Asus may have pulled its experimental Google Android-powered netbook from sight after teasing journalists with it at Computex in June. But that doesn’t mean the company is sticking to Windows and Xandros Linux. Sascha at NetbookNews says a reliable source has told him that Asus will launch a netbook with Moblin Linux in October.
Moblin is a custom Linux distribution created for netbooks. The OS started out as a pet project for Intel, and it’s designed to work well with always-connected netbooks with small screens and Intel Atom processors. The Linux Foundation now runs the project, and a number of other Linux distributions have talked about adopting some of Moblin’s technology for their own netbook-optimized operating systems.
I’m going to take this news with a grain of salt for now, since Asus has a tendency to experiment with products that never make it to market. But Sascha is in Taiwan at the moment, where I know he’s been meeting with officials from the company. He also reports that Asus is working with Google to develop products that will run that company’s upcoming Chrome operating system.
Yea, MS likes to play the field – ALOT, especially with their
PC Software if they smell market share domination – up goes the prices.
Asus initially launched the EeePC with Linux, but the Linux models all but disappeared after Microsoft offered discounts on WinXP. Now Microsoft is threatening to raise prices with the launch of Windows 7, and suddenly Asus is talking about Linux again. So who knows if we will see an actual product or if this is just a bargaining chip.
Tell Sascha not to come back without pictures!