Robert Pogson

My next motherboard may well be from VIA if they keep making small and cheap motherboards. This one looks like it will fit any old ATX case you have laying around or you could just glue it in somewhere and hook up a 12V PSU and be on the air. It doesn’t get much easier than this. It runs Android/Linux 4.0 out of the box.

“Earlier this year, VIA released a tiny $49 ARM-powered motherboard it called the Android PC System (APC) in an effort to ride the wave the Raspberry Pi Foundation accidentally started with its $35 Linux computer for budding young developers. Today, it’s announcing a pair of follow-ups: the APC Rock is a $79 bare motherboard, and the APC Paper is a $99 version that is identical, except it loses the VGA port and comes in a recycled cardboard case designed to look like a small hardcover book. The Rock is available now, and the Paper has a March pre-order date. The original APC will continue to be sold with Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) for $49.

Do they have the raw power of my present Beast? Nope. Nor do they have the storage but they would make a nice thin client, access to gazillions of Android apps, and a cool and quiet form factor I could use anywhere like out in the workshop or in the kitchen. No doubt I could set things up to run applications on Beast or access a web application on Beast from anywhere on the LAN for only a little more than the cost of a keyboard, monitor and mouse. Heck, I could probably get this to run on my lawn mower… Best of all, there are no hefty fees involved for paying off M$ or Intel or a wireless ISP.