The Intel Atom Thread

[frozentundra123456]

I noticed those are all Windows Tablets.

Do we have any idea when the Android Bay Trail Tablets will be out?

I am on the dell mailing list, and got a flyer showcasing their products. They list two atom tablets running android. Prices are right at 149 and 179 dollars, but the advantage of bay trail seems to me to be the ability to run windows. Not sure what advantage it offers with android.

Edit: The one I am interested in is the Venue 8 Pro for 300.00. I think someone else mentioned it already in this thread. I have a desktop for gaming, and dont do any other intensive work on the PC, so I would love to have one for e-mail on the go, web surfing, etc., but with the ability perform light use of office and other x86 apps as well. Unfortunately I already have an older android tablet (acer Iconia 100) so it is hard to justify another tablet. The acer is a real POS though. It has lousy battery life, abysmal wi-fi connectivity, is buggy, and dog slow. I am sure newer android tablets are much better, but it has so turned me off that I will never purchase another android tablet.

 

[liahos1]

I am on the dell mailing list, and got a flyer showcasing their products. They list two atom tablets running android. Prices are right at 149 and 179 dollars, but the advantage of bay trail seems to me to be the ability to run windows. Not sure what advantage it offers with android.

Edit: The one I am interested in is the Venue 8 Pro for 300.00. I think someone else mentioned it already in this thread. I have a desktop for gaming, and dont do any other intensive work on the PC, so I would love to have one for e-mail on the go, web surfing, etc., but with the ability perform light use of office and other x86 apps as well. Unfortunately I already have an older android tablet (acer Iconia 100) so it is hard to justify another tablet. The acer is a real POS though. It has lousy battery life, abysmal wi-fi connectivity, is buggy, and dog slow. I am sure newer android tablets are much better, but it has so turned me off that I will never purchase another android tablet.

i feel the same way. i buy a lot of gadgets for work diligence. i have the 2012 nexus 7, ipad 4 and kindle fire hd. what i've found is i spend 99% of the time reading stuff online and watching netflix/vudu/hulu content. Sometimes though i wish I could play some windows based games and or do a little light productivity. hence my real interest in getting a windows tablet. ultimately i'd really love a low power broadwell that could replace my ivybridge ultrabook and my ipad4 in one fell swoop. AT that point , i'd probably donate my ultrabook to my mom, give my baytrail tablet to my gf (next year) and get myself a broadwell fanless 2-1. i would hit the G.U.T. of personal computing :biggrin:

 

[Nothingness]

Had problems trying to get the live USB booting (the reviewer at some site had the same problrms)

Disabled secure boot, created live USB from x64 12.04-3 and 13.10 which are supposed to work with uefi. No luck... USB light flashes, but nothing happrns(same thing with secure boot on). USB drive boots properly on desktop with bios

Will try more later tonight

Any news on that?

Read some comments on Liliputing and that really looks bad

I hope upcoming devices won't be as bad...

 

[paperwastage]

Any news on that?

Read some comments on Liliputing and that really looks bad

I hope upcoming devices won't be as bad...

haven't had time to play with it (been working late for the past few days)

will have more time on the weekends

anyways, I'm basically tried the same things in the comments (disabling Secure Boot in UEFI doesn't do anything. HINT: pressing ESCAPE when booting up should get you to the selection screen where you can boot to a particular device or UEFI)

might try installing Windows 7 from USB drive to see if it's locked down that tight.... or go old school, and dig out my external DVD drive and try booting from that instead



tried loading ubuntu x86 12.04-3 on virtualbox... able to install, had some problems with apt-get upgrade, might delete that and try again.... it's a little slow/laggy, (gave it only 1 CPU and 512mb) but responsive enough to use as a VM

 

[Shivansps]

If i remember well UEFI Boot will only boot from new partitions, i cant boot from UEFI: (USB device) on my mb either, you need to use Legacy mode for that(boot from the device name that has not UEFI on it). Or try a make a bootable GPT partition on the USB Stick.

 

[paperwastage]

If i remember well UEFI Boot will only boot from new partitions, i cant boot from UEFI: (USB device) on my mb either, you need to use Legacy mode for that(boot from the device name that has not UEFI on it). Or try a make a bootable GPT partition on the USB Stick.

can't select any Legacy mode in BIOS...

I'll try creating a bootable GPT partition on usb stick..... none of my other computers use UEFI... will try these steps https://wiki.ubuntu.com/USBStickUEFIHowto

I also bought some DVD+Rs to burn Ubuntu ISO on it

thanks for the tips

 

[Nothingness]

If i remember well UEFI Boot will only boot from new partitions, i cant boot from UEFI: (USB device) on my mb either, you need to use Legacy mode for that(boot from the device name that has not UEFI on it). Or try a make a bootable GPT partition on the USB Stick.

I can boot fine from a USB key on my MB (ASUS Z87 PRO) without doing anything peculiar. I just used a utility to put Fedora on the key and it went fine. I didn't turn on any legacy stuff in UEFI.

 

[Sweepr]

ASUS T100 climbs to 2nd spot @ Amazon's best selling notebooks/laptops: www.amazon.com/Best-Sellers-Electron...d_i=2956501011

 

[OBLAMA2009]

ASUS T100 climbs to 2nd spot @ Amazon's best selling notebooks/laptops: www.amazon.com/Best-Sellers-Electron...d_i=2956501011

dayum, dat be hella cheep, but asus...meh

 

[cbn]

I am on the dell mailing list, and got a flyer showcasing their products. They list two atom tablets running android. Prices are right at 149 and 179 dollars, but the advantage of bay trail seems to me to be the ability to run windows. Not sure what advantage it offers with android.

I'd be interested in the a Z3680 Android Tablet if it was better at web browsing than a similarly priced and spec'd ARM Tablet.

In addition, I could also run Ubuntu on the Z3680 Tablet.

 

[Nothingness]

ASUS T100 climbs to 2nd spot @ Amazon's best selling notebooks/laptops: www.amazon.com/Best-Sellers-Electron...d_i=2956501011

Does this ranking mean anything? ARM Chromebook is number 1, and why is the T100 ranked as a laptop?

 

[frozentundra123456]

Does this ranking mean anything? ARM Chromebook is number 1, and why is the T100 ranked as a laptop?

Looks like the ranking means cheap sells. I cant believe the chromebook is number one, at any price. Just so limited. I suppose if all you do is web surfing and social apps, it is OK though.

I would assume the T100 could be considered a laptop because it has an attachable keyboard standard. The lines are becoming increasingly blurred though between what is a laptop, tablet,or something in between. I think the T100 if a very attractive package for the price.

 

[frozentundra123456]

I'd be interested in the a Z3680 Android Tablet if it was better at web browsing than a similarly priced and spec'd ARM Tablet.

In addition, I could also run Ubuntu on the Z3680 Tablet.

Good point, can you install Linux on it easily, or is it locked down and you have to basically root it? If you could easily install Linux, yea, that would make it much more attractive.

I have to admit that after using it for a year, I still absolutely hate Android on anything besides a smartphone. Could be that the android tablet I got was just a lemon, but it certainly is a buggy mess and slow as molasses in winter.

 

[paperwastage]

Good point, can you install Linux on it easily, or is it locked down and you have to basically root it? If you could easily install Linux, yea, that would make it much more attractive.

I have to admit that after using it for a year, I still absolutely hate Android on anything besides a smartphone. Could be that the android tablet I got was just a lemon, but it certainly is a buggy mess and slow as molasses in winter.

you'll have to look at how the manufacturer (eg Dell and it's Venue 7/8 android line) implements it...

they could be like Microsoft and lock down the product/bootloader (can't load android/linux on Surface). you might have access to the android kernel source, but can't do anything. or Google and the Chromebook Pixel (Intel chip, but can't get Windows working on it)

Once I get ubuntu working, I'll see if I can compile android x86 and get it working on the T100

 

[blackened23]

Looks like the ranking means cheap sells. I cant believe the chromebook is number one, at any price. Just so limited. I suppose if all you do is web surfing and social apps, it is OK though.

Think about the average person buying these machines. These people aren't doing multiple instances of photoshop, so stop thinking in your terms and think in market terms. Media consumption is the only thing that most buyers do, that is why tablets and chromebooks sell so extremely well now.

Intel is making the right move by getting products into this price range. They have to - keep in mind, again, that the MASS MARKET doesn't require the additional power that core products provide. Core will be around for a long time because some people do, but most people only want media consumption and web related functions. And it's pretty obvious the chromebook does that absolutely just fine; in fact I just bought one for a relative and she loves it. Does everything she needs - she is not me, she doesn't need what a power user needs. We are the minority, they are not, stop thinking of computing in your terms and think in broad market terms. In 1999 people bought desktops to browse the web as that was the ONLY option available despite the high cost. Do they need a desktop to do web functions now? There was no chromebook or tablet option in 1999 - it was desktop or nothing if you wanted rudimentary online connectivity with whatever 56k modem people had back then. Do they need this now? Hell no. Therefore they will not buy a desktop or even a powerful laptop generally speaking. If a relative ever asked me for advice on a device for web functions, there is absolutely no way in hell I would suggest a grand desktop or 1500$ laptop - that is not needed for what folks like that do (facebook, email, web browsing, watching videos).

For the relatively fewer number of power users, there are core i5 and core i7 Windows laptops and obviously the macbooks. They aren't going away any time soon, and they cost more for what you get. Most people do not need that much power for what they use a computing device for. I'm continually amazed at people trashing the chromebook - Would I use one? Absolutely not. But having used one I know that it does pretty much everything that the average person uses a computing device for. That's why it sells so well. Cheap and does everything that the "average" non power user needs it to do.

I guess, I can't believe it when someone expresses surprise at the chromebook selling so well. Think about it what the average person needs in a computing device, and the answer is all too obvious unless your personal oldschool desktop bias skews your objectiveness.

 

[Shivansps]

I can boot fine from a USB key on my MB (ASUS Z87 PRO) without doing anything peculiar. I just used a utility to put Fedora on the key and it went fine. I didn't turn on any legacy stuff in UEFI.

Its when the device shows up as UEFI.
Having a boot device named " UEFI: *Pendrive Name* " and *Pendrive Name*, the last one is using legacy mode even if you dont know it, and it will boot from MBR on the pendrive, the other one "UEFI: xxxx " will only boot from GPT partitions, thats whats happens on my mb and i think it makes sence.

I dont think BT devices bios will have any legacy support to boot from MBRs. Only support to Windows 8 OS also suggest this.

 

[frozentundra123456]

Think about the average person buying these machines. These people aren't doing multiple instances of photoshop, so stop thinking in your terms and think in market terms. Media consumption is the only thing that most buyers do, that is why tablets and chromebooks sell so extremely well now.

Intel is making the right move by getting products into this price range. They have to - keep in mind, again, that the MASS MARKET doesn't require the additional power that core products provide. Core will be around for a long time because some people do, but most people only want media consumption and web related functions. And it's pretty obvious the chromebook does that absolutely just fine; in fact I just bought one for a relative and she loves it. Does everything she needs - she is not me, she doesn't need what a power user needs. We are the minority, they are not, stop thinking of computing in your terms and think in broad market terms. In 1999 people bought desktops to browse the web as that was the ONLY option available despite the high cost. Do they need a desktop to do web functions now? There was no chromebook or tablet option in 1999 - it was desktop or nothing if you wanted rudimentary online connectivity with whatever 56k modem people had back then. Do they need this now? Hell no. Therefore they will not buy a desktop or even a powerful laptop generally speaking. If a relative ever asked me for advice on a device for web functions, there is absolutely no way in hell I would suggest a grand desktop or 1500$ laptop - that is not needed for what folks like that do (facebook, email, web browsing, watching videos).

For the relatively fewer number of power users, there are core i5 and core i7 Windows laptops and obviously the macbooks. They aren't going away any time soon, and they cost more for what you get. Most people do not need that much power for what they use a computing device for. I'm continually amazed at people trashing the chromebook - Would I use one? Absolutely not. But having used one I know that it does pretty much everything that the average person uses a computing device for. That's why it sells so well. Cheap and does everything that the "average" non power user needs it to do.

I guess, I can't believe it when someone expresses surprise at the chromebook selling so well. Think about it what the average person needs in a computing device, and the answer is all too obvious unless your personal oldschool desktop bias skews your objectiveness.

Gee, I didnt expect a lecture. In any case, I agree the trend is toward cheap lower powered devices. Android tablets, I dont like them that much, but I accept that they are good enough for a lot of things. I just dont like the Chromebook because it is too dependent on the web.

 

[blackened23]

Yeah, my mistake on the super long "lecture" - i'm just surprised that people are surprised at the chromebook selling so well. You and I would never go for such a device but it's pretty good for what a regular joe uses a computing device for. I think that's why it's super important for intel to get into this space, because like you said - that's where the trend is heading. High end, high cost and powerful core products will be here for many, many years to come for those of us that need it, but I can see intel making a serious play for future "chromebooks" and what not as so many people use those stupid things, you know? In fact, I think the acer chromebook is already using haswell celerons. So long as intel remains competitive with the latest ARM SOCs they're in a pretty good position to get into those types of devices - I can definitely see BT or Airmont being used in future iterations of the chromebook. In fact, one thing I noticed about the Samsung chromebook is that there is definite UI lag thanks to the A15 processor used within. I don't believe that would be the case with a Haswell celeron or 3770 Bay Trail CPU since they have so much more CPU grunt than the reference A15.

 

[seitur]

Think about the average person buying these machines. These people aren't doing multiple instances of photoshop, so stop thinking in your terms and think in market terms. Media consumption is the only thing that most buyers do, that is why tablets and chromebooks sell so extremely well now.

Intel is making the right move by getting products into this price range. They have to - keep in mind, again, that the MASS MARKET doesn't require the additional power that core products provide. Core will be around for a long time because some people do, but most people only want media consumption and web related functions. And it's pretty obvious the chromebook does that absolutely just fine; in fact I just bought one for a relative and she loves it. Does everything she needs - she is not me, she doesn't need what a power user needs. We are the minority, they are not, stop thinking of computing in your terms and think in broad market terms. In 1999 people bought desktops to browse the web as that was the ONLY option available despite the high cost. Do they need a desktop to do web functions now? There was no chromebook or tablet option in 1999 - it was desktop or nothing if you wanted rudimentary online connectivity with whatever 56k modem people had back then. Do they need this now? Hell no. Therefore they will not buy a desktop or even a powerful laptop generally speaking. If a relative ever asked me for advice on a device for web functions, there is absolutely no way in hell I would suggest a grand desktop or 1500$ laptop - that is not needed for what folks like that do (facebook, email, web browsing, watching videos).

For the relatively fewer number of power users, there are core i5 and core i7 Windows laptops and obviously the macbooks. They aren't going away any time soon, and they cost more for what you get. Most people do not need that much power for what they use a computing device for. I'm continually amazed at people trashing the chromebook - Would I use one? Absolutely not. But having used one I know that it does pretty much everything that the average person uses a computing device for. That's why it sells so well. Cheap and does everything that the "average" non power user needs it to do.

I guess, I can't believe it when someone expresses surprise at the chromebook selling so well. Think about it what the average person needs in a computing device, and the answer is all too obvious unless your personal oldschool desktop bias skews your objectiveness.

Many (most?) power users don't like Chromebooks not because of hardware capabilities but because of OS and crazy web-integration. edit: of course Intel is doing necessary move in moving into low end price CPU brackets. I understand Intel moves, I do understand why cheapo tablets, chromebooks or other such devices sell so well. It is all great business. My judgement as a power user and my judgement as a person judging business moves are two very diffrent things.

 

[blackened23]

Many (most?) power users don't like Chromebooks not because of hardware capabilities but because of OS and crazy web-integration.

I know this and stated as much. I'm not praising the chromebook as a great machine because I know it has drawbacks - however, when I think of the mass market I can see why it sells so well. To be clear: I would never go for a chromebook. But considering most users ONLY want media consumption, web browsing, email, and facebook? The chromebook does all of that 100% fine, therefore most folks like the chromebook.

As I said, though, you and I would never go for a chromebook - we want more out of a computing device. I do think folks like us (power users) are in the minority, though.

 

[paperwastage]

Its when the device shows up as UEFI.
Having a boot device named " UEFI: *Pendrive Name* " and *Pendrive Name*, the last one is using legacy mode even if you dont know it, and it will boot from MBR on the pendrive, the other one "UEFI: xxxx " will only boot from GPT partitions, thats whats happens on my mb and i think it makes sence.

I dont think BT devices bios will have any legacy support to boot from MBRs. Only support to Windows 8 OS also suggest this.

Yeah, the USB flash drive shows up as UEFI: <name>

Will be home in an hour to test

EDIT: Burned ubuntu x64 12.04-3 to DVD. doesn't work

 

[Exophase]

If media consumption is all most people do then the arms race that has been going on with improving mobile CPU and GPU perf and perf/W has been a waste of time. You just need good decoder blocks for decent media playback and battery life.

 

[cbn]

Unfortunately I already have an older android tablet (acer Iconia 100) so it is hard to justify another tablet. The acer is a real POS though. It has lousy battery life, abysmal wi-fi connectivity, is buggy, and dog slow. I am sure newer android tablets are much better, but it has so turned me off that I will never purchase another android tablet.

I have to admit that after using it for a year, I still absolutely hate Android on anything besides a smartphone. Could be that the android tablet I got was just a lemon, but it certainly is a buggy mess and slow as molasses in winter.

I looked up the specs of that Acer Tablet:

http://www.amazon.com/Acer-Iconia-A1.../dp/B00548QAPC

Tegra 2
1GB
8GB Storage
HoneyComb OS

A comparison of HoneyComb vs. Ice Cream Sandwich on tablets: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IITt4-hRqI

So it looks like Google did make good improvements in the speed of the software(assuming the hardware used in the video is actually in the same between the two OSes.). Of course, Jelly Bean comes with improvements over ICS too.

=============================================================

P.S. Right now, I can buy a 1.5 Ghz dual core Cortex A9 at Walmart for either $80 (7", 1024 x 600): http://www.walmart.com/ip/Nextbook-7...emory/23711117

or $100 (8" 1024 x 768): http://www.walmart.com/ip/Nextbook-8...vices/23554123

....so I am really interested to see how the budget Z3860 Tablets will compare. (CPUwise, the Intel should be a big jump up from a 1.5 Ghz dual core Cortex A9)

 

[paperwastage]

Using Rufus 1.3.4 USB tool(GPT for UEFI + FAT + 64 kb+ clonezilla-live-20130819-raring-i386.iso or the amd64.iso as bootable disk using ISO Image), was able to boot to clonezilla GRUB screen (Ubuntu raring based), with secure boot disabled

haven't tested the functionality of clonezilla yet.... trying to load the ubuntu x64 13.10 ISO using the same settings above


EDIT: same settings with ubuntu 13.10 x64 doesn't work. Rufus won't load 13.10 x86 ISO to copy to USB (claiming it's not EFI enabled)

EDIT: ubuntu 13.04 x64 doesn't boot. 13.04 x86.iso is rejected by Rufus as non-EFI compatible


looks like clonezilla is doing something good... ISO:EFI\boot\bootia32.efi may be the key

EDIT: yep, copied bootia32.efi from the clonezilla amd64 to the USB prepped from 12.04.3 x64. Able to boot from USB, but it drops me straight back into grub cmd line

EDIT: Getting there... eventually

EDIT #&#8734;: going to compile grub x86 efi properly from sources, instead of trying to hack clonezilla's version

EDIT Last one before going to bed

Using ubuntu 13.04 x64 raring.ISO

Using Rufus 1.3.4 USB tool(GPT for UEFI + FAT + 64 kb+ raring x64 as bootable disk using ISO Image)

Download grub2 sources for raring
https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/grub2/2.00-13ubuntu3

apt-get install gcc bison flex

./configure --with-platform=efi --target=i386

make

#make GRUB EFI binary and mods

cd grub-core

../grub-mkimage -d . -o bootia32.efi -O i386-efi -p /boot/grub ntfs hfs appleldr boot cat efi_gop efi_uga elf fat hfsplus iso9660 linux keylayouts memdisk minicmd part_apple ext2 extcmd xfs xnu part_bsd part_gpt search search_fs_file chain btrfs loadbios loadenv lvm minix minix2 reiserfs memrw mmap msdospart scsi loopback


cp bootia32.efi to <USB DRIVE>/EFI/BOOT/
# might be missing some modules... but if i tried to compile all *.mod, I get an invalid stack frame during grub boot

// here is the version I built - compatible with ubuntu-13.04-desktop-amd64.iso
http://files.ngvincent.com/Asus_T100/linux/bootia32.ubuntu_13.04_x64.zip

I can now boot to USB, Try Ubuntu.... X server doesn't start properly, gets dumped to ubuntu shell, but that's enough for today. need sleep

 

[Shivansps]

im hoping for android ones to also have the USB boot option...