[Wylug-discuss] Fwd: Upgrading the netbook [Incident: 150205-000843]

[Paul Brook]

> On all the Atom netbooks I've come across it's the processor itself
> which won't address more than 2GB.

Correct, it's a limitation of that family of Atom chips.  Then again those the 
rest of the CPU and GPU in those Atoms chips is so woefully underpowered 
you're likely to hit another bottleneck pretty quickly.

I recently switched from a similar spec netbook a new Chromebook[1].
The difference is positively astounding. They both have SSDs and the new 
machine still only has 2G ram. The Atom chips really are that bad.

> If you don't mind a slightly heavier and larger format (12.1" 1024x768
> screen) then you can put 3GB in a Libreboot X60 from
> Gluglug.org.uk[1].  Or up to 8GB in a Libreboot X200 (12.1" 1280x800)
> from the same place, but they're not netbook prices like the X60.
> They're both FSF RYF (Respect Your Freedom) certified too.

While I guess being FSF certified is nice, those really are *very* old 
machines, substantially older than the AA1 that started the conversation.
The X60 isn't even a 64-bit CPU, and the X200 is still an old Core2. Apart 
from anything else the GPU performance is going to be pretty dismal. Not quite 
as bad as the Atom, but probably an order of magnitude worse than any vaguely 
current i-series core. Even if you're not gaming, a modern desktop benefits 
from having a GPU that doesn't completely suck.

IMO a "new" machine with such antique hardware is just insane.
Personally I wouldn't recommend anything new that isn't based on current 
generation i-series chips (the power/efficiency savings really are that good). 

You also seem to be paying a pretty steep premium to have someone replace the 
BIOS (market rate for those thinkpads looks like £50-100).  In fact I've 
pulled comparable machines out of skips recently.

Paul

[1] A Haswell based Celeron (acer c720).  Running full linux/gnome, not 
ChromeOS.