Vodacom Linkbook review

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Linkbook review

The Linkbook aims to be the Linux-based netbook PC that introduces people to personal computing and the Internet. Will it succeed?
 
Let's see.... that's R199PM x 24 = R4776, for 7.2GB of data spanned over two years and a crippled little machine that won't be able to browse quite a few pages on the internet or do much of anything else...
Why not just use a cheap netbook with a decent OS on so that the person using it can also learn some real-world PC skills using a proper OS?
 
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Seems like a piece of crap at a price people that don't know more will buy...
 
RaptorSA said:
Let's see.... that's R199PM x 24 = R4776, for 7.2GB of data spanned of two years and a crippled little machine that won't be able to browse quite a few pages on the internet or do much of anything else...
Click to expand...

Don't worry through brilliant foresight they've disabled YouTube, to, uhm, "protect new users".
 
Methinks someone is just trying to make a quick and easy buck from those "poor, needy souls"...
 
Oiram said:
Don't worry through brilliant foresight they've disabled YouTube, to, uhm, "protect new users".
Click to expand...


haha... luckily you won't be able to watch This link to see how much you've been screwed
 
Why do you neeeeeeed flash? Millions of iphone users go on without it quite easily.
Isn't smokescreen also due to go live?

I think this is a good product that services the needs of a specific segment of the population..
Not every one needs uncapped or 10's of GB's a month. I made due with 500mb a month for a quite a few years.. Sure lots of other people also do.

For email and web browsing it's perfect!
 
No-one said you NEED flash. I've also used my iPhone to surf the net for years now and never felt the need for flash. But you have to realize this thing is primarily supposed to be used for surfing the net... I don't think crippling the one feature it's supposed to do well is a good idea.

Imagine this:
Little Jimmy sits in his low income home while dad is out all night working for the security company he's been employed at for several years. Little Jimmy boots up the Linkbook dad bought so they can have basic internet access, he needs to do his homework. As the notebook's 400Mhz processor slaves away to open up his Google search, he sees the perfect match to what he was looking for. He clicks on the link and for a few moments he waits in silence as the Linkbook painfully churns away, slurping up precious data to open a page from HowStuffWorks.com. As the page springs into action he notices large white blocks on the page where the flash animations are supposed to be. Every second paragraph on the screen refers to a white block of emptiness....

Little Jimmy takes the notebook by the screen and beats his grandmother to death, then he takes the blood covered notebook, still warm and slippery from Grandma's blood and shoves it up Vodacom's ass... THE END.
 
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Ya but it's physically not able to do flash well. Because it's so CPU intensive...

If you want to save money you not going to get the best. But I'm sure it is adequate at surfing the net.
When you look at paying what R4776 and get an InternetBook (think I just invented a new word :D) + a mobile data connection. It's very reasonable!
 
Well until someone else can launch a cheaper laptop + internet connection this is a pretty good deal. The laptop is also a first release so they will most likely improve it in future.
 
nakedpeanut said:
If you want to save money you not going to get the best. But I'm sure it is adequate at surfing the net.
When you look at paying what R4776 and get an InternetBook (think I just invented a new word :D) + a mobile data connection. It's very reasonable!
Click to expand...

lol, Where do you think 'Netbook' comes from?

If it costs R40 a month for this thing, then it costs R160 for 300MB!!!!
 
Looking on the data bundles it's R139 for 300mb so it's actually R60! Some one never did their maths right :wtf: So it's R1440 for the thing! Now it seems a little more expensive!
For that price you can get a phone with a faster processor! But smaller screen..

I still prefer my InterNetBook... Sounds cooler :p
 
i would call this the **** YEA! As in... image junkies with their quad core super aluminum mother spinning liquid wtf ever supertops, sending emails, could never match the blizzard of bull**** you could unleash with two of these puppies and a clean link.
 
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I would love one of these things to SSH into our servers, its the perfect LINUX sysadmin support netbook. Just toss the X and off you go, install MUTT and LYNX with a touch of CURL and you have a wicked system.

Old School rules!!!
 
nakedpeanut said:
Why do you neeeeeeed flash? Millions of iphone users go on without it quite easily.
Isn't smokescreen also due to go live?
Click to expand...

An iPhone isn't generally a primary browsing device, though. A smartphone can also do a lot more than browse the Internet... It's the swiss army knife of technology.

Also: Smokescreen requires at least Firefox 3.6 to work and the Linkbook comes with Firefox 3.5 (which is actually impressive considering it uses Ubuntu Hardy as the OS which came with Firefox 3.0 if memory serves). I'm also pretty sure that if the hardware specs aren't high enough to run videos through Flash it won't be able to run the videos through Smokescreen.

nakedpeanut said:
I think this is a good product that services the needs of a specific segment of the population..
Not every one needs uncapped or 10's of GB's a month. I made due with 500mb a month for a quite a few years.. Sure lots of other people also do.

For email and web browsing it's perfect!
Click to expand...

I wouldn't go so far as calling it perfect but it does a pretty decent job. It has some kinks I hope the guys will sort out in future devices.

RaptorSA said:
No-one said you NEED flash. I've also used my iPhone to surf the net for years now and never felt the need for flash. But you have to realize this thing is primarily supposed to be used for surfing the net... I don't think crippling the one feature it's supposed to do well is a good idea.
Click to expand...

Saying the crippling it isn't entirely fair. As nakedpeanut said the issue is the CPU. Not only is it too slow to play videos through the Flash Player, Adobe doesn't support Linux on PowerPC. Hell their amd64 player for Linux is still in beta!

I enjoyed your story, though. If I could draw/animate worth a damn I would've made it into an awesome short :-)

TheGuy said:
Well until someone else can launch a cheaper laptop + internet connection this is a pretty good deal. The laptop is also a first release so they will most likely improve it in future.
Click to expand...

This is what I'm hoping for as well.

nakedpeanut said:
Looking on the data bundles it's R139 for 300mb so it's actually R60! Some one never did their maths right :wtf: So it's R1440 for the thing! Now it seems a little more expensive!
For that price you can get a phone with a faster processor! But smaller screen..
Click to expand...

*Looks dubious* A phone with a 400MHz+ processor for less than R1.5k? I dunno man...

As for the pricing... Vodacom may have decreased their bundle pricing after we got the Linkbook info and someone just didn't update us with the bundle's new pricing. If we get updated info I'll definitely amend the review and post it in the forum.
 
lol sorry I should have done an <insert sarcasm> with the processor bit :D but you got the point that is pretty weak. I'll have a look, maybe you do get a phone for that prise .. Just maybe...

And the bundle pricing I got from dialling *111# on my phone so it might not be contract rates? I don't know how their pricing works now...

edit1: Found a htc http://www.cacell.co.za/HTC-S740-671 for R1999 with 528MHz http://www.htc.com/www/product/s740/specification.html
Pretty close.. Will similar features :)
 
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RaptorSA said:
Methinks someone is just trying to make a quick and easy buck from those "poor, needy souls"...
Click to expand...
Yep, welcome to capitalism.

Anyone know what these cost to buy, and if they can be bought? Might be nice to hack if it's <R1000 :)
 
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