Freescale to tip the netbook scale to Linux

A new netbook processor is in town and it promises to tip the scales to favor the Linux operating system. Jack Wallen gives you the scoop on what Freescale is offering and how they can make it better.

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Freescale Semiconductor is planning on releasing a netbook for the 2009 holiday season running on a new processor that would:

• Have up to eight hours of battery life.
• Be considerably thinner than current designs.
• Contain a 1Ghz processor
• Have embedded 3G connectivity.
• Be priced under $200.00

You read it correctly. A sub-200.00 dollar netbook that offers more than most current netbooks. The kicker? As of now it looks like the only operating systems that will support the new processor are Android and Linux.

Think about it…Netbooks are the hottest commodity in PC sales right now. If a sub-$200 unit ships that offers eight hours of battery life and has 3G, it will not only crash the netbook party, it will be the LIFE of the netbook party. This netbook promises to be the iPhone of netbooks.

I know there are a lot of readers out there that will say, “But Linux-based netbooks were returned  four times more than Windows-based netbooks.” To that I will counter by saying at a price point of less than $200, and with the hardware features Freescale is offering, users won’t give a toot what operating system it is running. And if Freescale plays its cards correctly (and has a distribution like gOS to create a special interface the users will enjoy) there will be zero problems.

And I do hope there are members of the Freescale company reading this. If there are, I would like to reiterate what I just said in a different way:

Freescale has a unique opportunity here. There are Linux distributions out there (gOS Gadets, Elive, Elive+Compiz) that could be ported over to the Freescale architecture creating one of the slickest user-interfaces for netbooks available.

I have used a Linux-based Netbook. Sure they do their job but the interface is rather blah (or in terms the teens and tweens will understand, “meh”.) Since the introduction of the iPhone, people want pizzazz. The end user does want to have fun using their computer and I think this offers the perfect opportunity to create a fun netbook.

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Of course that is all merely a side note. The real issue here is that the Freescale processor (based on the ARM chip) will not support Windows. And considering the current economic state we are in, price-point is going to be a key factor in the success of this model of netbook. Sub $200.This isn’t OLPC aiming for the sub $100 notebook; this is actually doable. It is already possible to purchase a sub $250 netbook (Target carries the Eee PC for $249.00), so dropping that extra $50.00 shouldn’t be all that difficult. When that happens, prepare to see Linux-based Netbooks in the hands of many more people. And if Freescale takes my advice and pulls in a unique version of Linux, you’ll probably see one of those in my hands.