Hello everyone,
I’m still here. Life took a detour while my daughter was born. That tends to keep one away from blogging.
As soon as I went off the radar for a month or two Zonbu ran out and changed their business strategy, or at least course corrected it. Which I happen to think is a good thing, and I’ll be writing about that in another post. I am worried about how long it took and developments in the broader linux market, like Ubuntu 8.04 shipping (which is very nice BTW).
Also, Mrs. Zonbu ended her three month affair with her Zonbu laptop and ended up with a new $500 Acer running Vista. I’ll be going in to more details later, but it was a wide combination of things, most of them Linux rather than Zonbu specific.
I have noticed traffice is also way down on the Zonbu support forums. Is this a sign?
-Mr. Zonbu
Real life with the Zonbu Mini-PC 
I hope it’s a sign that they are on a steep downhill slope to oblivion.
Welcome back Mr Zonbu. My Zonbox is now so slow that I am seriously contemplating a new desktop. I just can’t bring myself to get something with a noisy disk drive and fan after the serene calmness and zen state brought on by my Zonbu. Any suggestions?
P.S. If I couldn’t get ZonbuOS running on a new box then I would be happy to consider XP, but Vista? No flippin’ way.
For me as an owner of the Zonbu mini the change of the business strategie is good: my Zonbu is just a client system, a kind of dumb web terminal, with no data on that. And if they provide upgrades and updates for free in the future, it will stay for a long time in the cabinet under the TV set ..
Congratulations on your new child. It is understandable that you have less time to blog here. Still, your insights and observations on this new development with Zonbu will be of interest, when you are able to share them.
Congrats on the new offspring, the fun is just beginning, wait ’till the teenage years…
When do you expect to post about the latest developments? I’ve been researching this, and other thin client offerings, several interesting things in the pipe in this area.
Regarding Mrs. Zonbu’s move to Vista, Mrs. Z-Curious has had a Dell laptop shipped with Ubuntu for over a year now, and is totally happy with it, especially now that she knows how to download new Open Source applications at will. With Windows 7 around the corner and XP support (and downgrade from Vista) extending, I just wonder how long Vista will really live…
I’ve noticed changes, too. I placed an order on May 9, through their website and received a confirmation e-mail confirming my order for the Zonbu Mini for $99. Three days later they tell me that they are only offering the Zonbu for $299 and that it is out of stock but should be in stock within 1 or 2 weeks. I placed my order right before their website listed it as out of stock. But that’s OK, I could wait. I ask if they will honor my order or at least give me some kind of discount. Nope. I ask why they will not honor an order that has already been confirmed. They only say that they “can no longer offer a discount on the hardware”. They don’t realize that I’m not talking about now, I’m talking about an order I placed a few days in the past. Nevertheless, I placed another order for the full price of $299 on May 14, still asking for a direct response. A week later, after I requested a stock update they say that they expect stock by the last week in May. Four full weeks have passed since and not a word about when it will be in stock. Twice more I ask for a direct response. Apart from the fact that they never answered my question about why they cannot honor my confirmed $99 order, they suggested that it would be better if I were not a customer if I proceeded with this complaint. How about if they just answered my question and apologized for tripling the price right after I placed my order? That would have gone a very long way towards making me happy with them. I was still willing to pay full price, but I decided to cancel my order, especially after reading other peoples’ reviews about Zonbu’s products and customer service. I’ll probably buy when I feel more comfortable with them.
They’re still taking my monthly payment, so that part is working fine. My wife, for whom I purchased a “maintenance free” system, has few complaints, though I wonder about the wisdom of a two-year agreement at this time …
Hi Mr. Zonbu, it has been a month since you posted. It is understandable that you have other priorities now; this blog may be headed for the archive in the cyber sky. If so, perhaps you would would consider providing some closure, for those of us who have been checking back for your further insights, with a final update and analysis.
CherryPal may be of interest:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2326024,00.asp
Mr. Zonbu, either show up with useful information or close this darn blog.
Zonbu and the people behind it will make it fail. I had my credit card stolen, which is the one I used to pay my monthly fee. So I had to get a new number, so I open a support ticket and nothing.. Next thing I know I’m getting emails saying your account is late, so I respond to the email saying yes I know this is late, why have you not responded to my support request which I tried to take care of 13 days before I was to get billed. Again nothing back, and a week later the same email again asking for payment, so I again respond saying YES I KNOW, but again NOTHING BACK FROM THEM. So now I just ignore the emails they send, as AMEX has STOPPED PAYMENT ON ZONBU. This company is soon to go under.
Bye Zonbu
Oh I now have a nice looking paperweight aka Zonbu Mini
David – I think many would argue there is lots of useful information here about the Zonbu.
I am waiting for a new software release or a new announcement from the company before I invest further time. The last beta update listed on the support section of their site is from May.
A lot of new netbook and small desktop products have been released recently, but I am most interested in seeing what path Zonbu chooses, although I must confess I use my ASUS eeepc a few times a week and haven’t had my Zonbu on in a while.
-Mr. Z
I heard about this via an insider…a green pc that is powered by solar panels and REC’s….plus it uses 6 watts of power and replaces your home PC, work PC, and laptop…you just have one OS, the same OS desktop for all three. From what I hear its better then zonbu nd the others. You can check the web site for more info when it comes about at http://www.agreenpc.com