Angel spots CherryPal cloud chimera
It's small and it's real
Though some claimed it didn't exist, the CherryPal cloud PC chimera has been spotted in the wild.
Max Seybold's new-age thin client/ultimate buzzword mash-up first went on sale in late July, but it wasn't until yesterday that someone outside the mystery company actually laid their eyes on a shipping system.
Over the summer, Seybold and Co. enlisted an army of "Brand Angels" to promote the 2-watt mini-machine in the blogosphere, promising the ultimate in Silicon Valley currency for their efforts: stock options. But after more than four months of waiting, not even these Marketing 2.0 mavens had received their units — despite claims to the contrary from Seybold.
First, there was talk of a graphics glitch. Then there was the tale of the disappearing funding pact with a "UK based African born family."
And then, yesterday afternoon, one Angel announced a sighting with a post to a private social network that CherryPal may or may not have set up. "MY CHERRYPAL ARRIVED!!!!" the Angel wrote.
The package lacked setup instructions. But the Angel was able to verify that the hardware exists. And that it's small.
"It is soooo tiny — like a compact make-up case," she later wrote on her blog. "It is even smaller than a paperback book — it's the size of a handheld Nintendo GameBoy — the original ones — about the size of the Nintendo DS (dual screen). If you take a standard 8 1/2-by-11-inch piece of printer paper and fold it in half, it is smaller than that."
The 10.5-ounce box is billed as a "cloud PC" that moves "most of the software and data that traditionally sits on the desktop to the Internet." In other words, it includes a small solid state drive, but it also taps into data and services sitting on Amazon S3 storage servers.
This morning, Seybold told us that all Brand Angels and anyone who's actually shelled out $249 for a CherryPal would receive their units by December 15. Previously, he had said that an initial batch of systems went out in early November, but there's no evidence this actually happened.
One Reg reader ordered a unit when the thin client cloud PC first went on sale, and after CherryPal suspended its pre-order program, he was told he could ask for a refund. He did — and twelve weeks passed without the return of his $250. But yesterday, Max Seybold sent him a personal email saying a check was on its way. ®
COMMENTS
Angels Landed
Some units appear to have been shipped:
http://greentechgirl.com/tag/cherrypal/
This 'Angel' seems massively more clued-up than the previous one (but still tried to use a wireless mouse).
Summary from her blog:
OS is Xubuntu derivative
Wi-fi works OOB
No sign of 'cloud' features
Firefox is sloooooooow
Synaptic Package Manager is installed and working
gdm.conf appears to have got hosed while adding a user from the GUI, requiring a filesystem mount from a flash drive and a rebuild of passwd, group, and shadow files. Try talking your granny through that one over the phone ; )
So they do seem to exist, but perhaps not quite ready for prime time?
the chimera works ...
I got mine too. No noice, I love it. Epiphany browser works better than firefox. Overall good value for the price. I am a 3rd grade teacher and we here will place a volume order early next year. If Cherrypal improves their communication we have a winner here. But hey, its not easy to grow up, ask my students :)
Meanwhile, in DamnSmallLinux world...
For the lazy types, they sell a slick fanless mini-ITX-based machine that doesn't need no cloud... less ex-pensive, too. The aluminum case alone is sooo... excuse me, I need to get a room.
Of course the real geeks already have a couple of self-made similar things...
Pics or it didn't happen
given that even the lowliest of new mice gets a comprehensive high-res gallery of ill-lit kitchen table unboxing photos these days, are we now expected to believe that this particular astroturfer (astroblogger?) is not in possession of at least one device capable of capturing a digital image?
My, the smell of bullshit is strong this morning.
In defence of the new?
mine is scheduled to land on Tuesday, there are some pretty big hopes laid on these little boxes and despite the slightly bumpy taxi to the runway I'm beginning to think that this could really make the long haul flight!
There's a lot of potential there, things like Amazons HITs (tasks better preformed by a human rather than a script, selecting better images or sounds etc, paid for and transacted via the net) could really make a big difference to global business and employment. Also being used in as a field deployment for charities or aid workers who could then keep in touch with their back office, co-workers & families?
Like I said, there's a lot of positives and potential for these little black boxes, we'll just have to wait till Tuesday to see just what it can do.
