without MS? without it i am as good as dead. there are many people out there need MS for work purpose. its more than just MS office for general opening of documents or editting.
take me for example, i am a chemist, the software i use only works in mac and MS (chembiooffice and scifinder). I do not know of any software in linux that comes even close to its function. without these 2 you might as well ask me to quit my job. i am sure there are many out there with similar situation where their job require specific applications and only windows has it.
the world is very big, application linux or other O/S (except Mac) is still not strong enough to meet the demand of the majorities.
for a labtop that can use for recreational and work, without harddisk??? you sure?
how are you going to store your stuff? in ram? <--i am not a computer geek but i do know things here are gone once u off the power. web virtual harddrive?? no thanks depending on internet speed, i want things to be fast and smooth. i don't like the feeling of seeing the loading sign when the traffic is heavy.
but i do agree the idea of netbook without the need of a harddisk that is totally boot from ram where everything is "read only". NOT A LAPTOP or desktop.
this will remove a lot issue of computer idiot being a virus themselves. this idea will surface soon, but not so soon till google O/s is release. i believe this was their concept.
To be correct, MS is a weak OS in most ways, except for variety of application programs.
It is weak in reliability and security worst ever ways in entire history of computation. No other OS has so many risks and virus & malware that can even come close to MS.
To use originally windows based program in other OS, e.g. MacOS or Unix or BSD or Linux, just use virtual machines (VM). The technologies for VM is very mature these days and hardware (CPU + RAM etc) are abundantly powerful for use of VM these days.
Use of VM can very ideally compensate the worst weakness and vulnerabilities of MS craps.
Diskless PCs are around for many years already, they were essentially terminals or net nodes, most BIOS today can boot up PC directly via LAN via PXE, aka LAN BOOT. The disk image of OS & Software & Data are in the LAN server or NAS boxes.
A NAS like the above have essentially a single HDD inside, it is smaller than toaster box, slightly bigger then your cable modem. It can have 2TB (2000GB) inside shared to hundred PCs on the network.
I have setup many PCs diskless, essentially using USB, and mostly thumb-drives. They are only a bit slower to bootup than HDD, they are reliable because thumb-drives last better than HDD. These setup are suitable for e.g. POS cash registers; email terminals; browser station; media station; kiosks; ATMs; VNC terminals.
For diskless PCs in offices, using VMs, the VM can be setup inside the servers, and share desktop sessions out to many users who access via VNC terminals. These sort of setup are suitable for large corporates; government agencies; military; banks; campus; hospitals etc.
This way killed off tons of maintenance works and cost & time, and reliability is very strong, & security is very good. Users can not break nor sabotage the VMs, no virus / Trojans etc, because VMs are always fresh and reverted back to a know good state between sessions. If users VMC terminals are broken, they can be replace harmlessly and cost effectively, they are smaller and cheaper than netbooks, because they are just a palm-sized box with ethernet + USB + display connector.
The EEE pc is example of a VNC terminal, but I believe this one isn't diskless, it has 2.5" HDD inside.
Linux such as Splashtop is very suitable to be VNC terminal, built into a box like the EEE PC above, with flash disk on-board. You should then never need to upgrade nor repair them. VMs also does not need any upgrade forever. As long as you have additional resources you just reassign freely to them any time. That is the beauty within the virtualized cyber-world.
