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Linux Powers Sub-$200 Internet Appliance
by Dave Murphy
ISSN 1535-3613

Ebiz Enterprises has released the Pia, a $199 appliance that will be sold through Internet service providers (ISPs). Prodigy, one of the net's oldest service providers, has already signed up to market the Pia, which stands for Personal Internet Appliance.

Linux, which is free, is a good way to power cheap Internet appliances because it lowers the overall manufacturing cost by as much as $80, compared to similar machines running Microsoft Windows 98. And similar hardware configurations run faster on Linux than on Windows.

Ebiz is planning to sell its Pia device bundled with Internet access for about $20 a month for two years, The Pia itself is a loss leader. Ebiz will make back its investment plus some by charging above-average fees for monthly access service.

I love Linux, but not for low-end net appliances. I think Linux is a great file server operating system (OS) and a rock-solid OS for Internet web servers. I'm betting Ebiz will take a bath on this fiasco. The real winners will be integrators who use Linux to compete directly with the IS powerhouses: Windows NT and Novell NetWare. The real money is in making file and print services easier to manage at a fraction of today's cost.

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updated July 6, 1999
http://dgl.com/itinfo/1999/it990706.html