Just Ask Phil

I love Linux. My main desktop is running Ubuntu. As for the times that I might need to run certain Windows appications, I have a licensed copy of Windows XP installed on a virtual machine, but that is a story for another day.

I sell computers and quite often I have people visiting me asking for the cheapest laptop we have in stock. While doing a search on the directory, I came across the Asus Eee. We don’t carry it in the store, but I directed a customer to our web site.

I later did some research and found this handy little laptop with 512MB of Ram was running Linux! I was thinking to myself, “What a great idea!”

Windows Vista would never run on a laptop with 512 MB or ram, but with Linux it should run quite nicely.

The Eee comes with many standard Linux applications like OpenOffice.org (comparable to Microsoft Office) as well as the Mozilla Firefox web browser.

Now, for the user that must run certain Windows applications, they maybe able to do so by running the program alongside, or through, a program called Wine. It will let you run many Windows applications under Linux, but my experience has been that most of the ones I’ve needed didn’t work.

For those that need Windows, this is not the machine for you; at least not until the Windows XP model is released.

This computer retails from between $300 - $500, depending on the specs and the retailer. The computer buyer who needs a very basic computer, this is a perfect buy.