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back to article Microsoft shows off South Korean PC-on-a-stick

What's 11 centimeters long, packs an Intel processor, weighs 46g, runs Windows 10 or 8.1, and is sticky? Come May, the answer to that question is the Lucoms PC-on-a-stick, at least in South Korea. Microsoft's outpost in Nice Korea yesterday threw a bash of some sort to talk up the Windows device ecosystem. And among the …

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  1. PleebSmash
    Pint

    why not Windows 10?

    I thought Windows 10 was going to compress the system files and reduce the footprint. Why put Win 8.1 on this stick (other than Win 10 not being ready by May)?

    But wait, maybe the free year of Windows 10 upgrade will apply to 8.1-on-a-stick...

    2 0 Reply
    1. Sandtitz Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: why not Windows 10?

      I thought Windows 10 was going to compress the system files and reduce the footprint. Why put Win 8.1 on this stick (other than Win 10 not being ready by May)?

      The footprint is already reduced with Win8.1 IF the vendor has used the WIMBoot OS installation method.

      Also, the Win10 is still in beta stage.

      0 2 Reply
  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    darn.

    I'm going have to buy a newer TV with more ports.

    0 0 Reply
  3. frank ly

    lucomsamerica.com

    I've just had a quick look at their website. As usual for websites like this, I ask myself why the heck they don't get a native speaker to rewrite at least their headline paragraphs. It's a mess. If they can't be bothered to get that right then it leads to doubts as to whether they can be bothered to get anything else right.

    4 4 Reply
    1. Steven Roper
      Reply Icon

      Re: lucomsamerica.com

      Getting a site translated professionally is time-consuming and expensive. Getting some underpaid subaltern to whack your Asian-language website through Google Translate is much quicker and cheaper. And with the level of grammatical idiocy displayed by the majority of the English-speaking population, I doubt they lose much business due to the appalling grammar. Most of their customers are probably so used to badly-translated Asian sites that they no longer even notice.

      13 3 Reply
      1. frank ly
        Reply Icon

        @Steven Roper Re: lucomsamerica.com

        I'd agree that getting an entire website translated by a native speaker with appropriate domain knowledge is not a cheap or trivial job. However, for the highly visible tub-thumping and mission statement paragraphs, I could rewrite them to a high standard in less that an hour, including the time taken to send them an email with all the corrections in it.

        1 1 Reply
        1. Anonymous Coward
          Reply Icon
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: I could rewrite them to a high standard

          Apparently you can't even write a single paragraph without an error.

          1 0 Reply
    2. Robert Helpmann??
      Reply Icon
      Childcatcher

      Re: lucomsamerica.com

      I ask myself why the heck they don't get a native speaker to rewrite at least their headline paragraphs.

      Just pretend as though you in another country from which you are separated by a common language and you should be fine... It really is worse than that, though.

      3 0 Reply
    3. Edwin
      Reply Icon

      Re: lucomsamerica.com

      Because natively written sites are better, right? Like the time I visited the HP website a few weeks ago and it offered to 'Show me the results anyways'?

      (no, there's no excuse for crappy language on a commercial website, but there's even less excuse for HP to let an abomination like that escape. And yes, I have a screenshot to prove it)

      12 0 Reply
  4. PNGuinn
    Trollface

    Windows 108.1

    A few service packs down the line then ...

    OK - I get the lipstick, but where's the pig?

    17 0 Reply
  5. Warm Braw

    There are a number of these things around or announced

    Intel has its Compute Stick and Hannspree are shipping a product already.

    The question in my mind is what are these devices for? As soon as you need to start hooking them up to peripherals they lose the form-factor appeal and if you don't require the peripherals, then you're better off with a phone or tablet than something plugged into your telly on the other side of the room.

    2 1 Reply
    1. cupperty
      Reply Icon

      Re: There are a number of these things around or announced

      It can't be long before a mobile phone can be plugged into a screen & keyboard and function as a 'PC', surely?

      1 0 Reply
      1. Hans 1
        Reply Icon
        Boffin

        Re: There are a number of these things around or announced

        >It can't be long before a mobile phone can be plugged into a screen & keyboard and function as a 'PC', surely?

        My phone can already do that.

        I can even plug a keyboard, mouse, 3Tb Harddrive into the beast using a powered hub so I do not discharge the accu ... with miracast I do not even need to plugin an hdmi cable (which I have) ... I can browse the web, open and edit documents, have access to the command line ... you name it ... oh, the phone is a Z30.

        I know there are others out there that can do the same ...

        1 0 Reply
        1. Michael Wojcik Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Re: There are a number of these things around or announced

          My phone can already do that.

          Well, yes. So can plenty of phones, and many don't even need to be "plugged in" (keyboard via Bluetooth and, as you noted, display via DLNA or Miracast or whatever). And this sort of thing has been around for a while. I assumed the OP was making a joke.

          Power consumption is probably the biggest issue - you still need to plug the display into the mains, and probably need the phone on a charger if you want to use your phoneputer for any significant length of time. Thus we have phone-into-laptop setups like the Asus Transformer Book V (though that also has a separate CPU in the tablet/laptop part), so you can add a bigger battery with the keyboard and display.

          0 0 Reply
    2. Calleb III
      Reply Icon

      Re: There are a number of these things around or announced

      How much peripherals does the average home PC have? Keyboard, mouse, display, speakers.

      Hook this stick to a TV alongside wireless kbd/mouse and you have a PC. Going on vacation - packit in alongside portable wireless kbd+mouse taking 10th of a space of a laptop, plug it in the hotel TV and voila.

      It's not an universal solution, but there are plenty of applications for a device like this.

      1 0 Reply
      1. Michael Wojcik Silver badge
        Reply Icon

        Re: There are a number of these things around or announced

        Going on vacation - packit in alongside portable wireless kbd+mouse taking 10th of a space of a laptop, plug it in the hotel TV and voila.

        I understand the use case, but personally I don't find it appealing. With my laptops (I nearly always bring both my work and personal laptops with me when I travel), I can use them in the airport, in cafes, etc - I'm not tied to the hotel-room TV. I can use them on battery power. I can watch DVDs, if the urge comes upon me. I have a lot more storage available.

        But then I'm not a fan of tablets either. I'll take a full-fat computer or go without.

        0 0 Reply
    3. Jim 59
      Reply Icon

      Re: There are a number of these things around or announced

      Not sure. Shortly after a product like this launches, people start to say "I can have a tablet for the same price, complete with screen". Linux on a stick makes sense, because everything can be done over SSH, but not windows. The clue is kind of in the name.

      0 0 Reply
  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    But will it take a GTX 980 ?

    2 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      GTX 980 is need for games like Crysis.

      0 0 Reply
  7. Peshman

    Poke My,A$$?

    More like Head Up, A$$!

    You're likely to be gaming on a 2GB RAM micro PC are you? I think the post was made with a certain sense of irony. What value added will this stick bring that most newer smart TV's won't?

    0 6 Reply
    1. AIBailey
      Reply Icon

      Re: Poke My,A$$?

      What value added will this stick bring that most newer smart TV's won't?

      Word processing

      Spreadsheets

      File management (Copy from one location to another)

      Basic photo editing

      Proper web browsing

      Playing games that don't need the latest and greatest hardware

      Emulation of old computers & consoles

      Email

      Managing media libraries (Amazon music/spotify/itunes)

      Online shopping

      Banking

      I'd be quite happy to have a small and discrete PC hidden out of the way for those things.

      5 0 Reply
    2. Hans 1
      Reply Icon

      Re: Poke My,A$$?

      > You're likely to be gaming on a 2GB RAM micro PC are you? I think the post was made with a certain sense of irony. What value added will this stick bring that most newer smart TV's won't?

      See the other reply above, and best of all, you can upgrade the PC without changing your TV ...

      3 0 Reply
    3. Irongut
      Reply Icon

      Re: Poke My,A$$?

      It won't be a stupid TV a few years down the line when the manufacturer can't be bothered to support the software any more.

      It won't be listening to your every word and sending it to South Korea / Japan.

      It won't have useless apps for things like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube.

      It will access video from sites that smart TVs don't have apps for.

      It will be much easier to put in your pocket.

      What value does a smart TV add that a normal TV and a compute stick / Chromecast / Apple TV / media centre won't?

      5 0 Reply
  8. Hans 1
    Windows

    Years after gumstix

    Us freetards have had that for years, now ... just saying ...

    0 0 Reply
  9. pprotus

    Different target market?

    Good size hi-res monitors are already absurdly expensive, and the larger ones are nearly impossible to transport. Likewise a decent size qwerty keyboard with numeric keypad area takes-up more space in a garment bag than i'm willing to sacrifice. I'm thinking that a business model like the 2000 Kinko's once had...where one can casually rent a work area with computer, mouse, keyboard, display(s), internet access, etc...might work out well for people who travel frequently for business reasons, and who can carry their core computer hardware in a shirt pocket. Now, if we could only get border security agents to cease cloning one's mass storage whenever one crosses a national boundary...

    0 0 Reply
  10. dominicr

    Products just like this, based on Intel's technology, are already available around the world including UK, elReg should be aware of that. This is just a 'me too'. Taken in by the press release, I guess...

    0 0 Reply

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