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Posts published in “Hardware”

Will Google Keep Motorola?

By Christine Hall on September 7, 2011 |

Business, Distros, Hardware, Mobile and News

There’s been very little in the way of real news about Google’s purchase of Motorola Mobility since the deal was announced on August 15th. We know this acquisition was made mainly because Google desperately needs to beef up its mobile patent portfolio, and that Motorola has several boatloads of such patents. This means if this sale can pass antitrust muster with the DOJ, Google will be in a much better position to wheel and deal with the likes of Apple, maybe even Oracle, when it comes to Android and alleged patent infringements.

Everybody gets that – no argument. However, many tech writers have been wondering out loud how Android vendors like HTC and Samsung feel about Google competing with them in the consumer marketplace. Aren’t they worried that Google will give preference to Motorola at the expense of the other handset makers?

Continue readingWill Google Keep Motorola?

Finnix Finishes First, MS Wants to Own Cloud, Google Beefs Portfolio & More…

By Christine Hall on July 29, 2011 |

Business, Distros, Hardware, Mobile, News and Patents

Friday FOSS Week in Review

Cool beans, it’s Friday! Time to get out of the office and enjoy! Trouble is, here at FOSS Force the temps and humidity are so high there won’t be anything to do but stay inside and hug the air conditioning. Anyway, this week’s Friday review is mostly good news for a change, and that’s good news, no?

And the Winner Is …Finnix!

On Monday, Linus Torvalds announced the official release of the new 3.0 Linux kernel and on Tuesday Softpedia announced the first distro to use the new kernel as the default install:

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingFinnix Finishes First, MS Wants to Own Cloud, Google Beefs Portfolio & More…

Linux Coming to…Commodore???

By Christine Hall on April 11, 2011 |

Business, Hardware and News

There’s a new OEM getting ready to make a consumer desktop offering with Linux preloaded as the default OS. Get ready for the new and improved Commodore 64 running Linux. Wouldn’t it be a gas if Linux on the desktop finally took off due to it’s being the default operating system on a Commodore?

For those of you too young to have any experience with Commodore, let me offer this little description from our friends over at Wikipedia:

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingLinux Coming to…Commodore???

Facebook’s Open Source Green Machines

By Christine Hall on April 11, 2011 |

Business, Hardware, Internet, Media and Social Networks

Wow! Can it be? Has Zuckerberg and Facebook actually done something ethical, on their own, without any pressure from outside forces? For the moment the answer would seem to be affirmative, but I’m not quite willing to trust this one yet. Experience teaches me that Zuckerberg’s moral compass sometimes turns north into south.

What I’m talking about is the new 150,000 square foot server farm that Facebook has opened in Prineville, Oregon. It seems that in building this facility, Facebook’s developers have tweeked, tweeked, and tweeked again to come up with a data center that’s extremely green, as in environment not as in golf course.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingFacebook’s Open Source Green Machines

Will Android Tablet Sales Soar?

By Christine Hall on April 4, 2011 |

Business, Hardware and Mobile

When Android smartphones hit the shelves there were lots of favorable conditions to help them gain market share. For starters, there was demand. The whole “Crackberry” craze of the early 2000s had whetted the market, a demand that was only amplified when Apple then rewrote the smartphone book with the iPhone. The iPhone, however, was only available on AT&T’s network, which left the door wide open for exploitation by handset makers using Google’s Linux based mobile OS.

With people lining up around the block to purchase iPhones and sign up for lucrative two year data deals with AT&T, other carriers were hungry for a piece of the action. So they grabbed-up every Android implementation they could find and proudly offered them to their subscribers. They pushed the Android brand with advertising, convincing potential customers that Android phones weren’t merely “me too” devices, but were at least as good as Apple’s product, with the advantage of being less expensive.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingWill Android Tablet Sales Soar?

Friday FOSS Week in Review – Android Coming to PC

By Christine Hall on July 2, 2010 |

Hardware and News

It’s been rather hectic here at FOSS Force this week. You might have read that we had to replace our old worn computer with a new-to-us (that means “used”) box, and we’ve been spending the week configuring our POS app, plus downloading and installing all of the stuff we need to operate our daily business.

This means, however, that the FOSS Force army is currently working in (ugh) Windows. We’ve got a key dreaded legacy app we use that’s Wintel, and we’re not partitioning the drive and installing Linux to run it in WINE until we’ve thoroughly tested the new/used box and determined it fully ready to go. Don’t fear, however, everything else here is open source. I’m writing in OpenOffice, doing graphics work in Gimp, emailing in Thunderbird and browsing in Firefox. By this time next week, we’ll hopefully be running Linux.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingFriday FOSS Week in Review – Android Coming to PC

Why Buy a “White Box” Instead of a Dell?

By Christine Hall on June 29, 2010 |

Business and Hardware

On Friday, when I went to start up the main computer at our office I found it had died. I turned on the surge protector and hit the start button, only to hear none of the familiar sounds of a computer firing-up. No whine or clicking from the hard drive, no beeps from the self-diagnosis, not a noise except for an almost silent whir from a cooling fan.

This wasn’t entirely unexpected. The box was probably ten years old, and a few years ago we’d replaced a failed motherboard on it with a board that’d been salvaged from a worn out HP. The computer had served us well, but it was time for it to go.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingWhy Buy a “White Box” Instead of a Dell?
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