Anybody using really tiny computers?

[struggle4progress]

alfredo posted this in Open Source forum --

$25 dollar computer that plugs into your TV
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=240x2271

-- but it's not available yet

There seem to be a variety of very small devices around, such as:

Globalscale’s DreamPlug ($150)
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/02/tiny-150-pc-fits-in-a-power-plug/

Compulab's Trim Slice ($199)
http://www.engadget.com/2011/05/02/compulabs-trim-slice-on-sale-for-power-users-only/

Xi3 ($850)
http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/11/xi3-modular-computer-is-one-cool-looking-desktop-in-a-cube/

There's other similar stuff out there. None of these look particularly appealing to me, but maybe somebody here has experience to share ...

[IDemo]

1. Nothing quite that tiny

I'm using a quantity of Mini-ITX boards in card racks at work to test electronics products, though.

[struggle4progress]

2. I did a cheap mini-ITX barebones kit build earlier this year: price under $200.

That's one reason I'm not yet terribly excited myself about these smaller devices

[hobbit709]

3. I built one of these

with a 2GHz X4 AMD In one of these

and one of these

for my portable 8 track recording studio. I use a 12-in touch screen LCD with it

[struggle4progress]

4. I bet the amdX4 + jetway in the apex box came out at a reasonable price

That's the sort of build that would keep me from dumping money into the tiny boxes

[hobbit709]

8. I've got about $450 total in the box

But $200 of that is the M-Audio Delta 1010LT card

[blogslut]

5. I've been messing with this

It's a Zipit it's sold as a wireless chat device for teens. The cool part is it's got a Linux kernel and is totally hackable. I messed it up though trying to install someone's homebrew OS. I got it to boot to a penguin with a beak mask screen but that's as far as it goes. Those only way I can restore it now is to crack it open and flash it using wires and solder and clamps and stuff that I'm too lazy to do right now.

Just the same, this dude's managed to run all kinds of cool stuff from his Zipit:

http://hunterdavis.com/archives/category/zipit-hacking

There was this one gal who was using the older model as a server for her website but I think she took it down.

Not a bad toy for $50.00

[struggle4progress]

6. Cool: that's my kind of price for a 'puter!

Did you succeed in getting a small distro to work on it?

I wonder how hard it would be to trim down some distro, like archbang or crunchbang, using openbox as the desktop manager, to run on that: there's not a lot of space to work, with 8gb storage and 32mb ram

[blogslut]

7. No

All it will do is boot up to an image screen . I probably did it wrong. I used one of the homebrew OS's that have already been made for it.

Aside from that one site I linked above, here's a site that lists some OS's for it:

http://www.notanon.com/zipit/different-linux-distributions-for-the-zipit-z2/2010/05/30/

I think what I did was mess up during the install of the kernel.

[struggle4progress]

9. You've nearly talked me into trying something like this:

Plugbox Linux on the Zipit Z2
http://wejp.k.vu/zipit-z2/plugbox_linux_on_the_zipit_z2

[struggle4progress]

13. Maybe it just boots incredibly slowly or maybe there's a command line option you can use?

It's not quite the same thing, but I've just experimentally tried slitaz in virtualbox with very little memory on an 8gb virtual harddrive and a 320x200x15 virtual screen. This isn't really a fair test, because virtualbox will use one of my 2.8ghz cores; if I want to emulate the slow little arm cpu, I'd need a different platform (maybe qemu). I picked slitaz because the livecd is quite small -- say 30mb. I can get the slitaz livecd to boot in virtualbox for a a 320x200x15 virtual screen with 136mb ram but it freezes up at 128mb ram, and I can only get a command line boot, which runs out of memory and kills processes if I try "startx"

The poor little zipit has only 32gb ram. That's really not much. Even with 128mb of ram in virtualbox, it takes a few minutes for a livecd of Damn Small Linux to produce a desktop, and the desktop isn't very responsive at all; the situation is even worse for Damn Small Linux with only 32mb ram: it'll boot to a desktop, but it's not snappy. People doing quick dirty unoptimized hacks of existing distros into the zipit may be using additional tricks to get the sucker to boot. If you have any option to use the command line before you get to the image screen, or if a command line eventually pops up after the image screen, the experienced zipit hackers might be able to give you some pointers about configuring your boot successfully.

[DainBramaged]

10. Asus E-Box

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883220067

[struggle4progress]

11. How do you like it?

[DainBramaged]

12. We've distributed them in the sales area where Internet access is needed and basic word processing

using Word and Excel, along with corporate software. We've streamed NetFlix movies on them without a problem, and honestly, they are perfect for 90% of the people out there.