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Hearing all the fuss about some new consumer product that uses an ARM Cortex A8, I'm interested to get in on some of the action. But I want a real programmable computer running something like Linux.

I've seen many, many reports in the past 2 or 3 years about prototype ARM laptops with great battery life. Unfortunately, when I tried googling today, all I can find are the old videos and press releases about the prototypes, not a shipping product.

Is there an actual ARM laptop available today? Or did everybody give up and just use Intel Atom chips?

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I think this is on-topic and should not be closed. It's about the availability of ARM laptops in general, not about a concrete buying recommendation. Voting to reopen. – sleske Feb 5 '11 at 18:10
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closed as off topic by ChrisF, Sathya♦ Feb 5 '11 at 18:07

Questions on Super User are expected to generally relate to computer software or computer hardware, within the scope defined in the faq.

6 Answers

up vote 3 down vote

Laptops that can't run regular Microsoft Windows or regular Mac OS X have never found a market beyond a tiny niches. The product you're looking for could almost find a hobbyist niche, but hobbyists who want to program ARM chips are usually happier with things like reference design evaluation boards -- things you can hook up probes and ICEs and JTAG debuggers to.

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I admit it's a niche product -- that's why I'm having trouble finding one! But usually a niche is bigger than zero. :-) And I have no intention of "programming ARM chips", just like I have no intention of programming x86 chips, or anything else. I want to write HLL code, and I want small and light and great battery life, and all the ARM devices I've seen beat all the x86 devices at this. They just seem to have the slight drawback that nobody's selling one, yet. – Ken Apr 6 '10 at 6:05
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up vote 2 down vote

There's this one: CherryPal Africa, specs pretty low though.

Here's a really really tiny one...not sure if you could call it a netbook: NanoNote

Here's a roundup of announced ARM-based netbooks...but I don't think any have actually been released yet.

And you can find no-name ARM-based 7" netbooks in the $100-$200 pricerange on ebay or no-name seller sites. But they are usually Windows CE powered. I'd stay away from those.

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up vote 1 down vote

If you don't mind something a bit on the small side, The Nintendo DS can, with a memory peripheral, run DSLinux. Plus it can play games. And Pictochat.

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"A bit on the small side" is an understatement! :-) – Ken Apr 5 '10 at 15:23
DSi XL, anyone? – Nathaniel Apr 5 '10 at 16:41
Unfortunately the DSi XL (like the DSi) lacks a Slot 2, which means a much smaller selection of memory peripherals. – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Apr 5 '10 at 17:09
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up vote 1 down vote

Toshiba makes one, reviewed here:

http://www.reghardware.com/2010/11/03/review_netbook_toshiba_ac100/

The review score was low on the grounds of using Android - which is more suited to hand held devices.

I think this product would have done better in the review if it ran ChromeOS, Google's Chrome web browser packaged as a full OS.

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up vote 1 down vote

There's also https://www.genesi-usa.com/products/smartbook, but it's still a netbook.

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up vote 0 down vote

Check out touchbook by company called Always Innovating

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Comment by lkcl: the touchbook isn't a laptop, it's a 9in netbook that can also be a tablet, with the usual long-term-unuseable 1024x600 LCD screen. if 1024x600 9in is okay for you, then the use of the OMAP3530, which has extremely good free software community driver support, is very reassuring. – Arjan Feb 5 '11 at 17:41
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