Thanks for the reply, ahj. I think your advice is sound.
Cory Doctorow made kind of the same point last July, if you read his review
carefully enough:
http://boingboing.net/2012/07/06/zareason-a-computer-company-w.html
"ZaReason doesn't really do a laptop for road warriors (yet) ... Though I
thoroughly support ZaReason's mission, I regret to say that I'm not their
target market."
My Alto will probably end up living a sheltered life as a desktop-replacement
research machine. I'm back to square one on finding a capable, not-fragile
travelling unit. I might do what you suggest, or I might try to hack around
with a linuxified chromebook, single-distro. Either way, yes, 200-300, not
$1000+ ... I won't be able to afford any more grand experiments for quite a
while anyway.
