On Fri, 17 Aug 2007 10:17:49 +0000, cridecoeur wrote:
> Vista is bloated, topheavy, stagnant. MS has been touting the UMPC small
> form factor. Why dont they give us a made- for OS that is
> lean....mean....QUICK.........and that can handle ALL our applications
> in that form ??????
>
> WHY OH WHY OH WHY OH WHY
This is a good question. I think the answer is that Microsoft has an
unusual marketing problem... people with 5-year-old computers running XP
really don't have much need to upgrade. Releasing a new OS that will
only run on up-to-date hardware is one way to make those people feel as
though their systems are obsolete.
But computer hardware is becoming much more diverse. Lots of new gadgets
call for a full-fledged modern OS, but come with severe hardware
constraints because of their small size and the price point at which they
are expected to sell.
Developers have been busy modifying Linux so it can deliver robust
performance on relatively skimpy hardware. Here is an interesting link,
which Roy Schestowitz posted in comp.os.linux.advocacy the other day:
http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS9959043369.html
I suspect that the UMPC hardware developers will gravitate toward Linux
because they will want to take advantage of the OS development work
described in this article.
Charlie