New Sharp 3D Notebook Available with Linux

Anonymous Writer writes "Earlier this month, Sharp released the Actius AL3DU, the second generation laptop in its line of autostereo display products. EmperorLinux, Inc. is distributing it with Linux pre-installed, dubbing it the Molecule."

Problem is...

[knownsense]

I dont ever see the discounts that are supposed to accrue from not paying MS Tax... Another point, what about the peripherals?

Good choice of distros

[szlevente]

EmperorLinux (based on Fedora 3), Slackware, Red Hat Professional, Mandrake, Suse, Debian....they offer quite a good choice. Especially as most of these come for $0. Perhaps cusotmers will be more attracted to this notebook, when they see they don't have to pay extra $$$ for an operating system.

Finally...

[MoralHazard]

Just when I thought I'd never be able to buy a $4,000+ laptop again, they come out with this baby! Way to drive the high-end market, Sharp!

Seriously, though--I just finally bought an LCD desktop monitor last October, when a 19" got below $400 with shipping (thank you, NewEgg!). I bought an MP3 player for $50 in December that accepts CF card media, which is about $60/GB (thanks AGAIN, NewEgg!). Now THAT's some cool shit.

time getting excited about it until they're selling enough volume to bring the price down to commodity levels.

Re:Drop Windows Add $500???!?!

[aichpvee]

Should be noted that it isn't that the OS is unlicensed, but rather that it theoretically (and most likely practically) doesn't cost anything for them to license it.

But, yeah, Linux hasn't taken over the desktop market because all the distros with OEM deals make crap.

Re:Win-modems

[bmw]

They do actually say in the product details that the modem is only partially supported. This seems like an awfully strange choice of hardware given the circumstances. I know modems are nearly uesless these days with all the wifi networks everywhere but not only did they not include a wireless nic but I have to wonder what kind of company would sell a $4000 laptop with hardware that isn't fully supported by the pre-installed operating system. Pretty stupid if you ask me.