really need) but my main concern right now is whether it has a comfortable keyboard. I'm a demon typist and if I can't have a keyboard that lets me bust out at least a reasonable fraction of my 75WPM magic, it's not useful to me.

Re: Windows XP startup showdown: Mini-Note v. Eee PC

Korgmeister — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 20:04:54 -0000

I'm pleasantly surprised! I was expecting the hard drive and VIA processor to be a handicap for startup times, but it looks like it pretty much has parity with a full speed EEE.

Re: First look at OpenSUSE on the HP Mini-Note

Korgmeister — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 20:39:20 -0000

Sorry, no hardware acceleration for the VIA Chrome 9. I'm in contact with one of the key developers for X drivers for VIA chipsets (VIA's most infamous detractor - libv) and aware of the horrors he has to go through in order to get anything functional (VIA's 'support' in this area mainly consisting of random and sporadic drops of binary, not source code, which he then has to painstakingly reverse engineer in order to get something functional). Unless we get a tide of users harassing VIA for proper Linux support, they'll just continue their usual strategy of giving insincere support and then astroturfing like mad to pretend they're 110% behind Linux.

(Sorry if I sound like a FUD merchant. But I really want the HP 2133 to work, but right now a fire needs to be lit under HP and VIA so they get their act into gear.)

Re: Mini-Note top 9: Annoyances

Korgmeister — Mon, 05 May 2008 18:28:19 -0000

Yes, it would be worse. VIA C7 processors are significantly slower than Celerons.

Re: Eee PC 900 battery life: Not so good

Korgmeister — Mon, 05 May 2008 18:29:55 -0000

Fair cop, Brad! Didn't ASUS say they were going to fix their low capacity battery goof several weeks ago? I think you even wrote a post on this site about that.

Re: MSI Wind will come in (at least) three colors

Korgmeister — Thu, 08 May 2008 10:29:45 -0000

Mmmmm! Pink netbook!

Damn, this makes the decision even more difficult. Wait for an Isiah-Spec Mini Note that can (probably) run EVE Online, or get a deliciously fruity MSI Wind?

(It's a quirk of mine that I like to accessorize with pink, girly looking things despite looking like a lumberjack. Also, I figure a pink laptop is MUCH less likely to be stolen)

Re: Shocker: Asus warranty doesn't cover exploding 3rd party batteries

Korgmeister — Thu, 08 May 2008 10:33:53 -0000

Given what I am presently learning about batteries in class, and how weedy the power supply of the EEEPC is, it doesn't surprise me at all that plugging in a much higher capacity than would have been designed for is causing this sort of catastrophic failure.

Power systems are one of those areas of electronics that suffers from "Anything I don't understand is simple and easy" syndrome. A good, stable, non-explosive power supply is actually a damn tricky thing to accomplish and it's pretty easy to screw things up by randomly changing certain variables. (I'm pretty confident that the higher capacity battery I put in my MP3 player does not in fact charge fully because the factory charging control was probably preset for a 1700 mAh battery)

Re: Low-cost PCs are new battlefield in Microsoft's war on Linux

Korgmeister — Sun, 11 May 2008 03:14:54 -0000

The problem is these deals always mean XP home, and I hate that because I can't fix up the security policies how I like.

I must admit that when I first heard of the mini-note coming out with Linux I was quite willing to give it a try. But as we all know, HP failed and failed hard on that account.

Re: Asus Eee PC 900 and HP Mini-Note Linux boot comparison

Korgmeister — Mon, 12 May 2008 23:04:08 -0000

Also not a very fair comparison because ASUS actually put a modicum of effort into the Linux OS on their ultraportable.
(But then, this is meritocratic unfairness, which is the best kind of unfairness)

Re: MSI Wind to pack a 10 inch display and a $399 price tag

Korgmeister — Wed, 14 May 2008 07:49:09 -0000

That's a pretty tasty deal, at any spec level!

The big question that remains - how ergonomic is the keyboard? If it's anywhere near as good as the one on the Mini-Note, I might end up getting one of these instead.

Re: Want to know what the MSI Wind looks like in black?

Korgmeister — Thu, 15 May 2008 06:53:33 -0000

But I want the pink one!

Re: It's official: OLPC XO Laptop to run Windows

Korgmeister — Thu, 15 May 2008 21:15:26 -0000

In all honesty, I think this was for the best.

Re: Early look at the MSI Wind

Korgmeister — Thu, 15 May 2008 21:17:36 -0000

Lookin' GOOD! I think I might end up going for one of these instead of the mini-note.

Re: Asus and MSI must use the same advertising company

Korgmeister — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:27:42 -0000

Ah, plagiarism. It's not just for students anymore!

I'd love to know where they had that meeting: "OK, instead of doing a photo shoot, let's just photoshop a royalty-free image containing a competitor's product to include ours".

Re: MinBuntu: Ubuntu 8.04 custom built for the HP Mini-Note

Korgmeister — Sat, 17 May 2008 18:41:17 -0000

I believe there are only two words fitting for this occassion: Aww, yeah!

Re: HP Mini-Note now available in Japan

Korgmeister — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:52:13 -0000

Meanwhile, Australia remains the technological butt monkey of the developed world, with HP Australia yet to officially indicate that they've yet bothered selling the thing here.

Re: HP Mini-Note now available in Japan

Korgmeister — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:41:10 -0000

Actually, I finally got a date. August. Freakin' August!

You know, I'm getting mighty tired of things showing up in Afghanistan earlier than they do in this country.

Well, to hell with this, I'm just going to get a regular back-breaking laptop. Everything 15 inch is being fire-saled anyway.

Re: Fluxflux-eee: Fluxbox for the Eee PC

Korgmeister — Thu, 29 May 2008 21:10:04 -0000

Can't say I'm terribly impressed by it. If even the GUI runs at an appalling frame rate, I'd say they've bitten off more than they can chew in the "make it look pretty" department.

Are they honestly trying to pass this off as 'lightweight'?

Re: Fluxflux-eee: Fluxbox for the Eee PC

Korgmeister — Fri, 30 May 2008 04:33:30 -0000

That could make sense. I was assuming that was the output from a VGA-out port to a TV capture card or something.

Didn't even know there was screen capture software for Linux.

Re: Ubuntu Eee 8.04: Custom Ubuntu distro for the Eee PC

Korgmeister — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:11:38 -0000

So far I am not loving this thing.

I got an EeePC today (finally!) and figured I'd install this on it, since I wanted Ubuntu on it.

Instead it's been a living nightmare. The Ubuntu Eee people have assumed that you have a desktop running Ubuntu. I don't, so this annoyed me incredibly. I tried running their directions using an Ubuntu LiveCD but it didn't work.

Trying to get it to boot from USB was frickin' impossible until I went to the official Ubuntu helpsite and used Unetbootin like a sensible person.

Now it would actually boot, however, it crashed within 10 seconds of X loading up.

We really need a poll for what EEE optimised Ubuntu variant is less of a flaming PITA to use. Or at least a reccommendation along those lines.

Re: Ubuntu Eee 8.04: Custom Ubuntu distro for the Eee PC

Korgmeister — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 12:00:50 -0000

Hmm, that's not a bad idea. I am a little nervous about performing such an update (I killed my xorg once with an apt-get update) but at least the procedure for installing from USB seems much more user friendly.

Re: Ubuntu Eee 8.04: Custom Ubuntu distro for the Eee PC

Korgmeister — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 23:55:49 -0000

UPDATE: Turns out I did not pay the Ubuntu EEE team enough credit. It does not in fact freeze during the install. It's just that it takes a couple of minutes to do something, so it just *looks* like it's frozen.

Lesson learned: A watched pot never boils. When booting up from the USB stick, go make a sandwhich and come back when you're done.

I would still reccommend using the Unetbootin method to get a bootable USB stick rather than the unecessarily difficult method the ubuntu EEE team use, though.

Re: Asus to drop Eee PC 701/900 prices?

Korgmeister — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 21:30:00 -0000

In Australia, even though the HP Mini-Note has barely arrived here, the EeePC has already had something of a price drop. A well known website here called "Catch of the Day" has been flogging off 701 4G at $330AU a couple of times in the past two weeks. I bought one the first time they offered it.

Don't know where those guys got a hold of a buttload of cheap EeePCs, but it seems to indicate that there's not a supply shortage of them anymore. (They only have a lousy 10Wh battery, though)

Re: Another Asus update: Eee Box Virus, Eee PC S101 price, etc

Korgmeister — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 02:35:29 -0000

Lolz! The Recycler virus was going around my university campus for ages. Pretty embarrassing to have it show up in computers straight out of the factory.

Re: Indamixx netbook is a 2 pound music studio

Korgmeister — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 21:58:59 -0000

To be frank, anyone who would want to use Linux for audio production is insane.

Re: Easy Peasy Ubuntu-based Linux Distro for Eee PC now available

Korgmeister — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 05:21:50 -0000

If it lives up to it's name, I'll certainly be keenly interested.