gdium-parisThe Emtec Gdium Liberty netbook is set to go on sale in France at the Paris Fair this week for €349.

While most netbooks available today feature Intel Atom processors, 160GB hard drives, and Windows XP, there are a few companies thinking outside the box. And few of them are further outside the box than Emtec. The Gdium Liberty netbook eschews the Intel Atom processor for a MIPS-based 900MHz Loongson processor. And instead of Windows XP, the laptop comes with a custom version of Mandriva Linux with a series of widgets to give you quick access to information on your desktop or from the web.

Perhaps the most unusual thing about the Emtec Gdium Liberty is that while most netbooks use either a hard drive or cheap solid state disk with flash storage, the Gdium’s operating system runs from a removable USB flash drive. The idea is that multiple people can use the same computer, but carry their entire operating environment around with them in their pockets.

I got a chance to catch up with the folks behind the Gdium Liberty at CES. You can check out a video overview of the interface and an interview with one of the engineers behind the laptop after the break.

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6 replies on “Emtec Gdium Liberty netbook on sale in France this week”

  1. This looks like fun, but from “about €250” to €349 is a pretty big jump. Also I’m assuming that you can’t just take your G-key and plug it into any x86 PC at work or school, since it’s designed to run with the MIPS-based Loongson processor. This would limit the fun quite a bit. I don’t think there are many MIPS processors in my neck of the woods.

    P.S. I hadn’t seen the 1000H vs 1000HE HD playback video that popped up when I played the Gdium video. Looks like Brad’s cat Laney has made another directorial cameo appearance 😉

    2. Hi! Actually we’re planning for a fully x86/MIPS Gkey compatible. No date available yet, but working on it.

      1. Very interesting! That should make for a lot of happy hackers. Maybe the Gkey can ultimately be used to diagnose and repair crashed computers running other Linux distros or Windows, as people have done with Knoppix.

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