laptop question

[Leo J Mauler]

On Sun, 16 Nov 2003 23:52:35 -0600 "Jonathan Hutchins"
<hutchins at tarcanfel.org> writes:
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Brian Kelsay" <bkelsay at comcast.net>
> 
> > Try the Morphix LightGUI install.  I'm using that and 
> > it is great on older hardware.

[snip!]

> The latest Linux Magazine just gave a thumbs-up review 
> to a rack-mount keyboard/LCD combination that is priced 
> just under $2,500.  Those people are criminally insane!  
> You could get a great keyboard and LCD monitor for well
> under $500.  For $2,500 it should be a kick-ass workstation!  
> That kind of insanity shows up in what hardware gets support.  
> It shows up in SCSI being a preferred protocol, when most 
> of can afford IDE.  It shows up in $250 video cards getting 
> drivers while generic $35 cards go without.

And you've gotta wonder about "generic $35 cards [going] 
without".  You'd think that the kind of card the average person 
can afford would be the *first card*, not the last card, to get 
a driver written for it.

I sometimes wonder about that one, given the history of 
Linux drivers.  Back when Linux was first getting started, 
low-end hardware got drivers first, because there was 
tons of used low-end hardware about, and the low-end 
stuff was all anyone could afford.

Now that all the great Linux people have fantastic jobs 
doing Linux, they can afford the good stuff and have no 
reason to write a driver for a card that they will never 
use themselves.

There should be some "Principle" to put a name to what 
is going on.  I propose the tongue-in-cheek "Principle 
of Noble Poor Computer Geeks transforming into 
Rich Snob Computer Geeks".

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