O2, the UK mobile phone operator had an amazing offer a few days ago: they were selling their O2 Joggler for £49.99.
This little gadget, with a touchscreen, wifi and an intel atom processor, wasn’t really a best seller for your average cosumer and O2 ended up selling them at a loss.
I picked one up and installed Ubuntu successfully on an 8GB stick, following religiously the instructions from this
site.
Other interesting/useful sites on the Joggler are:
http://www.canonical.com/projects/ubuntu/unr
http://www.linuxformat.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?p=87157&sid=ed063024114914ddf6e977294bcb427a
http://www.avrfreaks.net/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=80756&view=next
The installation was pretty straight forward and uneventful but a bit long. I installed everything on the usb key, using my linux laptop. Everything was supported and worked out of the box, including the touch-screen and the wifi. I added a belkin bluetooth adaptor (which also worked out of the box) and installed skype on it. Unfortunately, the performance of skype with a bluetooth headset was below expectations. I’m also having performance issues: sometimes it’s slow, but I think this is because of my usb key being relatively slow.
It’s a great little system and for £50 I can’t fault it (I’ve paid more for photo frames!). I wish it had a few additional usb ports that I could use (instead of my ugly hub).
Also, it would be great if linux could be loaded on the device (instead of doing this on an additional external usb key).
I just had a look on the O2 site: it’s now priced at £99.99, but cheaper ones are available on ebay.
Stay tuned for more news and comments on this little gem!