Pretty much agree on everything you write. Also, it was reported on El Reg and other sites that Microsoft has already backported some of the telemetry into Win7 and Win8.x as well (via updates). Would be nice to know the extent of that one. It seems, that the only viable choice for general, open computing without handing over your data and user habits is now Linux + the different BSDs.

I wouldn't call absorption-cycle deprecated. In fact, I would definitely by an absorption-cycle fridge if it was available in similar size as my current fridge.

Absorption-cycle fridges can be made practically silent while the ones with compressors are very noisy (maybe not the top-of-the-line, very expensive ones but still). I have my fridge in the living room so it would be worth some premium for me to have a completely silent fridge.

Moreover, I have a huge solar-hot-water-collector array, which over-produces in the summer so I would run that fridge for free (if it had external input option)

Unfortunately, nowadays, only very small fridges can be purchased with absorption-cycle. These are designed for RVs and only have propane input.

Just because the power density proves to be weak, these batteries will not be automatically excluded from EV applications.

If the practical energy density is 4 times of the current, it will be worth it to combine them with supercaps or smaller packs of high-power-density battery types.

Acceleration and regen will be handled by the supercap while average power-requirements satisfied by the sulfur battery. Naturally, the sulfur battery must be able to provide at least the average power needed but that may be solved by over-sizing the packs to an extent (providing more range than it would be strictly necessary).

I believe x86 Chromebooks have very strong Linux support.

Even the Samsung ARM Chromebook is fairly well supported by ChrUbuntu 12.04. The battery life is definitely not reduced below 6.5 hours average and most of the hw features are well supported (audio, screen, trackpad, hw keys, suspend-resume).

Chromebooks are extremely limited in availability in Europe.

I have also ordered mine from Amazon UK but that was a fairly straightforward process. You can even have the VAT removed from the price if you register with an EU-wide company tax ID.

I am wondering how many Chromebooks get reinstalled with Linux or other operating systems so they don't show up in the statistics as Chromebooks.

The new generation of Chromebooks are usually very cheap when compared to Windows machines with similar hardware so it is worth it to buy them and put an other OS on it (especially if you are a Linux guy)

My XE303C (Samsung ARM Chromebook) got reinstalled in one day after arrival and Ubuntu 12.04 makes it a pretty good Linux laptop.

Ubuntu's Unity and Gnome3 != Linux 2013

There are a set of refined DEs for Linux which provide you with a better than "Windows 2007" desktop experience. KDE is the most prominent of them but MATE and XFCE are also strong contenders.

You get a refined desktop experience with Linux Mint MATE.

Bullshit. This nonsense has been refuted countless times.

1) Have you noticed the huge amount of solar and wind generation capacity installed in your country recently?

2) Have you noticed the annual 30-40% drop rate of solar panel prices?

3) Have you noticed the upcoming grid-scale storage developments (e.g.: GE's Durathon) which are nearing mass production?

I would say that the US grid will look VERY DIFFERENT in 20 years time whether anyone there like/want it or not. Renewables will simply kill fossil/nuclear based generation once adequate grid-scale storage solutions are deployed (which is not far ahead, see no 3).

Absolutely agree. It is possible to write excellent Java desktop applications especially if you use an RCP platform like the Netbeans RCP or Eclipse RCP.

It is even possible to make them good looking with modern Swing look & feels like JGoodies.

The big news here is that the first EOMA-68 formatted computing cards and accepting cases are nearing completion. This is an open-source project with a strong emphasis on embedded Linux.

This will make it possible to upgrade the computing core of your tablet or set-top-box or all-in-one computers, smart-tv when higher-performance computing cores become available.

This makes sense since, for example, there are a lot of parts on modern tablets that need no upgrade at all (e.g. an IPS retina display is already at the edge of the capabilities of the human eye).

I, for one, would be very happy if my NAS was upgradable like this.

The behaviour is certainly there.

I want to use desktop Java apps on it. There are quite a few usable ones. I also want to have an emergency-case Netbeans installation on it in case my desktop fails for some reason and I quickly need to fix something in the Java based SAS software our company is selling.

I have been using the new ARM Chromebook with ChrUbuntu Alpha + refinemeents for almost 2 weeks and I have to say that it already a usable configuration. Most of the important desktop stuff already works (suspend-resume, playing videos...etc) and with good speed. This new Exynos 5250 is really a desktop class processor (at least as strong as the one in my old Toshiba Portege m200). For example: it cold-starts LibreOffice Writer in 5s which is pretty unheard of in the ARM world. If I manage to setup hw accelerated video playing and Oracle's Java, I will be an extremely happy Chromebook owner but I already consider it a good purchase in its current state.