FOSS netbook

I'm looking for a netbook with the following characteristics:
- dirt-cheap (under the 200 USD mark)
- screen size between 7 and 11 inch
- preferably ARM-based CPU (but x86 is fine too)
- computational power at least half of an Intel Atom N450
- at least 128MiB of RAM
- at least 2GiB of nonvolatile storage OR SD-card reader
- over 6 hours battery life
- no binary blobs required for operation (I don't care if 3d and/or video acceleration require binary blobs, I don't use those anyway)
- open source firmware or "BIOS"

macbook pro

What hardware are you using?

I am using a Lemote Yeelong, a netbook with a Loongson chip and a 9-inch display. This is my only computer, and I use it all the time. I chose it because I can run it with 100% free software even at the BIOS level.

And what software?

To initialize the machine and boot, it uses PMON. Above that, it uses gNewSense, one of the totally free GNU/Linux distros.

I spend most of my time using Emacs. I run it on a text console, so that I don’t have to worry about accidentally touching the mouse-pad and moving the pointer, which would be a nuisance. I read and send mail with Emacs (mail is what I do most of the time).

I switch to the X console when I need to do something graphical, such as look at an image or a PDF file.

Most of the time I do not have an Internet connection. Once or twice or maybe three times a day I connect and transfer mail in and out. Before sending mail, I always review and revise the outgoing messages. That gives me a chance to catch mistakes and faux pas.

>>3
- dirt-cheap (under the 200 USD mark)¹
- screen size between 7 and 11 inch
- preferably ARM-based CPU (but x86 is fine too)
- computational power at least half of an Intel Atom N450
- at least 128MiB of RAM
- at least 2GiB of nonvolatile storage OR SD-card reader
- over 6 hours battery life²
- no binary blobs required for operation (I don't care if 3d and/or video acceleration require binary blobs, I don't use those anyway)
- open source firmware or "BIOS"

¹ Despite being designed and made in China and having very low-spec hardware, somehow it manages to be very expensive (over 300$).
² Higher-capacity battery upgrades aren't even available!  What the fuck!

Google "low_price_mini_7_laptop_cheapest"

- USD $60-90
- 7" 800x480 TFT
- x86 PC compatible
- DMP Vortex86DX @ 800MHz
- 512MB RAM
- 4GB SSD
- 3000mAh battery
- It runs Linux and the CPU docs are fully available on the DMP website.

>>3
Unfortunately Lemote Yeelong is quite expensive. I'd get one if they were cheaper.

Are you trying to be more hipster than everyone you've ever met?

>>7
Not OP, but it's not about being hipster, it's about freedom.

There aren't many notebooks that have a free BIOS or booting firmware. The Yeelong is one of the more famous ones because RMS owns one.

>>5
Whoa, that's actually not bad at all.  DMP advertises their CPU as using very little power (<1W) and the fact that it has SSD (as well as supporting an SD card, though they don't say whether it supports SDHC or SDXC) makes it very very attractive from a battery life standpoint.  Oh and it's incredibly cheap.  Wow.

Just to make sure, you are talking about this url (base64-hidden cause I'm no spammer), right? data:text/plain;base64,aHR0cDovL3d3dy5hbGliYWJhLmNvbS9wcm9kdWN0LWdzLzQ0ODM4OTEyNC9sb3dfcHJpY2VfbWluaV83X2xhcHRvcF9jaGVhcGVzdC5odG1s

If yes, have you already bought from there?  What was your experience?  If you have this specific model, how long is the battery life?  When the battery does go bad, can and where may I find a replacement?  How much was the shipping?  Should I go ahead and send them a message directly?  Does coreboot support that specific model?

Sorry for bombarding you with all these questions; I thank you very kindly, dear stranger, for you have made my day week!

>>8
I don't think you understand what that word means.
Freedom is not a synonym for 'limiting my choices due to arbitrary restrictions handed down by a messianic figure'.

>>11
freedom is choosing your own restrictions.
the opposite is imposed restrictions.

>>1
stop caring and buy an HP MINI. Normal netbook with a decent keyboard.

>>13
``Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Typing Comfort, deserve neither Liberty nor Comfort.''

tggghy

>>11
Freedom in this case means the ability to control your life and your own possessions. This cannot happen when your technology obeys somebody other than the owner of the machine. Case in point, Apple controls all iPod machines despite the fact that people supposedly own these machines.

bump so >>5 sees it

www.eweek.com/c/a/Desktops-and-Notebooks/The-Keyboard-Is-the-Standout-Feature-on-the-HP-Mini-Netbook-373278/

>>18
Don’t expect the three-cell lithium-ion battery to last much beyond 2 hours on a single charge, but using a netbook for longer than that taxes the eyes and brain.
Uh, I've been using my netbook sometimes for 12h runs.  Maybe you should go see an ophthalmologist.

The keyboard alone is worth the HP Mini’s relatively high price of about $500.
For 30$ I got a separate, very comfortable USB keyboard which I sometimes bring along with me if I need to do lots of typing.

HP
Motherboard's gonna fry, bro.  Oh and the BIOS is obviously closed-source, and coreboot incompatible like every other netbook.

I have been told
YHBT

>>19
I have a 3 years old HP MINI that came with a 9 cell battery. That article was quite old, so i doubt that now you can buy a 2 cell battery HP MINI.

Is slooooooooow. I can only watch videos in youtube at 360px resolution. 480px is slow.

But i don't use it for stuff like that. Mainly i use text editors and ssh connection to remote machines. Damn, i can even run an XP VMWARE virtual machine at acceptable speed for those strange events where i need stuff i can only do in Windows.

The only problem i had so far is the cpu fan that got dirty once. CPU temp was going so hot that the netbook turned itself off automatically after "heavy" use. After opening the netbook and cleaning it with a wind blower everything has been ok so far.

As for coreboot.. i guess is too old (or too jew) to be compatible for that. After running flashrom on it reported Intel ICH7M. It seems that coreboot supports some MB with ICH7, so maybe there is hope?

>>20
\BACK TO /g/ PLEASE\

>>21
Back to scrubbing toilets you no talent bitch.

>>4
Interesting, but does it have free/open source BIOS?

>>23
Damn, I meant >>5 not >>4

>>5
Is it supported by coreboot?

>>11
You might be surprised at the number of people who believe that's exactly what it means.

>>10
That's the one.

I didn't buy from there but I picked up something that looked very similar (down to the box art) in Shenzhen for 400RMB. Ask them if you're curious and want to buy one. I get ~6 hours from the battery with light use under XP; I think it's regular 18650 cells inside so it shouldn't be too difficult to replace when it wears out.

>>24
It has an Award BIOS (might be pirated, just like the XP it came with) so I don't know much about coreboot support but it seems there are people working on a vortex86 port for it. As I said the docs are open and the same SoC is used in a lot of embedded SBCs.

It is slow. Performance is comparable to a 300MHz Pentium II. If you want something better get an Atom. Don't even think about gaming on it --- except maybe old DOS stuff.

>>14
``Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Typing Comfort, deserve neither Liberty nor Comfort.''
Also applies to statically-typed languages.

>>29
I don't understand how that would apply.

>>10

Offtopic but, how have you done this conversion to the base64?

>>31
if your UNIX-like system has the program installed, try this in yo'ure shell:
$ echo "delicious dicks" | base64

If you want to prevent it from inserting newlines, use -w0 as a switch to base64.

"delicious dubs"

>>32
VGhhbmtzIGEgbG90Lgo=

>>28
It is slow. Performance is comparable to a 300MHz Pentium II.
Well, if I can write software that's fast, responsive and usable on that, then I can really write it for anything.

>>35
You haven't written software that runs fast on anything until it runs on a TI-86. I wrote a Pong game in TI-86 BASIC. It was slow as fuck (the ball moved 1 pixel about every 2 seconds), but when I ported it to QBasic on a fucking IBM XT, I needed to add a delay loop. That's how slow TI-86 BASIC is.

>>36
why not write it directly in Z80 asm?

>>37
BASIC is all that his little brain can comphrend.

>>37
I wanted to, but my Windows computer had no serial port and TI decided to make the USB cable's software not work with a TI-86^*. It's really hard to test a program when after typing thousands of hex digits, one bug or mistyped opcode could lock it up and erase the RAM.

*The Mac version works with TI-86, but not the Windows version so the cable itself is fully capable of connecting to the calculator. I hate it when companies do that kind of shit.

>>38
Fuck you