Are "baby PCs" the wave of the future? [BT broadband office]

Are "baby PCs" the wave of the future?

Posted 9 June 2008 at 8:52AM by Ian Betteridge in Doing business online

The philosophy that "less is more" hasn't really found much of a home in the computer market. The machine you buy next year will more than likely be faster than the one you bought last year, with more storage, better graphics, and a bigger screen.

But there seem to be some companies around that are trying to buck that trend, and produce machines which take advantage of the move to Internet-based applications in order to be smaller and cheaper.

One such company is Asus, which has announced the eee Box, a desktop version of its low-priced eeePC small laptops. The eee Box is tiny, includes a relatively small hard drive, and in most models runs Linux rather than Windows. It's also priced at as little as $269, which means it is substantially cheaper than the machine it most resembles, Apple's Mac mini.

But can a machine like this be used for serious business tasks? Thanks to the advent of Internet-based office packages like Google Docs, the answer is "yes". Even complex business tasks like customer response management (CRM) can be handled within the web browser with applications like BT NetSuite. Perhaps the days when you needed a powerful PC to do serious business are over.

Tags: bt, bt netsuite, eee pc

New feature: Rate this post!

Currently 3.3/5
1
2
3
4
5

Average rating: 3.3/5

Comments

1. At June 10, 2008 9:33 AM, JAMES LYON wrote:

"Perhaps the days when you needed a powerful PC to do serious business are over. "

Too many PC's on the market are full of all sorts of Bells and Whistles that are not required to undertake normal day to day business activities.

We are a totally internet selling business and our biggest problem is trying to get BT WHOLESALE to give us decent download speeds. For the past year we have been experiencing 7200 to 6800 mbps download speeds. However after recent local BT engineering work our speeds dropped down into the 4000 mbps range.

After constant complaints to BT FAULTS, it is now up into the 5000,s and BT WHOLESALE say this is acceptable to them.

It is NOT AT ALL ACCEPTABLE to us when we have previously acheived an average 6800 mbps.

WHY are BT WHOLESALE artifically keeping speeds down when higher speeds can be achieved.

Come on BT WHOLESALE - SLOW SPEEDS are not acceptable to BUSINESS CUSTOMERS.

BT WHOLESALE - You are causing our Company to be INEFFICIENT. !!

It now takes us twice as long to update data on the internet - which we attempt to do constantly from 8am to midnight 7 days a week - 365 days a year.

Come on BT WHOLESALE, come into the age of the INTERNET BUSINESS in 2008.

BT WHOLESALE - Small businesses need HELP not HINDERANCE.

2. At June 10, 2008 10:22 AM, Dr J Zoidberg wrote:

maybe your traffic shaped if your ACTUALLY use the internet that much. The reason you may be getting slower broadband speeds may be due to other users connecting to your exchange. The contention ratio is 50 users to 1 switch on the exchange so maybe only 15 or 20 users were previously on your switch and now there is 30 or 40 users or more.

3. At June 10, 2008 12:14 PM, james lyon wrote:

Reply to Dr J Zoidberg wrote: !!!! see above !!

We live way out in rural sheep country and have very few users out here in the hills -

Users out here are mainly residential and Businesses users should get preferental treatment as they pay more for your services.

Speeds are even slow between 10pm and 2am when most residential users are asleep in bed.

Come on BT WHOLESALE - IT IS ABOUT TIME YOU GAVE BUSINESSES A PROPPER SERVICE.

The reason we had higher speeds before was because an engineer fixed it in the local exchange so that, we - as a business - received higher speeds.

BT ENGINEERS spent a lot of time and money, on bring a 10 pair cable - six foot underground across a field to our property and installed a new cable from the newly installed green box on the roadside, to our local exchange - A small wodden hut in the village.

We are not townies out here - We are a rural business and need to be given a TRUE BUSINESS SERVICE, which we are not getting out here.

Two weeks to fix a reported fault and then only half fixed.

BT are not matching their MARKETING PROMISES. Peter Jones of TV fame (DRAGONS DEN), has put his name to selling BT BUSINESS BROADBAND SERVICES and makes promises that BT cannot keep - especially out here.

4. At June 10, 2008 3:22 PM, Chris Sabin wrote:

James, it might not be down to BT WS as Dr. J. Z pointed out.

Maybe your ISP is capping your speed? Maybe your equipment has become faulty?

Also Dr.J there is no longer contention ratio's that everything has migrated to adsl max

5. At June 10, 2008 4:13 PM, JAMES LYON wrote:

"Chris Sabin wrote:
Maybe your ISP is capping your speed? "

YES - ISP is BT and they are capping the speed - I have had higher speeds before and BT WHOLESALE need to LIFT the BT CAPPING or set it back to what it was before arround 7200 kbps.

I have been told by BT Faults in Liverpool that my line has been capped by BT Engineers !!!

"Chris Sabin wrote: Maybe your equipment has become faulty."

BT - Equipment is not faulty - Supplied by BT. 2700HGV HUB - The system has its own inbuilt Checking and Monitoring software installed on our computers.

BT WHOLESALE are hindering our business activity by capping down our speeds from 7200/6800 kbsp to around the 5000's.

BT WHOLESALE stated that these speeds are acceptable - Maybe to BT but not to us as a BT Business Customer. WE had higher speeds before and need them reinstating ASAP.

James Lyon

6. At June 10, 2008 5:30 PM, Dr J Zoidberg wrote:

apologies chris.
surely if you are in sheep heaven mr lyon then you have a "long line" meaning that you were lucky to get such speeds in the first place. sometimes rural areas are lucky to get 1meg or 2 at most.

7. At June 11, 2008 10:56 AM, James Lyon wrote:

Pleased to anounce that BT WHOLESALE have NOW asked BT to arrange for an engineer to investigate and call on Thursday 11th June 2008. We can only HOPE !!!

YES, we do at times reguire BABY PC's but they need to be compatable with other office PC's and use the same software and operating system - Preferably Windows XP and NOT VISTA.

I see that some Major PC manufacturers are moving back to offer XP again - Thank you.

8. At June 12, 2008 9:28 AM, James Lyon wrote:

Thanks BT - Engineer called this morning 9am Thursday 12th June 2008 to test line etc.
Upgrade work was undertaken in local exchange yesterday. All seems well at 7200 to 7392 kbps.

Thanks again to all at BT - James Lyon

9. At June 19, 2008 8:10 AM, bob roberts wrote:

JAMES LYON wrote:
"It now takes us twice as long to update data on the internet - which we attempt to do constantly from 8am to midnight 7 days a week - 365 days a year."

Updating data on the internet is all to do with upload and not download, and if you really cared about your business and it's internet connection, there's lots of options you could go for.. leased line, 2 broadband lines via a load balancer, SDSL with 2mb upload. You're on a standard BB package that residential users pay the same money for.. try investing.. you won't get champagne for beer money...

BT broadband office