Bulk ordering USB flash drives for exhibitions - call to action

[Colin Finck]

Hi all,

As more and more computers these days come without optical drives, we're
thinking about switching from ReactOS CD giveaways to USB flash drive
giveaways on exhibitions (like this month's FOSDEM). ReactOS would then
come preinstalled in a VM on these drives. When ReactOS' USB support
gets better, we may even think about making these drives bootable.

Now the prices for 1GB USB drives haven't quite reached the costs of
blank CDs yet. Also many countries put a high fee on USB drives, because
you will for sure always use them to pirate copyrighted work... For
example, we're talking about a fee of 1€/unit here in Germany. Germany
is fair enough though to not apply the fee if you're ordering from
outside Germany. Maybe this also works the other way round, i.e. we as
ReactOS Deutschland e.V. order USB drives from another European country
and don't have to pay this fee.

Sooo, who of you knows a good supplier in your (European) country for
bulk ordering USB drives with the best per-unit price? Even better if
your supplier can print a custom logo on these drives.
Depending on the price, we're talking about 50-200 drives here.

Reply on the forum please:
https://reactos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=13917

Thanks for your help in making a great ReactOS presentation at exhibitions!

- Colin

[Javier Agustìn Fernàndez Arroyo]

-------1!!!
Absolutely no! ISO files can be mounted into VM as easily as burned intó
CD/Dvd and everyone knows how to do it. I can not tell the same about USB
flash
El 05/01/2015 15:11, "Colin Finck" [e-mail] escribió:
> Hi all,
>
> As more and more computers these days come without optical drives, we're
> thinking about switching from ReactOS CD giveaways to USB flash drive
> giveaways on exhibitions (like this month's FOSDEM). ReactOS would then
> come preinstalled in a VM on these drives. When ReactOS' USB support
> gets better, we may even think about making these drives bootable.
>
> Now the prices for 1GB USB drives haven't quite reached the costs of
> blank CDs yet. Also many countries put a high fee on USB drives, because
> you will for sure always use them to pirate copyrighted work... For
> example, we're talking about a fee of 1€/unit here in Germany. Germany
> is fair enough though to not apply the fee if you're ordering from
> outside Germany. Maybe this also works the other way round, i.e. we as
> ReactOS Deutschland e.V. order USB drives from another European country
> and don't have to pay this fee.
>
> Sooo, who of you knows a good supplier in your (European) country for
> bulk ordering USB drives with the best per-unit price? Even better if
> your supplier can print a custom logo on these drives.
> Depending on the price, we're talking about 50-200 drives here.
>
> Reply on the forum please:
> https://reactos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=13917
>
> Thanks for your help in making a great ReactOS presentation at exhibitions!
> Colin
>
> Ros-dev mailing list
> [e-mail]
> http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev

[Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO]

As an aside it would be an occasion to try to see whether we couldn't test some kind of USB boot ramdisk thing.

-----Message d'origine-----
De : Ros-dev [mailto:[e-mail]] De la part de Colin Finck
Envoyé : lundi 5 janvier 2015 15:10
À : ReactOS Development List
Objet : [ros-dev] Bulk ordering USB flash drives for exhibitions - call to action

Hi all,

As more and more computers these days come without optical drives, we're thinking about switching from ReactOS CD giveaways to USB flash drive giveaways on exhibitions (like this month's FOSDEM). ReactOS would then come preinstalled in a VM on these drives. When ReactOS' USB support gets better, we may even think about making these drives bootable.

Now the prices for 1GB USB drives haven't quite reached the costs of blank CDs yet. Also many countries put a high fee on USB drives, because you will for sure always use them to pirate copyrighted work... For example, we're talking about a fee of 1€/unit here in Germany. Germany is fair enough though to not apply the fee if you're ordering from outside Germany. Maybe this also works the other way round, i.e. we as ReactOS Deutschland e.V. order USB drives from another European country and don't have to pay this fee.

Sooo, who of you knows a good supplier in your (European) country for bulk ordering USB drives with the best per-unit price? Even better if your supplier can print a custom logo on these drives.
Depending on the price, we're talking about 50-200 drives here.

Reply on the forum please:
https://reactos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=13917

Thanks for your help in making a great ReactOS presentation at exhibitions!

- Colin

[Colin Finck]

With more and more quotes from various European sellers coming in, I now
have an overview about the costs of bulk ordering 100 1GB USB drives
with printed ReactOS logos.
Even after considering all labelling, ink and paper sleeves needed for
CDs, 100 USB flash drives are still at least 10 times as expensive as
100 CDs.

I fully understand that more and more computers these days come without
optical drives. Still it's debatable whether that's really a problem for
the average interested ReactOS prospect coming to our booth.

So my actual question is: Is a USB drive really 10 times as useful as a
CD for promoting ReactOS at events?
What are your suggestions regarding USB drives? And I'm asking our PR
people in particular here.

Cheers,

Colin

[Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO]

Hi!
> I fully understand that more and more computers these days come without

optical drives. Still it's debatable whether that's really a problem for the
average interested ReactOS prospect coming to our booth.

Depends which type of computers you're talking about: if you're talking
about mini-laptops for example, yes they don't have cd drives, but for
bigger PCs I think they still have one (unless something happened in the
world that I haven't seen...).

H.

[Pavel Pisa]

Hello everybody,

my connection to REACTOS is really weak but there are my two
cents adds to the discussion.

The media at booth are mainly a more firm version
of business card/leaflet where most important information
is pointer to the project webpages. I suggest (above all) to invest
into preparation of installer (for Windows, Linux and probably MacOS
and may it be for Android) which can be downloaded
and prepares boot USB drive automatically. There are existing
projects to start with.

If you want to distribute your "visit card" for free, then use
CD, it is bigger to overlook when somebody brings it home and
if really wants to install system, he/she can download it from
website.

Then you can offer USB Flash as an alternative but at cost
which covers your expenses. It is no lost for buyer because
USB Flash is generic investment and can be used for something
else or be upgraded for newer REACTOS installer. And some
people would be happy to buy REACTOS USB Flash at end user price
and know that price difference to bulk orders goes to the
REACTOS community. This way SLAX Linux USB keys are distributed
for example - can be bought at exhibitions or ordered online.

Best wishes,

Pavel

On Monday 12 of January 2015 12:47:02 Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO wrote:
> Hi!
> > I fully understand that more and more computers these days come without
>
> optical drives. Still it's debatable whether that's really a problem for
> the average interested ReactOS prospect coming to our booth.
>
> Depends which type of computers you're talking about: if you're talking
> about mini-laptops for example, yes they don't have cd drives, but for
> bigger PCs I think they still have one (unless something happened in the
> world that I haven't seen...).
>
> H.

[Zachary Gorden]

Personal position is no, USBs are not worth it right now. Not with ReactOS
not being able to reliably boot from USB. Until we reach that point, stick
with CDs. At this point if someone does not have a SATA or IDE connected
drive, their chances of installing ReactOS at all has already dropped below
50/50. The goal is to give people something that they can use. If we
already know that it's not likely to work, we should not be expending
effort or resources on it.

On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 6:18 AM, Pavel Pisa [e-mail] wrote:
> Hello everybody,
>
> my connection to REACTOS is really weak but there are my two
> cents adds to the discussion.
>
> The media at booth are mainly a more firm version
> of business card/leaflet where most important information
> is pointer to the project webpages. I suggest (above all) to invest
> into preparation of installer (for Windows, Linux and probably MacOS
> and may it be for Android) which can be downloaded
> and prepares boot USB drive automatically. There are existing
> projects to start with.
>
> If you want to distribute your "visit card" for free, then use
> CD, it is bigger to overlook when somebody brings it home and
> if really wants to install system, he/she can download it from
> website.
>
> Then you can offer USB Flash as an alternative but at cost
> which covers your expenses. It is no lost for buyer because
> USB Flash is generic investment and can be used for something
> else or be upgraded for newer REACTOS installer. And some
> people would be happy to buy REACTOS USB Flash at end user price
> and know that price difference to bulk orders goes to the
> REACTOS community. This way SLAX Linux USB keys are distributed
> for example - can be bought at exhibitions or ordered online.
>
> Best wishes,
>            Pavel
>
>
> On Monday 12 of January 2015 12:47:02 Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO wrote:
> > Hi!
> > > I fully understand that more and more computers these days come without
> >
> > optical drives. Still it's debatable whether that's really a problem for
> > the average interested ReactOS prospect coming to our booth.
> >
> > Depends which type of computers you're talking about: if you're talking
> > about mini-laptops for example, yes they don't have cd drives, but for
> > bigger PCs I think they still have one (unless something happened in the
> > world that I haven't seen...).
> >
> > H.
>
> Ros-dev mailing list
> [e-mail]
> http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev