Android + Netbook = Droidbook

The Netbook sector has matured since the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC). There has been a lot improvements with speed, graphics, screen size, battery life and features. Growing pains came with the growth spurts in the sector. The biggest pain is the choice of operating system (OS), Windows or Linux.

The first wave of Netbooks were running Linux, which I saw a good thing. This would lower the entry price and overall expense of ownership. Linux also is a great choice for children to learn the OS at an early age and give them a head start towards being competitive when they enter the workforce.

Then there were the reactions to the Linux Netbooks in the form of product reviews on shopping sites that told a different story. Some buyers felt jipped because the computer they purchased did not have Windows installed. Reading a few dozen of the reviews it is easy to tell there are two types of people in the world. The really cool people who are willing to adapt for a lower price and those who wanted to stay with Window at any price. The divide lead to one large retailer making to move not to sell anymore computers running on Linux.

I received a belated birthday present which was unexpected and was a perfect fit for me, an Acer Aspire One. But there it wasn’t like any of the Aspire Ones that I have reviewed or used to date this one has Android installed alongside Windows XP from the factory. Nice to know Acer will still cater to the  Linux community. I’m a Red Hat/Fedora person, but Android rocks. I’ll be writing about it’s features in the near feature.

For Netbook and other computer owners feeling left out of the Android movement there is one distribution of Android that has been working to make installation and using the OS as painless as possible. Android-x86 Project has HowTos, nightly builds and documentation to make the running the same smartphone OS possible on your Netbook. The code tree was broken on November 15^th by the push of Android 2.0 (Eclair) to the public release, but it should be fixed soon.