gOS development motherboard and CPU for under $60

[danrok]

"VIA sells PC2500E development mainboard with CPU and OS from $59.99", see Front Page:
http://www.aoaforums.com/frontpage/content/view/3482/1/

Comments?

[Daniel ~]

Wonder if this will work!?

[funnyperson1]

Seems like more of a gimmick to me, I mean ANY pc is a gOS development machine, its an X86 operating system. The only thing that developing on this hardware does is ensure that your apps will run on crappy hardware, specifically the $200 pos Everex machines that WalMart sells with gOS and this hardware.

They aren't going to sell enough of these to motivate anyone to develop for this platform specifically. Anyone considering it would be better off developing for Linux in general, or even Ubuntu specifically.

Not to mention that these Via CPUs are really weak clock per clock, a 1.5 Via CPU is the equivalent of like a 1Ghz PIII. You get so much more value for money on one of those $500 Dells which come with nice LCD monitors and Athlon X2s. Buying one of the gOS machines only makes sense if you are really tight for money and already have a monitor and peripherals.

[danrok]

Seems to be popular at Walmart, and sold out:
Everex TC2502 Green gPC w/ Via C7-D Processor - Wal-Mart

These are just cheap Internet boxes, 1GHz is all you need to browse the web, send email, shop, etc.

[cloasters]

Please say that the Brits were cool enough to ban Mal-Wort from their storied isles forever.

[Favu]

All these people want is a cheap and simple computer. they want it to work out of the box, and that is about it. It is basically computers at the same level as the cheap alarm clock you bought - you don't really care too much about it, as long as it works.

[aghastpumpkin]

Originally Posted by cloasters

Please say that the Brits were cool enough to ban Mal-Wort from their storied isles forever.

Until Wal Mart bought out ASDA, we were OK.
However, ASDA is slowly evolving into the sort of Americanised warehouse of crap that makes me want to vomit.

[Daniel ~]

Vomit bags, third row across from the Stomach pumps.":O}

[cloasters]

Do VIA processors still have no L2 Cache? My first store bought box had a precurser to Via's CPU's. Worked fine except in the MFlop department.

[Samuknow]

For a basic email net surfing rig for some non tech folks, these will be fine. Plus there is no Bill.

[funnyperson1]

I know you guys are right about this being a simple internet appliance, but I can't shake the feeling that people are going to be buying this to replace their "aging" Pentium 4s expecting a better computer.

[danrok]

These are back in-stock at Walmart:
Everex TC2502 Green gPC w/ Via C7-D Processor - Wal-Mart

[dsio]

Having used a VIA C7, I must say they are nowhere near as bad as you think. They are purpose built for light kiosk style web browsing, word processing, and media playback, and as such, they are very bad for gaming, among other things, but excel at what the are designed for.

When you couple that to a very slimmed down ubuntu/debian based linux distro build exactly for that hardware, and you get something very usable.