Which CPU are we waiting for to get VM hypervisors in hw?

[Bill McGonigle]

On Jul 30, 2006, at 20:19, Ted Roche wrote:

> I'm tempted both by the ThinkPad T60p and the MacBookPro. Both run 
> Core Duo.  While I know these are capable of running VMs, I'm hearing 
> that a next generation chip is going to have more capability in the 
> chips to provide more powerful VMs. The technical details are beyond 
> me, but my questions are simple enough: does anyone know what's the 
> timeline on these new chips, and will their delivery in laptops make 
> all that much perceivable difference or are the features more aimed at 
> big iron (8-way and up) machines.

I'm waiting to make a similar decision until after WWDC.  The Mermon 
has AMD's 64-bit x86 extensions and runs one of 30% faster or 40% 
cooler (and is pin-compatible with the Yonah).  It should also be 
possible to load up a 4GB machine with Mermon, which will be nice for 
running 4 or 5 OS's when needed.

Before the IBM sell-off Lenovo was reported to have a deal with the 
Chinese penal authority to have their machines assembled by inmates, 
which include political prisoners.  It would be hard to promote Free 
Software on one of those.

When the US State Department announced a large purchase of Lenovo 
ThinkPads (since cancelled maybe?) the press reported the machines were 
to be made in North Carolina.  All I've found is that that product 
design team is in Raleigh, but nothing on manufacture.   Does anybody 
here know anything about Lenovos make in NC?

I had also looked into Clevo and Acer laptops which looked pretty good 
and in the price range of a Dell.  At the time I crossed them off the 
list because of their glare-type screens, but it looks like 3M's 
Privacy Guard screen cover can be used to add an anti-glare coating 
back to a glare-type screen so I might reconsider them again.

Are there any laptop manufacturers who actually support Open Source 
Software to a significant degree these days other than Apple?

-Bill
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