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Have Starling, Will Travel

For my Father's Day gift, my wife Janet ordered a System76 Starling netbook. No, you can't have her, she's mine. This is a review (of the netbook, not the wife), or more accurately, my first experience with System76 and their latest product.

Bottom Line and Index

If you're looking for the ten second review, the bottom line is that I love my Starling and would buy it again in a heartbeat. Here's the pros and cons from my perspective.

If you'd like to find out about a specific feature, here are the features I discuss with hyperlinks. Notice that this review is as much about Ubuntu Netbook Remix as the Starling's hardware - it's a system review.

Background

My computing background inevitably colors this review, so let me be candid. I've used computers since 1976, from mainframes to tiny embedded microprocessor trainers. I've used every version of Windows from 1.0 to 7 professionally or at home, or both. I've used Sun Solaris professionally since 1992. I've used various Linux distributions since 1999 - Red Hat / Fedora, Suse, Mandrake / Mandriva, Lindows / Linspire, Ubuntu since the Warty Warthog, Xandros on the eeePC, and Linux Mint. I've run Linux from LiveCD, self-installed on many home brew and former Windows desktops, and pre-installed on Fry's "Great Quality" desktops and laptops and on Janet's eeePC netbook (when she lets me).

So, I'm not a newbie with respect to Linux or computers in general. I do, however, support a rather large cadre of "normal" users, both in professional and private life, so I have some insight into what is "easy to use" and what is not - to the extent that anyone truly understands "normal" users.

With that said, here is my Starling story.

Unboxing and First Boot

The Starling was delivered exactly when promised - about noon on Wednesday following the Saturday order. The shipping box is somewhat larger than I expected (compare it to the standard mouse in the photo).

The shipping box consisted of the Starling product box and eco-friendly packing peanuts; the Starling product box securely packaged the laptop, battery, power brick, power cord, and two "quick start" sheets. One sheet showed the layout of the Ubuntu Netbook Remix (UNR) main screen, the other explained the physical ports available:

Right side: Kensington Lock attachment, MMC / SD / xD flash card slot, 2 USBs, microprocessor and headphone

Left side: Power, SVGA monitor, Ethernet, and USB.

Back and Front: None

Hardware setup was trivial - remove the plastic protective covers from the screen and lid, plug the battery into the laptop, and hit the power button. The battery came 90% pre-charged, a very nice touch. The screen is bright and crisp, and performance is remarkably snappy.

Initial boot required 30 seconds, ending in the traditional "Choose a language" screen (with a choice of 61 languages plus a "No localization" option, and with English logically pre-selected).

After I clicked Next, the Starling offered a choice of time zone (by city, as is traditional); I chose Chicago for Central time, something that has annoyed me for decades - I live near Dallas, TX, far from the streets of Chicago. Couldn't Canonical (Ubuntu's vendor) include Dallas, or at least Houston?

The third screen presented keyboard layout options among a wide variety of countries and layouts (such as Dvorak). This seemed a bit redundant - the keyboard is built into the netbook, after all - but the correct keyboard was selected by default so no worries.

Another click of Next, and the final setup screen asked "Who are you?", collecting my real name, user name, a password (entered twice as usual), and a check box to log in automatically (which I selected - I protect my sensitive data with Truecrypt).

Setup then ran for about 1 minute, at which point the Starling rebooted. Ten seconds after reboot, I was viewing the main screen.

First Impressions

The keyboard is noticeably smaller than a standard keyboard, but although I'm 5' 11" and a rapid touch typist, I adapted rather readily.

The trackpad is comfortable and convenient, with taps and double-taps implementing clicks and double-clicks respectively. The Starling has the same problem as every other trackpad-driven computer I've ever used regardless of operating system - it's far too easy to accidentally brush the pad with a thumb while typing, resulting in unwanted cursor movement. It was also too difficult for me to avoid vertical scrolling when moving the cursor, but a quick visit to Preferences → Mouse allowed me to disable vertical scrolling with the trackpad.

The left and right mouse buttons are to the sides of the trackpad rather than under it, and are a bit stiffer than I expected. The only reason I use them is for right-click context menus and the occasional drag-and-drop, so this isn't a major drawback. No "middle" mouse button is provided, but pressing both buttons simultaneously (the "double-thumb" maneuver) has the same effect - in my case, mostly pasting text from the X-buffer. (For you Windows-only folks, the X-buffer automatically copies any text selected, and the middle mouse button / "double-thumb" maneuver pastes it where the mouse cursor is pointing at the moment. This is in addition to the Gnome copy / paste buffer, which operates much like the Windows clipboard. Yes, I miss the X-buffer badly when using Windows.)

The Starling includes a wired Ethernet port in addition to the usual "G"-speed wireless radio - a very nice touch. By contrast, no "airplane mode" switch (to disable the radio only) is provided, and I haven't yet found a software disable.

Surprisingly, the speakers are mounted on the underside of the case. "Bumps" keep the speakers off the table, but this is certainly sub-optimal for higher frequencies. Volume is reasonably good, but quality is rather tinny without strong bass components. If you're a music aficionado, you'll want some quality external speakers.

I was most impressed by the subtle but charming effects in the UNR program menu - hovering over a program icon causes it to enlarge slightly, and selecting it causes it to spin briefly as the program begins to launch. I was also pleased to see that the Super key that is adorned with a Microsoft Windows logo on lesser computers sports an Ubuntu logo on the Starling.

In the upper right was the wireless icon (4 bars), which (when selected) showed 4 available networks (including mine). Selecting my network required only 6 seconds to bring the Starling on-line. Ubuntu remembered this selection, so that the netbook re-connected whenever in range of that network. The Starling's range is fair to middling, and not quite as good as my Nokia N800; we have a fairly large Texas farmhouse, and at the edge a solid connection is temperamental.

The 160 GB hard drive is partitioned into two virtual drives - an operating system partition (with 2.2 of 10.9 GB used), and a user partition (with 0.218 of 131.9 GB used). This is quite roomy, and the main reason that I still prefer hard drives to solid state drives (also called SSDs) for netbooks.

While exploring the wide selection of pre-installed applications, I noticed the Update Manager in the task list (upper left of the screen).Clicking it revealed that 47.6 MB of updates were waiting (I neglected to take a screenshot of that one, but include a later update above). I gave permission to update by providing my password, and the install proceeded in the background without a hitch - almost. One less-than-friendly event transpired when a dialog reported that an update would overwrite a custom component of the Starling's pre-installed OS. The dialog offered 8 different options, including a bewildering array of 2-way and 3-way compares that resulted in something like the ancient "diff" command output. I finally just took the default, and experienced no ill effects - but this was a very un-Ubuntu experience that desperately needs some TLC.

This event provoked some philosophical thought. One thing that I love about Linux is that it doesn't presume I am an idiot. While a cryptic dialog or two doesn't bother me, it does bother a "normal" user. This tension between catering to "normal" users and enabling power users could be resolved (perhaps) with one additional selection on the "create user" screen during startup. If the user could select between "Normal" (default), "Technical", and "Expert", and have this selection available throughout the GUI to tailor dialog boxes to the current user's skill level, perhaps that would provide a more satisfying experience all around. (No, I don't have a patch, just a politely offered suggestion.)

Sleep and resume work exactly as expected - close the lid, and the Starling sleeps. Open the lid and press the power button, and 12 seconds later you are right back where you left off. If you just walk away with the lid open, it drifts off to sleep after 10 minutes, slowly blanking the screen, until a touch on the pad awakens it.

Battery life while actively browsing the web is about 5 hours. I didn't measure battery life while sleeping, because I haven't let it sleep longer than I've slept. The battery life exceeds my expectations, and that's that.

I plugged my ViewSonic VA712b 17" monitor into the SVGA plug, with hopes that the Starling would self-configure. It did not, so I tried the obvious (to me, at least) - Preferences → Display. The VA712b was properly detected but disabled by default; selecting it in the panel and clicking "On" allowed me to position it in the panel as on my physical desktop. Selecting Apply replicated the netbook display on the monitor; a message informed me that I needed to log out to achieve full functionality. After logging back in, I was able to use the netbook display and monitor as an extended width desktop, as expected.

Pre-loaded Software

One reason I chose the Starling over (for example) a Dell netbook is that System76 pre-loads the latest Ubuntu release, in this case 9.04 (also called the Jaunty Jackalope). Dell and some other major vendors pre-load the most recent Long Term Support (LTS) release, which is currently a year older.

Having 9.04 means having the sexy new notification system (which I've found that I like), but I would be happy with 8.04. I'm just "normal" enough to favor higher version numbers.

In theory, 9.04 includes some very nice Compiz effects, but turning them on created distracting artifacts on the Starling display. Compiz does not appear to be well-supported on the Starling, so I saved the CPU load for the applications.

Favorites

On first boot, the Favorites application tab is displayed. It offered exactly what I expected, having used Ubuntu for several years.

Firefox 3.0.11 is the default browser, of course, and comes with the necessary plug-ins (such as Flash) to play rich Internet media pre-installed. As with most applications, pressing F11 causes Firefox to occupy the full screen - even the tabs are hidden, allowing the web page full use of the screen, a very nice feature given the small screen size of a true netbook (in this case, 1024x576). Bumping the mouse against the top while in full-screen mode reveals the tabs and toolbars for easy selection. I added my favorite add-ons (Tab Mix Plus and Del.icio.us) via Tools → Add-ons as on every other computer I use, and browsing was exactly as I've come to expect.

The Evolution mail and calendar application is provided by default, though I prefer Thunderbird for off-line email access. I set up neither on the netbook, however, as I forward all of my non-work email to gmail, and I've grown quite accustomed to its ubiquitous web interface.

The default instant messenger is Pigdin, which promptly connected me to AOL and Google given a couple of user names and passwords. This too was refreshingly simple and familiar.

The webcam is a mere 640x480 pixels in resolution, remarkably small in this day and age. It is well-supported by the Cheese application for taking photos and videos, with an array of special effects to sweeten the deal. The only feature apparently missing is videoconferencing, unsupported by Cheese or any other pre-installed application I could find. I installed Skype with no trouble, and it works just fine, but a free / open source application for video communications would have made me smile.

The other pre-defined favorite is Help, which I browsed a bit. Unlike most help systems with their "Use the foobar widget to access the foobar" uselessness, Ubuntu Help actually provided clear, specific steps for common tasks like connecting to a non-DHCP wired network or adding a software repository. I recommend that you try this even before you google, a recommendation I've rarely offered with other help systems.

Adding other applications to Favorites is trivial - right-click the application icon and select "Add to Favorites". Similarly, removing an application from Favorites requires simply right-clicking the icon and selecting "Remove".

Productivity

The Starling comes with the core productivity apps common across the open source landscape.

For office work, it includes (of course) OpenOffice.org (word processor, spreadsheet, presentations, and drawing) and the Evolution email and calendar manager; these correspond and are largely file-compatible with Microsoft Office and Outlook. OpenOffice.org also supports full-screen mode, but using control-shift-J instead of the otherwise-standard F11 - an annoying variation.

Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) files are well-supported out of the box by the file system (which faithfully reproduces the first page as an icon) and Evince (now renamed Document Viewer).

Via the usual F11, Evince will use the entire screen to display the PDF file, very useful if you are using your Starling to read E-books.

A true E-book reader (FBReader) is installed by default, supporting a wide variety of formats (fb2, html, chm, rtf, plucker, and apparently some others), although I prefer my books in the ubiquitous PDF.

A dictionary application is also provided, but perversely requires Internet access; given that, I saw no advantage over (for example) dictionary.com in the web browser. I'd really like a local dictionary.

Oddly absent was the ubiquitous GIMP graphics file editor. It was quickly installed, but given its well-known power at manipulating images, I was surprised at its omission.

Media is no problem for the Starling - it plays music and videos out of the box with relative ease. Don't expect Digital Restriction Managed (DRM) files such as songs purchased from iTunes to work, however - despite Linux's growing desktop share (between 1% and 5%, depending on which statistics you believe), major DRM media suppliers such as Apple do not yet provide players for the up and coming OS. The important sources, such as YouTube, work just fine. I understand that syncing earlier iPods (prior to the Touch or iPhone) with non-DRM media such as mp3 is supported by several easily installed applications, though I don't own such a player with which to test it.

System76 offers an optional USB-based DVD writer with the Starling, an option we didn't purchase. We already purchased an Iomega SuperSlim DVD writer for netbook use, because the vendor explicitly supports Linux. When I plugged it into a USB port on the Starling, it was immediately recognized and could read data DVDs without a problem. Burning a CD or DVD requires adding a burner app, however - I recommend Brasero, which installed painlessly via the usual Accessories → Add / Remove dialog.

Movies were more problematic - they were immediately recognized, but Movie Player responded with a horribly user-hostile error dialog, "Totem was not able to play this disc - You are not supposed to show G_IO_ERROR_FAILED_HANDLED in the UI". Somebody needs a stern lesson in "UI" design here.

Since Iomega ships codecs for Linux with their DVD writer, I felt quite justified in installing the ubuntu-restricted-extras package, which enabled DVD playback with no further unpleasantness. This is a bit much for a novice to figure out, however; it should definitely be easier (and possibly is, when the DVD drive is purchased with the netbook).

The low audio volume makes external speakers or headphones a must for watching movies.

The Iomega DVD writer is a "two plug" device - it includes a data USB plug, and a second USB plug to boost power when the host device is current-limited. The second plug was needed when the Starling was operating on battery power, indicating that the USB ports are current-limited. The second plug was not needed when the Starling was plugged into the power brick, except to play videos.

The Starling includes a wealth of accessories, including a calculator (with Basic, Advanced, Financial, Scientific, and Programming modes), multi-language text editor, the Tomboy Notes manager, F-Spot photo manager, Take Screenshot (with full screen, window, and region modes), password manager, and printer manager.

If you are an old-school "RPN" calculator fan, by the way, you should seek out Free42. It's not in the repository, but you can install it by googling "ubuntu free42" and following directions. It works just like the old HP-42 super-calculator from my college days.

Administration

Administration is straightforward, with applets similar to other operating systems including Users and Groups, Time and Date, System Monitor, Update Manager, Network Tools, Printing, Hardware Drivers, Language Support, and Calibrate Touchscreen.

Login Window Preferences gives excellent control over the login screen (if you use one).

The Synaptic Package Manager is basically Accessories → Add / Remove for more technical users; they should really be integrated into a single applet. Software Sources makes managing the vast "repositories" of freely available software easy for the novice (us old-timers still like to modify the underlying text-based configuration files, but we'll get over it).

An applet unique to the Starling (and perhaps other System76 products?) is called System76 Driver. This enables you to restore your Starling to the original factory load (i.e., what used to be called a "Restore CD"). You can also create an archive of the system logs to provide System76 support technicians when requesting technical support, and search for additional drivers, neither of which I found to be necessary. Its inclusion is a very nice touch, and another reason to prefer the Starling over loading Ubuntu on a netbook over that other operating system pre-installed.

Games

Linux has a reputation for weak game support, but this is only true if you love the latest massive on-line games. The Starling comes with a very nice selection of 17 more conventional computer games, including better versions of Solitaire (more variations than I could count) and Minesweeper than you'll get with Windows.

I am a huge fan of Yahtzee-like games, and was initially pleased to see Tali pre-installed. However, the Roll button doesn't quite fit on-screen (see the screen shot above), requiring a creative use of the Tab and Enter keys to accomplish re-rolls (hint: Tab cycles between the score sheet, dice, and off-screen "roll" button, so tab until nothing is highlighted and then press Enter to roll). This was a surprising rough spot for an operating system that projects such polish in so many areas.

One of the first games that I ever saw on a 1970's computer, Robots, is available on the Games tab. Again, the game has a surprising rough spot in that the key assignments for movement assume a numeric keypad not present on a netbook. The trackpad worked fine for moving your robot-phobic avatar, however, and the sound effects are amusing. All in all, it was as fun as I dimly remembered.

I had never tried Same Gnome before, but it has everything a new addiction requires - trivial to understand rules, hypnotic animation, and that "just one more game" factor.

Some of the best games on Linux (in my opinion) are not included, but should be. This includes the excellent Crimson Fields, a turn-based hex-oriented strategy wargame giving you command of tanks, helicopters, and other units. It is very reminiscent of the old Avalon Hill paper-and-die wargames that I loved in my youth. I've played every pre-defined battle from both sides. Recommended.

If you prefer puzzle-style games, you won't be disappointed by the inveterate Hex-a-Hop. The girl skips around on hexes, breaking the green hexes which disappear behind her. The goal of each screen is to eliminate all green hexes. More advanced levels include dark green hexes (requiring two passes to destroy), raised hexes, laser hexes, regenerative hexes, trampolines, hop-in-place power-ups... well, you won't be soon bored.

I installed both easily in a few minutes via Administration → Synaptic Package Manager.

WINE (Wine Is Not an Emulator), sometimes used to play Windows games on Linux, is not included. I didn't install it, because the Starling's Atom processor isn't really intended for such abuse. If you want to play high-end Windows games, you'll want a gaming laptop - they start around $1,099, so bring your savings passbook.

Performance

The Starling is powered by a 1.6 GHz Intel Atom low-power processor, which is known to strain certain other operating systems' ability to provide good performance. Under Ubuntu NBR, the Atom seems more than adequate.

I was able to run full-screen video and a simple game with no lag at all. Indeed, nothing I threw at the Starling caused it to hesitate, which is a testament either to Linux' efficiency on a low-power device or my lack of true hard-core applications - notably, I don't play First Person Shooter (FPS) games like World of Warcraft. I wouldn't expect the Starling to handle such a load without issues, but you never know.

(The screenshot shows some apparent artifacts in the video stream, but this appears to be a side-effect of the Take Screenshot applet. The video itself was very smooth and watchable, if a bit quiet.)

Conclusion

In my opinion, the bottom line in any review by an actual owner (as opposed to a professional journalist with a loaner system) is buyer remorse: Would I buy it again over competing products if I had the chance?

Without a doubt, I would buy it again. Despite a few rough edges, and I've never used a system without a few rough edges, the Starling is a pleasure to use. It is light, comfortable, very responsive, and a joy for writing, browsing, or communicating with friends.

I purchased a small, briefcase-style padded case to take the Starling with me when I travel. In addition to the power brick and cord, I carry a CompactFlash to USB adapter (my old camera still uses CF cards); a 5' Ethernet cable for when wireless isn't available; an audio patch cable to run sound to an external system; earphones; a small USB mouse; and a USB-powered 160 GB external hard drive for backups and file transfers.

In other words: Have Starling, Will Travel.

Last updated 9 August 2009