Everex introduced this week a $198 Linux desktop with Google software embedded. The sub-$200 Linux-powered "Green gPC" made by Everex of Taiwan went on sale at 600 Wal-Mart stores and online. This is basically the same computer as the $298 Windows Vista computer from Everex, and the $100 difference is due to the licensing costs of Windows Vista (most of it) and the addition of more memory.

The Everex TC2502 Green gPC features a 80 GB 7200 RPM hard drive, combo DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive, 512 MB of RAM, a VIA C7-D Processor running at 1.5Ghz, and standard peripherals: speakers, mouse and keyboard, with the monitor not included.

"We had been contemplating this since the beginning of the year," said Everex director of marketing Paul Kim to ZDNet. "We had been looking at various Ubuntu distributions, but we always felt that Ubuntu wasn’t quite what we needed. Then we met with David and the GOS team."

The gOS Linux distribution is based on Ubuntu Linux. However, gOS is heavily geared toward Google's Web sites and online applications, like YouTube, Gmail and the company's word processing program, all of which can be used only when the computer is connected to a broadband line. The gOS also comes with the preinstalled freeware office suite OpenOffice.org 2.2 (which includes WRITER, IMPRESS, nMATH, DRAW, CALC and BASE).

"The intent of GOS is to take [Linux] to the consumer and do what Steve Jobs did with Mac OS X-- to take an alternative OS and package it for the consumer," said David Liu, founder of GOS.

Everex also announced sub-$300 laptops which will come with 12.1-inch to 17-inch screens and run the same gOS. The notebooks will be introduced in the first half of next year, Kim said.

Everex ("Ever for Excellence") was established in 1983 and is headquartered in Fremont, California. The company was market leader in backup tape drives in the 80s but folded and went bankrupt in 1993. It was subsequently acquired by the Formosa Plastics Group.