Why Dell Won't Offer Linux On Its PCs 628
derrida sends us to an article in the Guardian by Jack Schofield explaining why he believes Dell won't offer Linux on its PCs. In the end he suggests that those lobbying Dell for such a solution go out and put together a company and offer one themselves. Quoting: "The most obvious [problem] is deciding which version of Linux to offer. There are more than 100 distros, and everybody seems to want a different one — or the same one with a different desktop, or whatever. It costs Dell a small fortune to offer an operating system... so the lack of a standard is a real killer. The less obvious problem is the very high cost of Linux support, especially when selling cheap PCs to naive users who don't RTFM... and wouldn't understand a Linux manual if they tried. And there's so much of it! Saying 'Linux is just a kernel, so that's all we support' isn't going to work, but where in the great sprawling heap of GNU/Linux code do you draw the line?"
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:5, Informative)
As far as Windows and daylight savings goes, XP/2003 boxes were all patched by standard patch-tuesday patches. For win2k it took me a grand total of 15 minutes to research it on MS's website, write (+ copy/paste) a few text files, and roll them out on the Active Directory Domain. Not really tough. There are lots of problems with Windows. Daylight savings time just wasn't a big one.
Support (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Existing Open Source Series? (Score:2, Informative)
There was that article a while back about people using the EULA clause that required OEMs to refund the money if the user didn't agree to the EULA, the Dell refund was for $53. This would indicate that Dell has a fairly good deal with Microsoft to get Windows at a reduced price (This itself might be a reason for not shipping Linux, as MS could start charging full price again as a retaliation).
The other thing is that Dell can ship with spyware, adware, AOL, Yahoo! toolbar, etc... to get a price reduction, unless they can do the same for Linux, they might actually be loosing money by not shipping Windows depending on how much these packages pay Dell. Although if they pay via usage rather than the number of shipped installs then offering systems without an OS might not matter so much because the systems would probally be getting wiped anyway but if they ship Linux installs then there Windows sales would probably go down with people trying to save money.
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:3, Informative)
Acer from Walmart (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Good point (Score:3, Informative)
He ignores the issue that Linux has been much more stable and problem free than Windows. I have been able as a novice to fix a couple items myself on linux such as losing the administrator privilages in Ubuntu. Fixed it with a Hosts file edit. The answer was found on Google. All my hardware works "out of the box" except a couple Windows only items such as the Dell all in one printer and a HP flatbed scanner.
On the other hand things are broken beyond my ability in the Dell desktop of my wife. A prime example is we had a software photocopier installed. It would use the flatbed scanner and print to the default printer. One day I needed to shrink a photo for posting online (100K size limit). I fired up the included photo editor for the very first time and found it was not a full program but a limited function 30 day trial which already expired. This trialware hijacked my flatbed scanner. Opening the photocopier now launches the photo editor preventing the photocopier from getting the scan. It also killed the fax for the same reason. It has been broken over a year now and I still have no idea how to fix it. I have removed the offending program. Now a scan simply brings up a nag screen that Windows can't find the photo editor. Would you like help finding the exe file? Other than needing to re-image the hard drive and losing all my settings, I have not found a fix in a year.
As a fix, I moved the scanner to the Ubuntu box. The photo editor just works. (yea gimp!) So does the photocopier. (Yea sane!)
As a novice Linux user, I have had far fewer unresolved problems on Linux. All my hardware worked out of the box without needing the manufacture's driver disk. This includes my HP printers attached to my LAN on Hawking printservers, my flatbed scanner (Cannon.. The HP didn't work) and my internal flash card reader.
I had a meeting where the guest speaker brought a Power Point presentation. My Windows machine with Office 2000 did not display the presentation properly. The text box appeared all at once instead of bullet by bullet. Switched to the Linux partition and Open Office presented it properly. Later I found the free Power Point viewer from the MS site.
In a nutshell, it takes a lot of money to keep up to date with MS products. (XP or Vista and the new version of Office + updated memory to run it cost about the same as a nice laptop.) Ubuntu makes a nice alternative that works better than older MS products.
As a novice Linux user I have found Ubuntu easier to maintain than Windows. I have used Windows since Version 3.1. I have used Ubuntu since 9 months ago. I have added Flash 7 then 9, added MP3 support, am able to burn ISO CD's without buying an upgrade or searching for an alternative.. The list goes on..
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:4, Informative)
On Windows, patches came with the standard Tuesday updates, and all I had to do was accept installation. Ok, for boxes without outbound internet access, I actually had to copy the patches and install them manually, but that was pointy-clicky-done, with no hassle whatsoever.
On my Linux boxes, I had to install (which for my Gentoo boxes means recompile) a new version of the timezone-data package (Arthur Olson time zones), then manually copy
Then I had to repeat the whole procedure again, because a new version of timezone-data came out, because of bugs in the first one. Then I had to repeat the whole procedure YET again a third time cause the bugfix release wasn't complete. All in 2007.
Then, on Sun boxes, I had to, in addition to a system update, also install a java runtime environment update, because of course java can't use the same timezone data as the system, but has to have its own embedded implementation. And with more than one jre per system, that meant one update per jre instance.
I still prefer Linux and Unix, but it's not easier, and I bet many people forgot to update the zoneinfo files manually for chrooted daemons. Hopefully, most of them will only see odd logging timestamps. (Which in itself can be bad enough, if RIAA asks who used a DHCP IP address at a certain time between now and when the "old" DST kicked in.)
Regards,
--
*Art
Re:Good point (Score:3, Informative)
So how do you explain all the pre-GUI stuff such as DOS? That seemed to do quite will in the mass market.
More important is trying to find proper documentation on the beast called the Windows Registery. I would rather fix a hosts file than try to fix the above problem with my scanner by editing the registery. This brings the question, just how many Windows have random glitches, blue screens, random crashes and such that users can't fix?
There is a diferance between being able to find and use a fix and simply leaving it broken until the next hard drive reformat.
Re-formating should not have to be the single most common Windows fix.
Re:The real problem... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Acer from Walmart (Score:4, Informative)
http://global.acer.com/support/download.htm [acer.com]
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:2, Informative)
If Linux came pre-installed (which it already does. Just not by dell) then the idea is that the configuration files would already be set for your system by the manufacturer so you would not have to edit
Everything would be setup to go for that specific machine out the box. You could even have a disk which reinstalls the operating system still with everything ready to go specific for that machine.
Re:sell without operating system (Score:4, Informative)
The answer's pretty simple (Score:5, Informative)
Basically - Dell don't offer it because - and I have to be careful here- Dell get a volume discount on the Windows licenses they preinstall. If they start to offer Linux, they'll fall into a lower discount level on Windows and suddenly be uncompetitive in the crucial Windows market.
My experience (in a slightly different sector) of such deals is that they always coincidentally have break points remarkably close to what happens when the reseller starts dealing with a competitor of the dominant vendor. Of course, MS cannot charge Dell more for Windows just because Dell happens to ship some Linux machines, but it can double the price of Windows if Dell falls below a certain sale volume - which they can vary any time they like.
The solution? Manufacturers could [be forced to] [by France?] publish the embedded cost of software which ships with each machine so MS shenanigans could be spotted, but I'm sure plenty of fellow readers will point out the impracticality of that. The alternative is whistle blowers...
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:3, Informative)
If you're stuck at a command line and can't run Synaptic, then you can also accomplish the same task with an ncurses (text-mode gui) based interface to the same wizard with:
dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:2, Informative)
I call bullshit.
1. In no possible situation a graphics card can go into a power-saving mode when you run a wrong driver. You need some ancient ISA graphics card to even make it possible for the wrong driver to TRY to access it -- otherwise PCI IDs won't match, and X will exit with failure.
2. If X server is running on any modern Linux distro, Ctrl-Alt-Backspace will merely restart it -- it's started from display manager. If X server failed multiple times, display manager gives you an error in text dialog box, and stops trying. You will see a text login prompt.
3. If X server does not fail, switch to console is Ctrl-Alt-F1.
4. You can always change display driver to "vesa" and use your graphics card in compatibility mode. As opposed to Windows it won't drop you into 640x480, either.
And since only a moron or Windows shill wouldn't know that, I recommend you to shut up.
Re:The answer's pretty simple (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Ignorance is just so wonderful to see in action (Score:3, Informative)
By comparison , I've been using Linux since '99. I have edited more config files than I could hope to count. I had to edit config files on three occasions while setting up the PC I'm typing this on. In addition, I have three consumer devices on this desk that I have been unable to locate drivers for. Actually, one of them I have found drivers for, it just refuses to work, and I gave up trying to figure out why.
Re:The answer's pretty simple (Score:5, Informative)
This isn't about demand or ideology. This is about shady business practices that, as a practical matter, guarantee that most people won't buy a pre-built PC without paying Microsoft. Do you really think that someone with a Windows2000 install disk from their last PC wouldn't have been perfectly happy to use that on their new PC if the new PC were $100 cheaper? This isn't demand for Windows - hang out in a Best Buy for a while and listen to what gets asked of the computer salesmen - people don't even know that Macs don't come with Windows. My wife can't even tell you when she is on a Windows vs. a Macintosh computer. I just helped a friend set up his Vista notebook, and he doesn't understand that it is not XP (though he does now after buying some incompatible peripherals and software).