Performance is certainly better this time around. I think posting (part of) the readme on the first page would help a lot of confused users. It includes a changelog, password (ubuntu), a list of what works and what doesn't, etc -- just like the Android builds.
My impressions of 0.3 are in some respects better than 0.2, but for all of my use cases, it is one step forward, 2 (or 3) steps backward. But I do not mean ANY insult by this, honestly. It is obvious a lot of work has gone into the release, despite delays. The lack of sound and keypad (X issue? Did you open a ticket/report?) and proper stand-by are the biggest remaining administrative niggles. I'm impressed by the Unity interface, even though it occasionally fails to load properly. (It loaded the first time, but on every subsequent reboot it never loads.)
- I see the available memory is now 412.3MB. This is good.
- Applications (as well as boot) speeds are much improved.
- There is no openoffice. This is a big regression, since the "Zoho" nonsense is no better than Office Mobile, Android's QuickOffice, or anything else, but much worse due to compatibility trouble, functionality, and usability on the go. A big allure to "Ubuntu" is that it contains full desktop compatible software, not watered-down items tethered to an internet connection (read below: wifi does not work). Real Office (OpenOffice) was one if not THE major use case for Ubuntu on the device, since a system with no sound, no calls, etc is only truly useful for desktop use cases.
- Wifi does not work, and my home network is not even detected. I'm looking into this and seeing if there isn't something I can do to get it running. (edit: only eth0 interface is detected by wicd, there is no wlan anywhere). Is the firmware included?
- Battery status partially works (you need to click an icon to get the status and fill %), and charging still does not seem to work (tested by hooking the USB to the computer).
All in all, this release is not usable in its current form -- no unity launching, I had to create desktop launchers for system monitor, terminal, etc, and no wifi means no ability to download openoffice from software center, I cannot browse the web or view/work on documents, etc.
An impressive effort, and I can see this is a step forward. But again, it is with great pain (and hours of struggle with the system) that I must report that for me it is multiple steps backward as well. I also wish, in hindsight, that the development progress had been posted here so I could comment/test/help out wherever I could. I'm going to keep trying to enable wifi, which will allow me to debug Unity (or remove it and install a real netbook interface like KDE's).