Open Hardware

[michael at michaelshiloh.com]

On Wed, 15 Aug 2007, Derek Potts wrote:

> Something occurred to me the other day...
>
> I was thinking about how great it will be to have this phone that has an almost
> completely open hardware arch. Then it struck me, I'll have a phone that is
> more open than any laptop I've ever owned!
>
> I'm going to get a new laptop soon, and I would love to find one that is
> designed with the same dream in mind that drove the design of the Neo. Does
> such a thing exist? What kind of laptops do the open-hardware-purists on this
> list own?
>
> _______________________________________________
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> community at lists.openmoko.org
> http://lists.openmoko.org/mailman/listinfo/community
>

I'm very happy with my Lenovo T60. I would have been happier with a T61, for
the same price, but they didn't have any in stock.

Important lesson learned: There are so many variations, that hardly any are
stocked. When you make your selections of CPU, video device, ram, etc., one is
built for you. Thus the lead time is almost always a couple of weeks.

If you are in a rush, like I was, you are forced to select from the very few
off-the-shelf options. Lesson: Don't wait until the last minute.

The Thinkpad series is rock-solid. I've owned some 5 different models and have
been happy with every one of them.

Thinkpads are well supported in the Linux community via websites (e.g.
thinkwiki) and mailing lists (e.g. ltp - linux thinkpads).

Michael