I did not notice any mention of battery life.  I've had a couple of laptops and the battery was the weak link.  Seem to recall the battery dieing within a year or a year and a half.  Have the batteries gotten any better? ------------------------ Keith Smith --- On Tue, 6/8/10, Stephen wrote: From: Stephen Subject: Re: Replacement computer options/ideas? To: "Main PLUG discussion list" Date: Tuesday, June 8, 2010, 9:11 AM The acer revo is about 300-350 at new egg with a Dual core Atom and 2gb of ram, it runs Ubuntu like a champ and has built in wireless low heat and low power even comes with the Nvidia ION chipset/gpu. and comes with a mount to attach it to the back of your monitor to the VESA mounting holes (comes with a cheap little wireless keyboard/mouse with dongle) but they are decent little machines and very zippy (even running Win7 or ubuntu) On Tue, Jun 8, 2010 at 8:46 AM,  wrote: > > Thanks again to everyone who responded to this question. > > In particular, thanks to Joseph Sinclair for such an excellent explanation > of the new options that are now available for low-power, low-heat. Sounds > like *exactly* what I was hoping to find. > > Outstanding information.  Many thanks! > > Joe > > >> I've been replacing desktop computers for a lot of people with Atom-based >> nettops running Linux lately. >> The dual-core Atom chips (original 330, or the new D510) are absolutely >> wonderful for general day-to-day tasks. >> They're VERY low power as well, so the system generates less heat overall >> and runs more quietly (fewer fans running slower, or no fans at all). >> >> I recently installed a (slightly older/cheaper) Zotac MAG Atom 330 ION >> unit with a 160GB magnetic drive ($299 on newegg) for my uncle who lives >> in a crowded and minimally cooled 1-bd apartment; It's working great >> fanless hooked to his 23" 1080P HDTV via HDMI (he wanted to be able to use >> the monitor as a TV most of the time, since he doesn't use the computer >> much). >> >> The newer Zotac ZBox with the D510 chip[1] includes ION2 video for 1080p >> video support, and a barebones kit is under $250 on newegg[3].  There's >> also an AMD Neo[2] with Radeon 3200 if you prefer AMD, but I'm not sure >> where to buy it. >> Add a 32GB SSD from OCZ[4] ($85) and a single 4GB[5] ($175) or 2GB[6] >> ($55) DDR2-800 SODIMM, and you're up and running cool-and-quiet for as >> little as $390 ($515 with 4G RAM, more if you choose a bigger SSD) (Note, >> the machine only has 1 RAM slot, so only buy a SINGLE stick, not a paired >> set). >> The whole system is designed fanless, and works great as long as the room >> temp stays below 85(F) when it's running (higher is OK when it's off).  If >> you're using it in an environment hotter than that, you'll need to get a >> more industrial-class system. >> Startup is about 90 seconds for Kubuntu 10.04, and around 45 seconds for >> Xubuntu 10.04; lighter O/S options may be much faster. >> >> You'll want a separate external drive or NAS for data storage, the box has >> lots of USB ports and an e-SATA port for that purpose. >> A 2TB external USB drive is under $150 most places. > > > --------------------------------------------------- > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > -- A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button. Stephen --------------------------------------------------- PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss