Intel Compute Stick – Available Spring 2015
This Atom Z3745D-based HDMI dongle is ready to plug into your TV or monitor. It will be pre-installed with Windows 8.1 or Linux and has built-in WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity, 2GB of RAM, 32GB of on-board storage, a standard USB port and a micro SD card slot for extra storage. A Micro-USB port is also on board for power supply. Basically it’s a Baytrail-T tablet without the screen, battery and speakers.
Pricing is $149 which is about the same as the cheapest Windows 8 tablet with HDMI. Of course if you don’t need that screen and don’t want the ‘bulk’ of an Intel NUC, this is a cleaner solution. A 1GB/8GB version with Linux is also planned at $89, which sounds like the perfect Openelec module to me!
Mobilegeeks got a brief hands-on at CES 2015.
Nice to see Intel starting to compete with those ARM sticks. Still a bit too big. When will the “core” version arive? ;-)
I really don’t get why the Linux variant gets lower specs…
Multiple reasons…
1) Most Linux distros are generally lean and light enough to work with less and still run fine… allowing an opportunity for a more attractive price point…
2) People generally expect Linux devices to sell for less than Windows but it’s harder now that many of these devices can get Windows for either a heavy discount or even for free…
3) Mind there’s still a very small market for Linux for general consumers and so most OEMs expect to sell fewer units and thus the thinking is to make it appeal more with lower pricing…
4) Keep in mind these do compete with even lower priced ARM based devices that can also run some Linux distros for a more direct competition than with the units running Windows… So harder to justify a higher price point if both are offering a Linux distro…