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Netbooks are all the rage these days, but there is a constant debate around which OS to run. Microsoft has made a hard push to make Windows XP the OS of choice, Canonical has their Netbook Remix of Ubuntu out the door, and now Intel wants to try their hand with the Moblin OS. Read on to find my opinions / impressions of the newly released OS.

Installation is a breeze. For those who have installed linux before, there’s nothing new here. It uses a modified Anaconda installer, and it looks a lot like the Fedora installation. If you’ve never installed linux before, don’t worry you’ll still find this ridiculously easy.

Intel Moblin Installation Screen

Not only is installation easy, but it’s fast. Once the installation is done, you’re ready for your first boot. Speaking of fast, the first boot is fast. And it’s elegant too. Those of you familiar with Ubuntu, Fedora, or other distributions, you know that booting up often includes loads of scrolling lines of text, status checks, a GRUB bootloader, etc. There is none of this with Moblin.

This is the only startup screen you'll see

The above screen appears for a few moments, and then you’re immediately greeted by the home screen. The name of the home screen is “m_zone”. Seems like an odd name choice for me. I think most users would prefer that it be called “home” or something useful like that. In any case, your favorite apps are remembered and listed on the lower left. There’s a little upward arrow you can click on the bottom to “roll up” whatever you’re using. Once you do this and get rid of the m_wave home screen, you’ll be at the default state of the Moblin OS. It’s a blank screen and if you move your mouse to the top edge of it, a “dock” of sorts pulls down from the top. It’s actually very neat, and this is the default behavior for all items that pull down off of the dock. The fonts are large, and this is an excellent use of screen real estate. However, I do wish something else populated the screen other than a blank desktop – maybe an app quick laucher, an RSS feed reader, something interesting?

By default, the “dock” gives you the following items: m_wave, status, people, internet, media, pasteboard, applications, and zones. Status lets you twitter out status updates easily. People allows you to instant message. Internet is the browser. Media is a media player, but it seems to only populate with recently played or viewed media. Applications takes you to a screen with folders (or sections, as they are laid out) of apps. Zones is the alt+tab interface, and can be used to switch between open applications.

So how does it all work? In my opinion, there are high highs and low lows. For example, I love that when I click the Internet button, it just drops right down for entering a URL. Very slick, and it’s efficient and quick. I don’t use twitter, but if I did, I would very much appreciate the quick access to status updates. Additionally, I think Intel did a great job of making this OS NOT look like Linux. There’s no firefox icon anywhere, there’s no “human” shades of brown, and all of the icons are custom created for Moblin.

So what are the negatives? Usability. When it comes to general usability, Ubuntu Netbook Remix puts all of your apps right at your fingertips, in an interface that uses the small screen quite well. Moblin makes SOME tasks even easier than UNR does, but if you deviate from the dock, it will take you longer to do what you could do in UNR. I like to use my mother as a use-case for the OS. She’s never used linux before, and we got her a netbook for mothers day. She wants a computer that will let her surf the net, run some apps, and accomplish these tasks in the most user-friendly, efficient way.

If she wants to play a game, Ubuntu Netbook Remix has a tab on the left for games. After one click she’s there, and then one more click opens any game of her choice. UNR wins by a click. Both netbook operating systems are one click away from the web. What about GMail, Google Maps, or other web apps? Using Prism, it’s really easy to turn any “web app” into a clickable icon. And with an icon view being the default view of UNR, all of those are only one click away. With Moblin, it’s just as fast if you’re doing a task that is in the “dock,” but if you want to do anything else, you have to click the applications button on the dock, and then navigate through that menu to find the app you want.

I don’t mean to be too negative on Moblin. The user interface is VERY slick, and I feel like I can say that this is the first Linux distro that doesn’t really look like linux. Furthermore, if you only want to surf the net, post to twitter, and IM with friends, then the unified dock interface might have you covered, and this might be a great OS for you. But once you start to do more, I find Moblin’s UI to be more of an inhibitor than an enabler.

Pros:

• Slickest netbook UI out there
• Great artwork
• Innovative user interface disguises the linux underbelly
• Quick access to the web, twitter, and IM
• Fast bootup

Cons:

• For anything besides the web, twitter, and IM, it’s extra work to do what you want

Conclusion: This is one to watch. I’m really looking forward to the next version. Let’s make the dock easier to customize so I can add whatever app I want up there. Use some of that blank desktop space for an application quick launcher or something else. Also, turn the “Applications” button into something more innovative than a button that actually just takes you to the normal linux menu.

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