Alpha 400 another "almost HPC" netbook

Alpha 400 on sale at Geeks.com

This one actually looks pretty interesting. The price is right for my limited budget and it's good enough for some on-the-go word processing, email, and web browsing.

WOW, that looks like a nice little machine! Great price too...

they had them before and the price fell down to $149 after awile.

@ the above price, if your looking for diffrent, might be worth a fiddle.

I have the same thing but has 3k razorbook 400 branding instead, same exact machine though.

No! Just bid a secondhand Sharp HC7000 for $110
It's the same screen resolution but much more powerful MIPS CPU
Not to mention the rest

HC7000(or Intermec 6651) only wins on "weight" and touch screen!

Now they have put them down to $149

but even at that price thcrw739 would you really recommend them? without at least reservations?

I've done extensive reading, googling etc over the past few weeks on these things. Now that the price @ 149 seems reasonable (considering that i've paid more for used hpc's) i'm going to get one. There are numerous hacks and extra apps already built on various forums/websites to make these more usable for the average joe already. However, i noticed OE supports MIPS also, and since i have it installed from building jlime mongo/henchman and my prebuilt userlands for the 7xx's i just have to create a new config to build for mips instead of arm.

That being said, i think i'm going to try my hand at making a better userland for these things and of course more software packages also.

Cheers.

RTFM,

Well remember i have one, so i'd be more than willing to help out in anyway i can

@ mr-mac, yeah $99 would probably be the best price point, but $149.00 isnt all that bad.

no touch screen? not worth more than 99.

What does not having a touchscreen have to do with price? It isnt a tablet or hpc or pocketpc. Its a laptop/notebook, of which 98% of those dont have touchscreen. Besides this has a built in touchpad which most hpcs lack. I personally hate touchscreens and much prefer touchpad/mouse if i have the option. Then also tell me where else you can get a NEW hpc/netbook/notebook or laptop for $149.00.

Going on my own personal buys over the years i've spent much more on less capable and lower spec hpcs/laptops. $200 for a Jornada 728, $250 for a MP 900c to name a few and those were USED. Then think how much those were when new. Close to $1000.

Sure $99 would be great, but be realistic. It probably wont happen and i wouldnt be surprised to see the price go back up soon as geeks.com has THE lowest price by easily $70. If you scour the internet you'll see the average price for these (and its clones) are $218-279.

Cheers.

Oh and thcrw739 thatd be sweet. First i'm just going to start off by extracting the recovery img and adding a few more libs/apps and replacing that fugly matchbox with something more useful like icewm. Basically be a custom recovery img. Then time permitting will eventually start working on a new userland.

Cheers.

"Besides this has a built in touchpad which most hpcs lack. I personally hate touchscreens and much prefer touchpad/mouse if i have the option."

I hear ya on that not fond of touch screens either., Jupiter models were my favorite hpc's, Aero 8000, Jornada 820..etc

On your other point,
That sounds great, yeah i hate that matchbox looks like a bad comic drawing the way the set up the default, would love a good window manager preset with icons, tried flux box, but couldnt get icons/etc to work, but my linux skills are still quite lacking at this point.

According to a post on an EEEpc Blog the manufacturer is upgrading the processor to an XScale CPU. I'm wondering if the MIPS version is being sold at a closeout price.

http://eeepc.net/bestlinks-alpha-400-sells-for-250-cheapest-umpc/

Darn, they went back up to $169.
RTFM, did you get yours yet?

Edited by Yoldering 2009-01-14 4:59 PM

gee, now CA pays $8 electronic disposal fee up front for new electronics? Sign of things to come, I assume.