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Look at it from the typical corporate PHB mutual admiration/derision society perspective.

Firmware Engineering: Oh no! I've got HOW MANY new drivers to port? I need more money, more head count!

Q/A: Oh no! What's my schedule to test these new drivers? I need more money, more head count!

Product Management: Ugh! I have to SKU up these new products? Graphics design is going to have to give me new blah/blah/blah. What about all of our OEM software partners? They aren't linux compatible. We need new product managers that are Linux geniuses.

Software Dev: Wait none of our apps are Linux compatible. Need more head count. Need to hire linux experts to do this.

Marketing: We need to buy lots of market research! We need to hire linux market experts! We're doing so much already!

Manufacturing: You want what? You've got the wrong guy in your office. The server assembly manager is the guy you need to speak with. He does expensive-but-kind-of-free-Red-Hat, not me. Wait, you want Optiplex's and Dimensions to have Linux? It can't be done. I'm not set up for it. I need more people and more money to expand operations to accommodate your new-fangled production ideas.

Support: Our Indian support center doesn't have the scripts needed to support, wait you said MANY versions of Linux? No. No way. Too complicated.

Legal: We need to enter into a contract with these Linux people. Wait, many linux people? I thought there was only one Linux. Need more head count to manage these new contracts. We need to research if this conflicts with any agreements we already have. Need to hire legal consultants that are experts in Linux. Hmmm plus all this "free" software written for hippies hasn't been vetted by the courts.

Purchasing: Where do we buy this Linux from?

Sales: All right! Linux on Dell! Let's do it! Who's with me?!?

What you are asking for (lower priced, OS-free hardware they will support) they will not give you. Besides, you will force distro's into a winner/loser software monoculture of it's own making that is best avoided at all costs. This is where the little guy thrives. Hmm, let's see http://www.sub300.com/port.htm or maybe www.linspire.com, or http://system76.com/?

What you want is a VIA Antaur system. It's like the VIA EPIA mini-ITX C3 systems, but tailored for laptop use.

e.g. http://www.sub300.com/port.htm

Here you go.

There are plenty of other companies that sell Linux an (sic) no-OS machines.

http://www.addonshop.com/
http://www.emperorlinux.com/
http://www.ibexpc.com/
http://www.koobox.com/
http://www.linare.com/
http://www.linspire.com/
http://www.linuxcertified.com/
http://www.linuxsyscorp.com/
http://www.microtelpc.com/
http://www.outpost.com/
http://shoprcubed.com/
http://www.sub300.com/
http://www.systemax.com/divisions.htm
http://www.walmart.com/
http://tuxmobil.org/reseller.html
http://www.us.debian.org/distrib/pre-installed
http://www.linux.org/vendor/system/index.html
http://tuxmobil.org/ (general information)

Slashdot's lameness filter is actually pretty... well... lame. Defeating it is usually as easy as adding more text. You know, like this sentence. :-)

There are plenty of other companies that sell Linux an no-OS machines. http://www.addonshop.com/ http://www.emperorlinux.com/ http://www.ibexpc.com/ http://www.koobox.com/ http://www.linare.com/ http://www.linspire.com/ http://www.linuxcertified.com/ http://www.linuxsyscorp.com/ http://www.microtelpc.com/ http://www.outpost.com/ http://shoprcubed.com/ http://www.sub300.com/ http://www.systemax.com/divisions.htm http://www.walmart.com/ http://tuxmobil.org/reseller.html http://www.us.debian.org/distrib/pre-installed http://www.linux.org/vendor/system/index.html http://tuxmobil.org/ (general information)

http://www.addonshop.com/ http://www.emperorlinux.com/ http://www.ibexpc.com/ http://www.koobox.com/ http://www.linare.com/ http://www.linspire.com/ http://www.linuxcertified.com/ http://www.linuxsyscorp.com/ http://www.microtelpc.com/ http://www.outpost.com/ http://shoprcubed.com/ http://www.sub300.com/ http://www.systemax.com/divisions.htm http://www.walmart.com/ http://tuxmobil.org/reseller.html http://www.us.debian.org/distrib/pre-installed http://www.linux.org/vendor/system/index.html http://tuxmobil.org/ (general information) No OS (Sabio made by Quanta, like Dell-latitudes) http://www.avadirect.com/ http://www.asimobile.com/ http://www.powernotebooks.com/

http://www.addonshop.com/
http://www.emperorlinux.com/
http://www.ibexpc.com/
http://www.linare.com/
http://www.linspire.com/
http://www.linuxcertified.com/
http://www.microtelpc.com/
http://www.outpost.com/
http://shoprcubed.com/
http://www.sub300.com/
http://www.systemax.com/divisions.htm
http://www.walmart.com/
http://www.xandros.com/

http://tuxmobil.org/reseller.html
http://www.us.debian.org/distrib/pre-installed
http://www.linux.org/vendor/system/index.html

http://tuxmobil.org/ (general information)

No OS

(Sabio made by Quanta, like Dell-latitudes)
http://www.avadirect.com/
http://www.asimobile.com/
http://www.powernotebooks.com/

http://www.addonshop.com/
http://www.sub300.com/
http://www.linare.com/
http://www.linspire.com/
http://www.linuxcertified.com/
http://www.microtelpc.com/
http://www.outpost.com/
http://shoprcubed.com/
http://www.systemax.com/divisions.htm
http://www.walmart.com/
http://www.xandros.com/
http://tuxmobil.org/
http://www.us.debian.org/distrib/pre-installed
http://www.linux.org/vendor/system/index.html

The major computer OEMs such as Dell, HP, and
Gateway are refusing to offer CONSUMERS a
non-Microsoft choice.
These OEMs are anti-competitve and
anti-consumer-choice. They continue to maintain Microsoft's desktop
monopoly.

I suggest not doing business with these companies until they offer a serious non-Microsoft choice to CONSUMERS.

Here are some companies that DO offer consumers a choice.

http://www.systemax.com/divisions.htm
http://www.microtelpc.com/
http://www.linuxcertified.com/

http://www.outpost.com/ (search for linspire)
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/catalog.gsp?cat=395 1&path=0%3A3944%3A3951
http://www.sub300.com/Skins/greyTech/greyTech_inde x.aspx
http://www.linare.com/
http://www.linspire.com/featured_partner/featured_ partner.php
http://www.us.debian.org/distrib/pre-installed
http://www.linux.org/vendor/system/index.html

Of course, it was reported on Slashdot when it became the first Linux store.

http://www.sub300.com/

Setup a maximum travel distance and charge for travel expenses for anything beyond that. I personally will travel 25 miles, but things are a bit spread out in FL. $.30-40 per mile is pretty fair if you include wear and tear on the car. Most companies reimburse for something along that lines so...

For labor I charge $40 per hour, in half hour increments. I make sure that the customer is satisfied before I leave, and be up front that if I need to come back it will be another fee. This avoids being at their beck and call whenever they install some stupid spyware. Be a bit flexible though, for instance if the computer gets stop error the following day I will come back reinstall widows for free.

I carry a couple of cds, like MS service packs, OO.o, Mozilla, AVG Antivirus, ZoneAlarm, the Gimp, and others. I also carry LiveCD and USBkey drive.

On old machines I do recommend upgrading to a new machine. For instance Sub300.com has some cheap systems that will work pretty well. For most home users it is perfect. Yes, it has Linspire, but Linux is easy enough once configured that anyone can use it.

Aparently, you can save your beer from Gene's gullet by going to http://sub500.com/ (http://sub300.com/ after the Canadian Dollar exchange ;)

Previously mentioned in Slashdot, they're now offering to upgrade your computer to Linspire for free. No beer required.

(and their car washes are top-notch)

First, while IE/Mac isn't supported anymore, there are some people who still use it.

Do Safari, IE/Mac, iCab, OmniWeb, and other Mac-only web browsers constitute enough userbase to persuade a small business to fork over four figures for a decent Mac OS X machine?

As long as it has a userbase, there's a reason to test it.

<sarcasm>There's still an Apple II userbase.</sarcasm> How much of a userbase is worth how much developer time and money?

there are still Safari improvements that aren't in Konqueror

So if you have the latest release of Konqueror, or whatever they call their equivalent to Mozilla's nightly build, you'll probably have the improvements from Safari one or two versions back. How up-to-date do most Safari users keep their installations? And are there really a lot of significant rendering differences between KHTML-based Safari and a Gecko-based browser?

Last time I tried it tho, KDE-Cygwin was slow and buggy as hell

I'd guess that it's a lot cheaper for a small business to buy and maintain a cheapass Linux box (either this way or this way or even this way) than to buy and maintain a Mac.

Point is that not everybody needs the fine piece of German engineering that is a BMW automobile. Some people are perfectly happy with bargain basement kit.

"Computer systems for well under $500"!!!!!

No... wait... it's just the same as Sub300.com but 200$ more expensive.

"Computer systems for under $300!"

On that note, it seems Lindows needs to update their Linspire testimonials page. "The marriage of Linspire and Sub300.com computer systems is made in heaven" -- Marc Silverman, President, Sub300.com

It is. Their American counterpart is sub300.com, with systems starting at $222.

The same people also run Sub300.com, for any who find Canadian currency to be challenging.

there's at least one - the lindows mobile PC (which is really an eNote OEM rebadged). Dunno i there are any others. This is based on the VIA eden chips, though I don't recall whether it is the ezra-t core or the newer antuar/nehemiah core. http://info.lindows.com/mobilepc/mobilepc.htm http://www.sub300.com/port.htm

To each his own. The notion of the perfect size/weight is subjective.

The same goes for pricing and OS. I would much rather get this 1.3 kg subnotebook, loaded with Lindows, no MS tax, for less than a US$900 (as compared to $4000 for the X505/XP). BTW, there are other options in Lindows.com. And yes, I would wipe it and put Mandrake on it :-)