HP Dumps Linux for Windows XP MCE in New Media Player 225
An anonymous reader writes "There hasn't been much said about this, but HP's new z545 Digital Entertainment Center appears to be a Windows-based re-spin of an earlier Linux-based model that HP unveiled three years ago at the Tech X NY trade show in New York, and which was sold for some time as the de100c Digital Entertainment Center. Seems like the joint's gone downhill ever since Perens left."
Not quite a backwards step (Score:5, Insightful)
In this day and age, the operating system is pretty much a commodity. It is the software features on top that give a device any sort of real value. Since a device like this never exposes the underlying operating system to users, it doesn't make sense to spend a lot of money developing something yourself, especially when someone else has already invested the development effort.
So blue screen jokes aside, this is probably a good business decision for HP. Maybe not so good for those embedded Linux engineers who don't have a job on that team anymore, but fiscally the best choice for the company.
we shall port linux to it. (Score:5, Insightful)
what hurts me though are the $$ that finally get to naughty bill for the embedded windows. HP should consider bare-bones.
Interesting opportunity (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd like to see some data comparing the two devices in terms of reliability, customer satisfaction, rate of returns and junk like that.
I know why *I* would prefer one version of the product over another because if I know there's Linux inside, I want to play with it. But Joe consumer doesn't usually know one way or the other so I'm interested in a manufacturer's perspective on this. They care about whether a [version of a] product is widely accepted, MTBF (mean time between failure), rate of returns and junk like that.
If the main difference between the two devices is the OS underneath, it would be a terrific opportunity to see the impact that the OS choice makes in the creation of a consumer product is concerned.
Wait a minute... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd argue that HP has been going downhill in terms of innovative products even *before* Perens headed out.
My Guess (Score:5, Insightful)
I would be surprised if Microsoft provides a linux compatable WMA codec, and I do not know if they license the algorithm or code. Is there any information whether WMA can be licensed to use on linux?
If not, then this is probably the reason.
Re:Competitive Advantage...? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's the DRM media angle.
In the near future everybody is hoping that DRM-enabled digital media will make a big splash, and if you want to play that stuff you need Microsoft.
It would be stupid for HP to release a device now that would be incapable of playing most forms of protected media six to twelve months from now.
I hope that DRM crap won't take off, but I doubt HP is willing to take that risk. So they spend more money on MS's crap in the hope that it will keep their device relevent in the forseeable future.
It's not like it's going to cost them much, almost people who buy computers nowadays pays the MS tax, so worst case for HP is that they'd have to raise the price of their products by 40 dollars (at most).
Is all linux hipe devices about hacking ? (Score:4, Insightful)
What is the proportion of hobby hackers, buying theses devices and choosing Linux based ones with stright intention to actualy hack them ?
Do average consumer care much about the nick names of the internal componants they don't even know about it to be there ?
This thing has an operating system ? (Oh great, and how do I enable this function ?)
And it even run Linux inside you know ?! (Well, I just need to watch and record video and music)
Well, it may look a squewed point here.
Who buy what and, what are the consumers IBM is looking at ?
Wouildn't hacker be more satisfyed with these nices open sources projects, like MythTv, Freevo or VDR loaded in a custum mini-itx home build media center ?
As of now, I'm not sure if selling stuffs for hackers is relevant for IBM.
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:1, Insightful)
I disagree. What differentiates a HP media center from a gateway or joe blow media center then? he color of the case?
Underpants Gnomes are running HP.
Make the same thing everybody else is making
Charge more for it
??
Profit!
I guess this explains the HP branded iPod too.
Why do we care? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why do we care? (Score:1, Insightful)
Personally, I'm more interested in what it can do, not if it simply works or not.
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is kinda sad, really.
HP was once a company that was innovative, creative and original. Now they've degenerated into yet another money-hungry company who're afraid to tread new grounds or create something from scratch.
I'm sure that if Hewlett and Packard were to see the company now, they'd cringe in sadness and shame.
Thanks to the eminent Carly, HP now does nothing more than rebrand and sell services - they've laid off so many people who were into core technology and research operations. It's really sad to see what they have become.
Re:we shall port linux to it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Try porting Linux to the Apple IIgs sometime.
Moll.
Re:Is all linux hipe devices about hacking ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Uh... (Score:4, Insightful)
1. Assuming a semi stable enviroment (which I class WinXP MCE as) the user will probably never see much of a difference between Linux or MS. They won't see the underlying difference.
2. There is no equivalent of MPlayer for linux that won't get HP in trouble. If they start selling off these things with linux on them they'll have to use MPlayer to get any sort of decent functionality and MS/Apple/everyone else will sue the pants off them.
3. Linux is inherently OSS. It isn't going to be as easy to build DRM checking into it as it is for Windows MCE. Now I'm not sure if HP is onto a good idea or not, but let's say it is. So this thing gets big, and without DRM they become a target for the RIAA. Now they aren't in a situation like Apple/iTunes, but things could still get ugly.
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:3, Insightful)
"Invent"
Sheeyeh, right,
Re:Who would be stup[id enough.. (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm so fucking ashamed of my country. I've lost all hope. It seems like we're fighting a war against the blindly patriotic and evangelical christians, and we're hopelessly outnumbered.
My whole world has truly turned upside down - my own sister voted for Bush, for crying out loud. She just keeps parroting back the "flip flop" thing and the "Iraq violated UN blahblahblah Saddam was a threat blah blah blah". It's like she's joined some sort of cult or is in the grip of some hideous mind control.
It's a nightmare, and I can't wake up.
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:5, Insightful)
>> "So blue screen jokes aside, this is probably a good business decision for HP"
>I disagree. What differentiates a HP media center from a gateway or joe blow media center then? he color of the case?
What differentiates them is that they sell this piece of shit at no profit and then, because they know that 50% of people who buy this box also buy a color printer, they will also sell them a printer and make money.
>HP was once a company that was innovative, creative and original. Now they've degenerated into yet another money-hungry company who're afraid to tread new grounds or create something from scratch.
Listen to yourself - "yet another money-hungry company" - it is a Slashdot-established truth that companies' exist to make money. Get over it.
"Create something from scratch" - for something like 5 thousand boxes a month - how much should they charge for their "from scratch" Linux code?
Let's see - 50 engineers * 10K (including overhead) a month = $500,000/month
Spread over 5,000 boxes a month, that's US$500 per box for the software alone, compared to (I guess) US$80 for the Windows version.
Good luck with that!
>Thanks to the eminent Carly, HP now does nothing more than rebrand and sell services.
That's actually untrue, but even if it wasn't, so what - that's what people like - cheap and mediocre shit - and that's what they can sell in volume.
Look how Dell's growing by leaps and bounds - and they're not exactly a bastion of product innovation. What is HP supposed to do?
>I'm sure that if Hewlett and Packard were to see the company now, they'd cringe in sadness and shame.
No, I think they'd smile and say "Holy shit, man, times are tough now - we were lucky that we had the luxury of doing things the way we did! I don't know if we could pull that off today".
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:5, Insightful)
Renting music, paying per view, locking the item to the device... The sky is the limit. That Linux is more mature in the embedded market than windows. Windows here is a newcomer, and can't leverage office. It's (still) an inferior product, and it shows.
Re:Carly Fiorina (Score:2, Insightful)
If things were going good, she'd never have taken over in the first place.
>>Seems like the joint's gone downhill ever since Perens left.
This (by the article author, not the parent post) is such a fucking dumb-ass comment... Spicing things up the
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:5, Insightful)
Listen to yourself - "yet another money-hungry company" - it is a Slashdot-established truth that companies' exist to make money. Get over it.
All companies are money-hungry - but they can be money-hungry and still do cool shit. Google is an example of that. IBM is an example of that. Even Microsoft is an example of that.
When your company's focus changes from creating new technologies to using technologies that others create, you're going down the wrong path.
TI and HP were innovators in their heyday. Look at HP now.
Your monetary thinking is short-term. Yes, creating new technologies is always expensive on the onset. So what are you suggesting? That we all use Windows forever and ever since creating new technologies and adopting them with overhead costs is anyway expensive?
However, tomorrow when HP comes out with something else, they would have the technology that they have developed inhouse. And that will save them future development costs. The initial investment is always high, however the returns in the longterm far outweigh the immediate losses.
That's actually untrue, but even if it wasn't, so what - that's what people like - cheap and mediocre shit - and that's what they can sell in volume.
That _is_ indeed true. Although HP's troubles started even when Perens was heading out, Carly's services-oriented outlook killed the principles the company was founded on.
Maybe you should read Losing the HP Way [salon.com].
Look how Dell's growing by leaps and bounds - and they're not exactly a bastion of product innovation. What is HP supposed to do?
See? That's exactly what I meant. HP was not a company that followed what others created -- they were trendsetters of their day, who created new technologies that _others_ followed.
There is a _LOT_ that HP could have done, given their expertise in hardware. IBM is still a bastion of innovation -- and it's not like they are losing out to Dell. HP could equally have done just as well, instead they chose not to compete and rather follow.
No, I think they'd smile and say "Holy shit, man, times are tough now - we were lucky that we had the luxury of doing things the way we did! I don't know if we could pull that off today".
Who're you kidding? Good companies can always do cool things and still do well, if they are enterprising enough. HP had the financial muscle to make a change, companies 1/10th the size of HP are making new inroads with little to no financial muscle. Every other company had to go through the crucible, I do not see Microsoft cutting down MSR or IBM downsizing TJ Watson or Xerox closing PARC.
HP Labs has laid off _so_ many people (around 6k, if I remember) after the Compaq merger -- and most of these people once were part of the core technology and R&D groups.
I'm sorry, I don't buy your argument.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Hard Work (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux got a leg up on Microsoft when HP released its Linux-based product. Then, no one cared enough to do the hard work needed to compete with MS. Don't complain about a bad decision at HP or another case of MS taking over a new market. Linux didn't lose the game. Linux never came out for the second inning.
I bought the HP de100c Digital Entertainment Cntr (Score:1, Insightful)
Wheres the distinction if they're all Microsoft? (Score:2, Insightful)
Where's the innovation?
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:3, Insightful)
How about being told that no matter what your people do, at least 10% MUST be classed as substandard performers.
Saw this same dumbass policy at Motorola (aka Freescale) a couple years back. I've since left, and all the good technically skilled people I know have left also. Best not to be the last one on that sinking ship...
Ironic thing is that it has the opposite of intended effect - most of the hardworking people who spend their time working instead of camped in meetings or sucking up to the VPs end up getting shafted as the lowest 10%. End result after years of that is a huge heirarchy of incompetent managers, and no one left to do the work. My recently freed coworker who left Freescale to join us mentioned that our old group which used to have 30 odd skilled designers now only has 1 left - they've since filled the open ranks with new grads. Laugh, yeah good luck with that...
Kind of a waste of time... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Wheres the distinction if they're all Microsoft (Score:3, Insightful)
Marketing and price.
What distinguishes HP from eMachines on the shelves of Best Buy? Since they are both generally crap, they make up for it with neat-looking plastic on the front, putting RCA jacks in the floppy bay of some models, and putting meaningless words like "accelerated", "professional", "educational", and "multimedia" here and there. Throw in a free crap inkjet printer somewhere, and the marks march right on out of the store with a new found credit card balance. Brownie points to the salesman that gets them to buy a network hub, even though they have only one computer.
Good troll (Score:3, Insightful)
As opposed to who? Techies? Techies that would demand open source everything, and drive the company into the ground faster than you can say "profit!" To lump all MBA's together is short sighted. In case you just fell off the turnip truck, almost every large business on the planet is run by MBA's. So before you go knocking an entire educational track, you should look into who runs the companies that made all of the computer stuff you posted with, or the people running the companies that you get your bandwidth from, or the people that run the companies that made the clothes you're wearing right now, etc.
Re:Not quite a backwards step (Score:3, Insightful)
Your line of thinking is, I believe, quite correct. To expand this to show that this really is correct in business, we can look at the steel industry in America. They have not significantly upgraded the technology used in most of their facilities in around one hundred years. Now they are being destroyed by foreign steel companies who have been trying to capture the market by using as much modern inovation as they can. Now they can produce steel much more cheaply than in America (and I am referring to European and Japanese production, so labour cost is not the major contributor to this).
Of course they can and have cried to Congress about this and had improper import duties placed on foreign steel instead of spending the money they should have been spending to upgrade their facilities into competitiveness. I would hate to see something like that happening with software, etc. but I suppose business practice patents and the DRMA have already started to ball rolling towards stagnation. Ah well.
The moral to the story is that you need to be the innovator or you slip into second class status. Kind of like the generals who won the last war, fight that war. The ones who lost fight the next war, and win because they are the ones who innovate (unless the other side figures out their mistakes fast enough).