Microsoft is a brand, and therefore has third party backing and a wallet to buy what they don't already have going for it. Linux is free and will only go as far as the community will push it, and despite eliminating some of the biggest bottlenecks a Windows OS will have, that push isn't going to dethrone anything.
The sheer lunacy of some Linux fans can be summed up in one tangible object: the EVO. I read about this a while back, and there was some excitement on my part. It sounded like it was going to be a full-console version of the GP32 line. That would really get some people excited. A Linux-box with gaming architecture? If we could just harness this power for awesome...
Yet, looking at the spec sheet, it's just a computer. To be fair, what you will actually pay for is a Linux Media Center PC with bundled Logitech gaming devices (keyboard, mouse, and controller). The deal itself isn't too bad at $379, and you could do a lot worse.
I, however, am not a deal finder blog. I'm not here to find you a great tech steal. What I can do is bash this console thoroughly, and that's what I'm going to do.
First of all, this was supposed to be a console. The word itself has a pretty broad scope, but when I think of a gaming console, I think of an architecture that is not PC in nature. If someone actually took the time and effort to design even a low-spec Linux console with an open SDK available to the public, then gamers would have themselves a gem. To be able to toy around with the speed, efficiency, and capabilities a gaming console had to offer without having to hack the damned console into submission would get us all away from poking at our current gen setups and focus is on actually doing something new and uncharted.
The website selling the thing is actually making this claim:
"The amazing thing about EVO is that you can use your existing keyboard and mouse with the system. Insert your keyboard and mouse into the EVO USB ports and the system will instantly recognize your peripheral device."This is clearly a futuristic concept.
In fact, many of the other claims are basically PC selling points made to sound as if there is actually something separating themselves from any other computer. To top it all off, in their list of appliances that can be substituted by having this miracle device in your living room, they list an HD DVD player. I don't hold a business degree, but I'm pretty sure that, in the middle of a recession, the last thing you want to do is embrace a technology that painfully died last year.
Now, despite Envizions clear attempts to sabotage themselves, they claim to have sold enough PC's to be optimistic. Trouble is, the whole idea isn't ready for prime time anyway, and the concept they are selling is doomed to fail. Even if they were selling a gaming console, the moderate-at-best success of the GP32 and its successors combined with the quick rise of portable gaming power spells bad news for an open source gaming console.
The reality is that the open source community is not a group you should rely upon to back a console. Even those who are actively developing in that scene will tell you that the crap far outweighs the quality. To even imagine that the open source community is going to put together a killer gaming app anytime soon is just plain nuts. The ideas are there, the concepts are great, and there's certainly some talented individuals in that sector, but you are ten times more likely to get fifty Quake clones in your first year of business than one single title that could compete with any decent last-gen game.
Besides, even if someone did, they'd get paid to make sure it ends up on a legitimate gaming console, or at least Steam.
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