Twitching Fingers

With a 2 year signed contract & $99 down, you pay about $13 15/month.  There's no real hard drive, which means that this thing doesn't need fans and can't overheat.  PCMag says, "...the Zonbu is a silent (no fans) machine that consumes less electricity than most notebooks. (It used 8W in standby and 11W in use playing DVDs or making a Skype call, using our Kill-A-Watt power monitor.)"  I won't pretend that I know enough about wattage to compare these stats to what an average PC takes at either regular use or standby mode, but I think it's safe to assume that this is an impressive amount less.  Zonbu here claims, "Zonbu delivers the power of a traditional desktop computer but uses just a fraction of the energy. That could mean as much as $10 a month in energy savings for you..." 

So, are there really true advantages to owning renting/leasing a computer on a monthly basis?  

If you wanted to watch a DVD or listen to a CD, that's an extra $50 purchase for this external device for you because that drive doesn't exist inside the Zonbu.  Zonbu Mini also doesn't seem to come with the peripherals you'd expect; their product seems to assume that you already have a keyboard, mousey, and monitor to use with it.  Thus you can expect to make additional purchases if this is your "starter" PC.  Finally, that $10 bucks you save in energy is taken right back by the $14.95 you pay monthly. 

Keep in mind that in this particular subscription mode, you can't download extra software.  That's a good thing if you have a tendency to download crapplications from freeware sites that have crashed your system, it's a bad thing if you just want a new piece of software to run that didn't come pre-installed.  (PC Magazine does state that you can purchase more freedom for your Zonbu in "community" mode.)   Note also that Zonbu is "broadband ready" and so too must you be; the back of Zonbu (click here) has no option for a dial-up user.   Thus, folks who are relying on dial-up (maybe to save some cash or something) will not be able to take advantage of Zonbu.  

In the long run, yeah, maybe this subscription method IS the way to go.  It's hard to swallow the thought that a subscription might actually, in the long run, save you money.  But their OS (Linux Gentoo) promises transparent upgrades that you'll never have to worry about.  (Upgrading Vista scares the shit out of me, and I'm rather happy with my tower growing old on XP, thank you very much.)  Any files / work you save is web-based, so you don't (nay, CAN'T!) rely on the Zonbu device for storing much outside of your settings & preferences.  Thus...

As long as you are a subscriber to a Zonbu hassle-free plan, in the unlikely event that your Zonbu device fails, let us know and we'll send you a replacement Zonbu device that very day. Just plug in your replacement Zonbu device and immediately access your valuable data stored on the Zonbu service, with all of your preferences and settings intact. Once you're back up and running, send us your old Zonbu device. What could be easier?

(But since Zonbu does include the money factor as a reason that their solution will work best, then why not also partner up with ISP high-speed services & *really* deliver the whole shebang to us?)

PC Magazine reports that the storage is serviced by the Amazon S3 network.  So if you weren't comfortable with saving all your data on the web, then you... had best work on getting over that, if you're purchasing a Zonbu.  C'mon, everyone's doing it anyway...   And speaking of what everyone else is doing, Zonbu's personal productivity suite relies on OpenOffice.org.  With a Linux OS, it probably makes sense to go with an anti-Microsoft alternative (they certainly don't want to include security flaws in their transparent upgrades to you) -- but more importantly, it reflects the growing commitment to the open source mentality, which seems to be a founding father of Web 2.0.

And let's not forget: Zonbu is appealing to that ever ubiquitous eco-conscience that's blooming in all of us.  Considering the cash that mega-corps are hurling into the green tech revolution for R&D, surely your inner eco-warrior is growing greener by the day, no?  Don't you want her/him to be tech savvy?

Despite Zonbu's lack of fans in terms of hardware, it could very well have many fans growing elsewhere.

...booooo, horrible pun, I know...