$200 is even more astounding after further thought. We've paid as much as $600 for our linux thin-clients (wyse winterms).
I guess that extra money went to the small form factor and some of the bundled but proprietary software. The end result is pretty sweet though. A linux box with no moving parts or custom settings. They boot off of firmware files pointed to by our dhcp server. (also a linux box) Our workers, when something goes wrong, have been instructed to pull the power cord, wait 5 minutes, and plug the thin-client back in. Only time that hasn't worked has been when a switch port fails randomly/permanently in our network stack.
This is where cheap linux boxes have actually started making inroads. Limited use workstations for retail and manufacturing. Free-form office work? Not so much yet.
While the thin-clients have come down in price, they certainly don't match this $200 milestone. Example pricing:
wyse.vecmar.com/winterm/default.htm
Comparing the prices across the OSes is a bit baffling in that link...
