Intel Alder Lake-N CPU powers news Linux tablet PC — Juno Tab 3 features N100 CPU, 12GB RAM, and 512GB SSD for $699

Yesterday, Juno Computers launched its Juno Tab 3, a 12.1-inch, 3:2 PC tablet based on an Intel N100 CPU and one of three pre-installed Linux flavors, starting at $699 for the 512 GB model and quadrupling storage to 2 TB for $799. All models of this new tablet also have 12 GB of soldered LPDDR5 RAM, which is an excellent baseline, though soldered RAM handily removes your usual memory upgrade options. The most exciting aspect of this tablet for most should be the operating system options— proper Linux tablets are incredibly uncommon, after all.

The Intel N100 is an Alder Lake-N chip with a quad-core design without Hyper-Threading. Clocked at 3.4 GHz, it isn't as fast as the N200 or Core i3-N300, but the chip should be more than adequate to power the Juno Tab 3. The fact that the table utilizes the Linux operating system means that the N100 doesn't have to do a lot of heavy lifting.

The three flavors of Linux that can be pre-installed on the Juno Tab 3 are Mobian Phosh, Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, or Kubuntu 24.04 LTS. Ubuntu and Kubuntu are pretty standard desktop Linux flavors, but Mobian Phosh is a derivative of the also-standard Debian distribution that provides a more touch-friendly interface.

Juno Tab 3 Core Specifications

All that being said, it's difficult not to address the elephant in the room here: the pricing of this tablet for its specifications isn't excellent. While a small US-based hardware vendor like Juno Computers probably shouldn't be expected to be price-competitive with the biggest PC manufacturers, $700 is still a lot of money to ask for any single piece of hardware— particularly when much cheaper tablets of the same spec for close to half the price.

Overall, more robust Windows machines will be available if you're willing to spend $700. But if your desire to use (and support) Linux is strong enough and you don't want to bother with the risks and tedium of installing Linux yourself, Juno Tab 3 could be a nice companion. Your mileage may vary, though.