[ale] $99 netbook

[Brian Pitts]

On 12/22/2009 07:31 PM, Steve Tynor wrote:
> Has anyone seen one of these locally (Frys? Microcenter? Target?).  I'm
> tempted, but given some of the reviews I've seen about build quality,
> I'd like to touch one before I buy...

Giving what I've read [0] about how they're built, buying one in person
is the only way to know what you're getting.

"we buy access inventory, overcapacity, out-of-fashion shells, shells
with minor cosmetic flaws, discounted limited batches, and other high
quality though discounted components and systems, package them up and
sell them under the Cherrypal Africa brand. Bear with me. What this
means is that 5 randomly selected people ordering a Cherrypal Africa on
any given day theoretically might get 5 different systems, with
different configurations."

And by different they mean one could be 7", another could be 10", one
might have an x86 cpu, another might have an arm cpu. Those are big
differences.

It's certainly a cool concept though. Don't promise specific hardware,
just promise a minimum (7", 400 mhz cpu, 256 MB RAM, 2GB storage) that
can perform a certain task (web browsing) and buy whatever components
are cheapest that at least meets those specs.

[0]
http://cherrypal.com/GreenOpenFair/2009/12/19/the-open-secret-behind-the-cherrypal-africa-or-a-brand-is-a-promise-or-understatement-by-design/

-- 
All the best,
Brian Pitts