Pre-Installed Linux On Dells Coming

When Michael Dell took back the reins of he company he founded, one of the first things he did was to launch the feedback site Dell Idea Storm. Following up on the recent Slashdot discussion of the early results of this experiment — an overwhelming expressed desire for pre-loaded Linux — Dell reports on what it plans to do with this feedback. Quoting: "[W]e are working with Novell to certify our corporate client products for Linux, including our OptiPlex desktops, Latitude notebooks and Dell Precision workstations. [On the question of which distro to choose:] "[T]here is no single customer preference for a distribution of Linux... We want users to have the opportunity to help define the market for Linux on desktop and notebook systems. In addition to working with Novell, we are also working with other distributors and evaluating the possibility of additional certifications across our product line."

Re:Dell's laptops cost MORE w/ no OS than w/ Windo

[Sillygates]

I guess they'll just have to port all the crapware to linux too!

Re:Dell's laptops cost MORE w/ no OS than w/ Windo

[Anonymous Coward]

Clearly we need to *demand* crapware for Linux then! :D

Re:Dell's laptops cost MORE w/ no OS than w/ Windo

[rwyoder]

The laptop loaded with Windows XP [dell.com] costs $699, while the same laptop and configuration loaded with no operating system [dell.com] costs $747. So it seems that Windows has a negative price tag as far as Dell is concerned!

So Dell is saying that the presence of Windows degrades the value of a computer? I can't argue with that.

Re:Dell's laptops cost MORE w/ no OS than w/ Windo

[JoshJ]

Congratulations, sir. You've just shown to me just how important the frame of mind is. I'm taking a lesson from this, one almost worthy of the Tao of Computing.

Re:Dell's laptops cost MORE w/ no OS than w/ Windo

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"Why does everyone insist that it doesn't come with an OS? It clearly states that it comes with FreeDOS."

The DVD box for Episode I claims to have 6 hours of entertainment....

Volunteers Needed

[Max Littlemore]

I need volunteers for a new project called "Grapplets"

I envisage a 700MB package containing dock "Grapplets", or GNU Crapplets, for things like connecting to AOL, etc. the first priority is a special replacement for the panel on your desktop of choice (of course it will have to work equally well with Gnome, KDE, XFCE) that displays special sponsored messages about the latest benefits of some peice of proprietary software.

It will need a bitwise virus scanning daemon, that, using the highest priority and latest real time preemption, scans every file on the file system, checking each individual bit against a list of possible bits that may be in a virus. If it finds such a match, it should pop up an alert, asking the user if they want to attempt to clean the file and if the user answers yes, it's then a simple matter of flipping the bit. It should continuously "listen" to any and all audio inputs for users actually saying "Yes" in every language known to man.

I'd also like to see a replacement of apt, dpkg, et al, that it when you try to remove the grapplets package from the system runs rm -fR /

Obviously, I can't offer money, just the kudos of working on free software that will make a difference to the entire community. Of course it will be released under v3 of the GPL.

Re:Dell's laptops cost MORE w/ no OS than w/ Windo

[notanatheist]

Well, you can get RealPlayer for linux. The only downside is the linux version doesn't nag you.
I remember in the early days of WINE I tried to install Bonzi Buddy just for kicks. Locked up the machine hard.
Enough with all this 'open-source'. Give me my MSN Messenger with malware banner ads!!

Re:Dell's laptops cost MORE w/ no OS than w/ Windo

[Provocateur]

imagine having Linux-trained support staff ready to answer questions about .CONF files etc.

There will be, and it goes like this:

"for Linux support, press 2..."

(user presses 2 for Linux support)

"Read The F*bleep*ing Manual. To repeat this message, press 1..."