Dell "Days of Deals" has Ubuntu notebook

[D. Hugh Redelmeier]

| From: Fabio FZero <fabio.fzero-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org>

| I'm prejudiced against Celerons... Renata's EeePC 900 has one and,
| besides the slowness, you can fry an egg on its back. I know this is
| probably a completely different animal, but for $100-200 more it's
| possible to get one with an actual Pentium or even Core 2 Duo (with
| some luck) inside.

It is important to realize that "Pentium*", "Celeron*", "XEON*",
"Core*", etc. are brand names and not technologies.

Typically, on the low end, you are not paying much for the brand name.
On the high end, you usually are.

I have no idea which Celeron M ULV 900MHz the EeePC 900 used.  Maybe the 
333 or the 353 (TDP 7W or 5W).  In either case, the processor power 
requirements are quite low.  Blame the heat on the design of the netbook 
(or other components).
  <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_Celeron_microprocessors>

Basically, Celerons are usually slightly crippled versions of more
middle-of-the-road chips.  You need to decide if the crippling is,
uhh, crippling.

As an example, the very first set of Celeron chips were not generally a
good choice (crippled Pentium II chips -- no L2 cache).  The second set
(300a) were a bargain and I used a pair for years.

In the case of the Celeron M USV 743, what you seem to lose is:
- VT (virtualization)
- Intel Enhanced SpeedStep (You still get regular Intel Speedstep)
- only 1M of cache

For $110 more you can get an Intel Core 2 Solo SU3500 processor.  What
does that get you?
- 3M cache instead of 1M
- 100MHz faster clock
- lower power (TDP 5.5W vs 10W)
- Enhanced Speedstep
- VT
- Trusted Execution Technology (Is that of any use to us?)

$110 feels like an expensive upgrade to a $429 system.
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