Michael Dell Using Ubuntu Linux At Home

whoever57 sends us a link from the Dell site noting that Michael Dell is using Ubuntu Linux at home (7.04, Feisty Fawn) on a Precision M90 laptop loaded with Openoffice.org and Evolution. If one were betting on which distro Dell will eventually ship pre-installed, this factoid might be food for thought. Oh, and Micheal Dell's gaming system uses XP Media Center edition.

Seriously?

[CastrTroy]

I really want to know what it is that makes people think Ubuntu is the best thing since sliced bread. I've tried it out, and it's not any better than a lot of other distros. Actually, I find that because they aim too much towards the home user, that it makes it difficult to do more advanced things. Personally, I use Mandriva. I have used it since version 7. I don't see Ubuntu doing anything that Mandriva (or Mandrake) wasn't doing 3 years ago.

Re:Just an advert

[somersault]

Yeah, because a laptop with a Core 2 Duo, 4GB of RAM and a Quadro graphics card is utterly crap.. pfft.. I had an M60 for a while and it was great, that M90's specs look pretty awesome to me, and it probably costs more than £2000.. not that I'd want to swap my MacBook Pro for it at the moment anyway.

Re:Businessmen & Their Customers

[Aladrin]

No, he merely said that he never ASSUMES it is. It might very well BE the best thing for the customer as well as the businessman. You've taken the point in reverse.

He's saying that the fact that M. Dell is using Ubuntu should not play a major factor into what distro Dell decides to ship to its customers. The opposite is not true... If he were to pick a distro AFTER the decision had been made, he may very well choose to use the same distro his company is shipping.

We don't know if that decision has been made, what it is, or why M. Dell chose Ubuntu. Making assumptions on any that is foolhardy at best. But then, that's what journalism means today. Making half-assed assumptions and printing them as fact. When you're wrong, you just write the retraction in tiny print on the billionth page.

Soft

[mattr]

I'd rather see several detailed screenshots per machine with detailed info on exactly what software packages are used, how he likes them, and how, and how much, they are used.

I must be the only one who thinks displays look cooler with something displayed in them.

That said it is almost enough to get me to buy those dual 30" ultrasharp displays. I mean they must be readable if Dell has them at home, right? Just how much do those suckers cost I wonder.. Quality of LCD display is pretty important to me as my eyes need rest.

Re:Seriously?

[porkThreeWays]

Yes, the secret is out. High quality Linux distributions aren't that much different from each other. I think Ubuntu has come to the forefront because they've got the right advertising, were in the right place at the right time, have a very dedicated community which wants Ubuntu in the most hands, and because it still is a pretty good distribution. That's not to minimize all the hard work that has gone into Ubuntu, but everyone is working hard. Ubuntu just did a lot of non-technical things right as well combined with a little luck.

Re:I used to support executives

[Anonymous Coward]

Not true in Michael's case. I work at Dell and a couple of stories I heard...(posting AC) (1.5 years ago) IT team is having a meeting and Michael happens to drop in... They are discussing why/ what of some web application. Michael questions why Firefox is not supported...--End result, the whole of Dell has an option to use Mozilla as a supported app. second one, at a newly set-up facility a midlevel manager is showing michael around the lab. we have 5 of these latest computers, 5 of that etc. etc. Michael proceeds to completely open up one of the servers and proceeds to ask "Why are you using test systems on production environment?" turns out that the machines indeed were pre-production...and michael figured it out from the connectors used!!

Re:Just an advert

[hswerdfe]

yah, but it would be nice if google earth would work right.
I have a newish dell laptop with and intel Graphics card running Ubuntu and google Earth has masive drawing errors and is unstable.
I have a 4 year old desktop with as 32Mb NVidia card running Ubuntu and google earth works perfectly.
I don't need 3d for games, but I do need some small amount of 3D. for simple stuff.

Next laptop I buy will have an NVidia card, I hear they are power hungry, and expencive, but at least I will have some form of 3d working.

Re:Maybe he ist looking at a course change?

[prelelat]

You know I don't know if he would go with Ubuntu on the consumer side, it would be nice its what I use for a regular desktop. But you have to consider that some of their servers ship with Red Hat Enterprise and ask yourself "If I ship a Red Hat type OS with my consumer computers could I get my Enterprise people to train my Consumer call centers?" I don't know if this will be a deciding point, but the fact that he does have call centers trained in RH might factor in.

Re:Just an advert

[Anonymous Coward]

However, as a Dell employee, what's not mentioned here is that using non MS Windows machines can be a fireable offense at Dell, as with connecting anything else that has a network connection but not an official corporate sponsored MS Windows OS. (Disclaimer: many of us engineers run Linux on the sly, IT has thus far overlooked this, but we are technically in violation and CAN be fired) Now add to it that our IT infrastructure is totally MS 0wn3d, performs like a ten day baked turd and is barely functional chaos, and you'll have no wonder why we don't ship Linux except on enterprise stuff where we HAVE to (apparently our customers are smarter than we are).

It's probably no secret there's often a huge divide between what Michael says and does, versus what his corporation does.

Posting anonymously, since the last guy in the company who said anything remotely anti-Microsoft was fired. You can be totally incompetant, hurtful to your team and generally a pain in the ass to everyone (esp if you are old, a woman, or a minority) and even get promoted, but so far trash talking MS, and trash talking offshoring have resulted in the ol' insta-ban.

Re:I used to support executives

[atamido]

I'm going to skip out on using my mod points for your post and add some more related stories.

I've known several people that have spent some time with Michael Dell, including my father who has had some group sit downs with him. Every one of them has commented on how connected (opposite of disconnected) he was to the business, both management and technical wise. He may not make a great sysadmin with his current knowledge, but he's no slouch either. If you think for a minute that he doesn't know what's going on, you've sorely underestimate him. (Also have stories about how funny/nice he is.)

On a related note, I've talked to Kevin Rollins (ousted Dell CEO) a couple of times. He doesn't have all of the technical background that Michael Dell has, but he's no idiot. Kevin is a real sharp guy, and super nice to boot.

Re:Support......

[Anonymous Coward]

None. He has support take care of it.

You laugh, but Michael Dell does call Dell tech support. Rather frequently for a CEO, actually.

It's not what you think, he doesn't call in order to get help, but rather he impersonates customers and sees how a random call goes.

Him (and Kevin, before the outster) would also listen in on random calls to see how they're going.

One relevant anecdote is that Michael hopped into Dell's Consumer (India) tech support (although the story sometimes goes that he hopped into the Dell Web Based eSupport chatroom) and had such a bad experience with Dell's policy of asking for Name, Email, Phone Number, Address, and Company before the Techs will even start helping you that that was IMMEDIATELY changed to "Hi, This is Blah From Dell, How can I help you today?"

Which is pretty cool, I suppose.

Re:Gamer?

[ross.w]

Yet you have time to hang out on Slashdot? :)

Just because he has the PC doesn't mean he uses it regularly. He can only drive one car at a time too, but I bet he's got several. Part of the lifestyle of the mega rich. Loads of toys you never get to use.