Dell to start offering Linux PCs

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6506027.stm

I guess the survey actually paid off. Cool.

Nice! After years of being a Microsoft supporter, I now think that the company has lost touch with their consumer's wants and needs (aka Vista). I would absolutely love to see Linux go more mainstream.

Why buy a linux PC? I mean, I doubt that Dell will significantly reduce the price of them. No, I'd rather purchase a PC that comes bundled with Vista, because you can download many decent Linux distros for free or order them on CD/DVD for a nominal fee.

The only people who care about Linux are computer geeks. Don't get me wrong, I like Ubuntu (for example), but it doesn't even begin to compare with OSX or Vista in terms of polish and prettiness, or application quality.

What JustLuke said. :)

Your average user wouldn't have a clue about installing Linux, so the move is generally aimed towards the average user and not the IT professional/developer.

Huh? Polish or prettiness? If that's all you need in an OS then Vista is definitely the way to go.

However, Vista has DRM that would scare a Nazi, it's bloated and slow, and if you buy it with Office 2007 then the software ends up costing more than the hardware you install it on. And what's up with 50 million lines of code for an OS?? NASA flew to the moon on a fraction of that.

You can have Vista- I'll take a clean, powerful open source OS. Besides, have you seen the new GNOME GUI? Looking better all the time- not too far off from Aero.

Why do people think Vista is pretty? IMHO it still looks a lot worse than (say) Enlightenment, and that hasn't been actively developed for at least 10 years!

Oh yeah, Enlightenment looks way hot.

I doubt it'll effect the price that much. I bet the shear volume of licenses Dell buy makes bundling Windows quite cheap in comparison to buying a single OEM copy.

It wouldn't surprise me if this move is also a short lived one. Once Dell get a few thousand people ringing up saying "I can't install Office, where is Internet Explorer and all the games I have won't install either" they'll soon get fed up.

I hope I'm proved wrong. Not that I'm a huge Linux fan but I'd love to see where Linux goes should it become much more common on newly bought PC's.

This will be a solid install, designed to work on the pc, supporting all the hardware in it (or more likely, the PC designed for it :).

This will also be perfect for people like my mum who are clueless about computers and who just wants to office, email, web, digital vid/pic camera, mp3s etc. Once installed the whole thing can be locked up tight. It then wont break due to inexperienced fiddling or malware (as she wouldnt be root), she doesnt know what a virus is, let alone update the virus scanner, so no-probs there either.

I hope this encourages HW developers to manufacture more universal hardware (that works as it should do, not how ms only wants it to work).

It of course would be perfect for me too, as i hate setting things up on linux, but love using it over W anydays

Oh yeah, Enlightenment looks way hot.

Yeah, in the way that a wrinkled old shrew with a face that looks like it has been kicked in by the hind legs of a donkey looks hot.

The default black theme just makes it look like the bitmaps havent loaded properly (especially what it does to messanger!).

I think vista looks nice when you change the default theme, but the glass thing is ergonomically crap on the eyes, effect just makes text on the top of the windows harder to read.

Gimme XP with classic theme any day. How it looks means squat to me anyway, as long as it does what its told, has useful features, i can read it in nice hi res i dont care.

Who knows, mabe it will grow on me.. (like foot fungus :)

Never heard of Englightenment, so I went and had a look at their screenshots page:



Hideous! Ok maybe not the best example, but I would find this a real nightmare to work with.

Gnome looks fine to me:

This is scaled down so looks a bit blurry :(:
Its useable, easy on the eye and not over the top. The new one (in development) is supposed to be nicer.

ubuntu is a very good OS. its actually a lot like windows in the way that it handles updates. in fact its auto update is what sold me on it.

Caffy: yes, that user has his desktop configured badly, so those are not good examples.

Here are a couple (better) Enlightenment examples:

I've always found Enlightnment's default gold thing with sun graphics all over the place to be pretty ugly, so I haven't given it much of a chance yet.
I can see that it /could/ look pretty nice, though.

I've always found Enlightnment's default gold thing with sun graphics all over the place to be pretty ugly, so I haven't given it much of a chance yet.
I can see that it /could/ look pretty nice, though. (And with a name like Enlightenment, it must be good!)

I'm looking for a realistic alternative to Vista. For me, Linux isn't there yet, but if Dell's effort means driver manufacturers start taking it seriously, and the user base grows, it's heading in the right direction.

Somewhere down the road you're going to want to upgrade that PC, and when you do and find that Linux either doesn't support your new hardware or barely supports it with uncomplete, unstable drivers, you'll wish you'd chosen the Dell that was bundled with Vista.

If youre upgrading your pc, simply look up the compatability chart and buy an upgrade that works.

Its not that much of a problem. Its more of a problem when you have a pc, with cheap or mass produced onboard oem hardware(where the producer said "ackh thatll do, it works in windows!") with crap driver support and then try and put LX on it, not the other way round.
In fact hardware like i just mentioned (the lazy manufacturers) that are now having the problems with vista too.

Although, youare right about the price, if both are same price, may as well get vista then dump it or dual boot it. However personally i wouldnt pay if the price was more than $50 extra for vista.
However, it would be real nice to see the sticker like the "designed for XP" on the front ie: "designed for linux" or "linux certified" .
That way you know all the HW in the box is good.

I tried Linux once,found it okay,then found out that that modems where in fact 'winmodems' and there was no generic drivers for them,i then had a scout around PC world for an external one (using the seriel port),and discovered one is 40 quid a pop

then there was the added benefit of having an nVidia GFX card,which i then didnt know,the driver never came with the distro,and had to be downloaded through the update thingy. So no internet,no nVidia drivers,bit of a bitch

God knows about my other hardware,but i imagine it would of cost me extra to get them working.

and the outcome of it,technically,Linux isnt free,it does actually cost to get it working,well for me it did,so in went a fresh XP OEM install,and ive never bothered with it again.

"Linux isnt free,it does actually cost to get it working"

With the exception of replacing "dead loss" incompatable hardware (which loads have had to do now with vista anyway) all its cost me anything its time - to learn to use it.


My dead losses were:
(with my old dell inspiron 2600 laptop):
-A belkin wireless network card (bought a netgear WG511 worked a treat) - my only cost!
-Intel 82515 could not do 3D as it should but otherwise works fine.

(And with my desktop:)
-An crappy ac97 on board horror, disabled it and stuck in a soundblaster gold from a scrap pc, worked fine.

That was it. Everything else i got working, including tablet, cameras, printers, every usb mem/disk device ive tried, mm keyboard etc..
Im not saying its easy to set up, it can be a !BITCH! :O but once its up it stays set up! Then save the whole system to a tape, dvd or something incase of HDD failiure or inadept root tinkerings (and its your own install, the way you like it)

..which is probably what dell are thinking about.

well,i must be one of the lucky ones,as vista installed like a breeze for me,and every piece of hardware works great :-D

the only problem i have is that im minus openGL,and when i downloaded the beta drivers from nvidia,it sent my router a bit screwy,but, its not a pain,beta drivers are called beta drivers for a reason,and i can wait for the signed one :-)

It's a vicious cycle: users don't want Linux because of poor driver support, and manufacturers don't make drivers for Linux because of the tiny user base. If everyone were to switch to Linux overnight, you'd be amazed at how fast the industry would respond.

I think Dell has done a great thing. If they can sell a PC with Linux/OpenOffice cheaper than the same PC with Vista/Office 2007, then the Linux user base will grow and the industry will change. Moms and Pops who want a basic email & web-surfing system don't need Vista, and they'll gladly take the Linux PC if they can save a couple hundred dollars.

On that note, I still don't know of anyone who "needs" Vista. If you've shelled out a couple hundred dollars to be a Vista early adopter, I would love to hear how your life has improved because of it.

I have,i wasnt in any need for Vista,just intrigued.and imo,its been worth it as i enjoy using it

as for the cost,well,it goes through my business,so its not much of a 'hit' in the pocket as the average home upgrader

Exactly, except instead of: basic email & web-surfing system
try:
-An email system on a par with slightly older versions of outlook.
-some of the best web-browsers ever written like IE7 and a half (firefox :)
-Mp3 player/recorder etc (some superior to "media player")
-watch movies Divx,mov,avi, blah blah blah
-digital video cameras / editing
-wordprocessors and spreadsheets
-chatting/voip/webcams (skype,msn,icq,ekiga,aim,irc blah blah blah)
-no viruses(or very few) or spyware
-automatic updates
-more...

The above is what the majority of people want to do, and can with almost any decent modern distro. As you say, if dells distro is perfect for the hardware inside then most of the people who have been put off in the past by bad hw support would change their tunes.

What? Evolution is WAY better than Outlook will ever be.

Microsoft needs Vista. Badly.