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if you want linux pre-installed, there are a number of options for linux-only vendors. I've had good experiences with System76, and heard good things about ZaReason. Of corse, you could pay the MS Tax on you hardware, but these two are pretty competitive, and you get Linux support and (to the extent they control it) hardware that was designed for Linux (a big deal for suspend/resume and making hardware Just Work, until vendors can stop cutting corners (e.g. broken DSDTs, see problems with Microsoft's compiler (which is pretty much the only one in use, except sometimes when Linux is pre-installed) and the recent foxconn debacle) and working around bugs in their windows-only drivers!) So basically, Linux-supporting hardware is less hassle, full vendor support, and fairly comparably priced.

I find many aspects of smart phones compelling, with one exception: the cost of the phones, which typically exceeds that of a traditional box. I understand all of the benefits of smart phones (and the downsides, thanks) but I'm very hung up on spending more for less.

You have to pay more to fit all that technology into a smaller package! If you don't care about space, just run a virtualized desktop on traditional desktop hardware.

BTW I would recommend diskless workstations for thin clients. They may not be the cheapest, but they are full featured, fairly affordable, and well supported.

Hey Hairyfeet like your posts, just disagree with a few here and there, however even when I disagree I can see the experience, the real life experience in your posts.

Have to disagree with this statement:

These companies are NOT gonna release their source code, at least not now in this hostile climate, but what they WILL do is put drivers on CDs, and penguins on the boxes if you'll let them, because nobody like cutting off potential customers.

Specifically the if you'll let them part. No one is stopping them, besides perhaps Microsoft (and many would debate that...so sad ) . When you have projects like the Linux Driver Project, companies have no excuse not to make device drivers available to customers. No reasonable excuses that is.

But expecting users in 2009 with a straight face to play paperweight roulette is just truly the height of arrogance and insanity.

Perhaps suggesting PCs and hardwares might end up as paper weights was not the best choice for an analogy. As this is exactly another reason why I loath Microsoft today, thanks to Vista, though admittedly I had been burned by Microsoft multiple times before than. The BSOD, GPFs and now the blacK Screens Of Death (KSODs) that have occurred after one of Microsoft's recent auto updates.

Microsoft was more than happy to play paperweight roulette as you call it with Vista and user PCs. Though I would suggest to you that with roulette you have a chance at winning, albeit a very small one. With Vista, there was absolutely no chance the old PCs running Vista. As they say hindsight is 20/20.

Can you say Vista, I knew you could...

The best solution for all PC users for hope of NOT being left with a paperweight is to purchase a PC, whose hardware will run Linux FIRST. If you want to run Vista or Windows 7, you can always run them, but if you are smart enough to purchase hardware that will run Linux first, that same hardware will run Linux in 10 years from now, when Microsoft will obviously no longer support either Vista or Windows 7.

I would suggest buying all future PC hardware from a Linux vendor, who knows which proprietary hardware to stay away from. Two that I know of are ZaReason and System 76. Of course a forward thinking person like yourself might see this opportunity for what it is and start creating systems that will run Linux and Windows 7...just a thought!

Perhaps Linux and open source should thank Microsoft, although I am not willing to do that for at least 7 years as I reset my 7 year clock (check my other posts for info about the 7 year clock), as System76’s 1Q 2009 revenue growth — 61 percent thanks to the Vista debacle and that is only one Linux vendor.

Here are six great options, ZaReason, Inc: Building Linux hardware so you don't have to

Here are six more: System 76 laptops

Did you even try to look? Most people do not even try.

The biggest mistake any consumer of PCs, laptops, towers, etc can make today is to buy any hardware from a vendor who does not understand and do Linux. This goes for all the big box stores and even Dell, they only pay a passing glance to Linux and do not really do it right, as experienced by Linux being buried down in their website and not prominently marketed on their main page from the start.

If you are foolish enough to purchase from anyone but a Linux hardware computer builder, you will be frustrated with needless vendor lock-in issues meant only to keep you a Microsoft Windows users, period.

Here is the rub, Every Linux PC can run Windows. Because of Vendor Lock-In, not every Windows PC can run Linux.

Even the most devout Windows / Microsoft FAN can NOT deny that simple fact!

Moral of story: Eventually a proprietary company will STOP supporting what you purchased attempting you to pay more for new equipment. Your only choice for that older, yet very useful, hardware is to KNOW you can run Linux (any distro, there are many). Even if you do not want to run Linux, by purchasing hardware that will, you will be in a position to donate that older hardware to non profits that will get Linux up and running and donate it to third world countries so children can learn.

There is NO downside to purchasing hardware from a Linux vendor. There are almost ALWAYS vendor lock-in hardware issues from any of the big box stores and anyone who only does Microsoft.

Use the two vendors ZaReason or System 76 above, you will be glad you did, and you will help out children in third world countries one day when you upgrade your hardware, as the hardware your purchased will run Linux.

Please remember that the vast majority of hardware and peripherals are designed from the ground up to work with Windows and that most computers are sold with Windows preinstalled and preconfigured.

If you want a similar experience, I suggest buying a computer with Linux preinstalled and preconfigured. I recommend System76

I just threw an NVIDIA 8400 GS 512MB PCI card into my ancient PIII 600mHz, and since I'm running Linux (Ubuntu 9.04 although I've seriously tweaked the install) XBMC just uses VDPAU to offload all the rendering to the video card. And yes, it can do 1080p x264 video just fine, which amuses me to no end since the majority of the parts in that computer are from 1999!

If you don't have a spare old computer around, or you want to buy a complete solution, basically any of the "Ion-based" nettops should be cheap, tiny and get the job done. There's tons out there, and you can even get one from System76 that already has Ubuntu installed ( http://system76.com/product_info.php?cPath=27&products_id=95 ) at which point you only need to add the XBMC PPA to the repository list, click install and apply, and voila, a tiny cheap machine capable of 1080p video. For some anecdotal evidence on how easily these setups can run you can hunt around the XBMC forums a bit. Basically the key is just to get any kind of machine with a GeForce 8-or-later card in it, and the newer ones have even more features as far as using VDPAU is concerned.

I recently bought one of these (Meerkat Ion dual core NetTop) and overall I'm fairly pleased with it. I have not measured how much power it draws, but in terms of low profile and sound level, it's hugely better than its predecessor (a big hulking gazillion-fan Xeon based full size desktop).

You could save some extra cash by going with the lower end model (Atom based).

In addition to saving money, you get Ubuntu Linux pre-installed, and you support a company that only supplies Linux on its products.

ObDisclaimer: I have no connection with System76 other than being a satisfied customer.

I recently bought one of these (Meerkat Ion dual core NetTop) and overall I'm fairly pleased with it. I have not measured how much power it draws, but in terms of low profile and sound level, it's hugely better than its predecessor (a big hulking gazillion-fan Xeon based full size desktop).

You could save some extra cash by going with the lower end model (Atom based).

In addition to saving money, you get Ubuntu Linux pre-installed, and you support a company that only supplies Linux on its products.

ObDisclaimer: I have no connection with System76 other than being a satisfied customer.

http://system76.com/
http://www.zareason.com/shop/home.php
http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/linux_3x?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

There are a few :-)

I'm looking forward to the official 9.10 release, but I really want some new hardware to run it on! Almost all the netbook offerings are going the XP/W7 route. Providers like system76 have some OK offerings, but they are on the pricey side. I wish I had a wide selection of hardware without having to pay the Microsoft tax!

Please remember that almost every computer is purposely made to run Windows, which is why its always a little bit easier to install it.

If you want a computer preconfigured with Ubuntu, so that you don't need to see a CLI ever and you can be sure everything works out of the box, you can buy one from these guys:

http://system76.com/

You are not looking hard enough. Please check at least the last link.

system76 offers them

"Warning labels" lol

For those using Ubuntu, System76 offers free stickers

I just don't see what's stopping Entrepreneur OEM Rig Setter-Upper from buying hardware, putting it together, slapping Ubuntu on it, and selling it. Maybe that's just not profitable enough to sustain?

You mean like System76?

You have to remember, this thing is more underpowered than the cheap netbooks that will barely surf the web on anything that has Flash.

Really? I received a System76 Starling netbook ($360 complete) for Father's Day this year. I normally have 10-15 tabs open in Firefox, while running Pidgin IM, a couple of OpenOffice.org documents (our spreadsheet budget and whatever I'm writing at the moment), and a couple of other programs. With all that, running a video on YouTube (for example) is acceptably smooth and quite watch-able. Not anti-aliased and scaled in real-time, of course, but perfectly fine for relaxing in my recliner.

Have you ever tried anything other than Windows XP on a netbook? Not trying to slam Microsoft, just curious.

System76 has some nice laptops with Ubuntu preinstalled.

Of course, Ubuntu-haters will probably argue that the original poster wanted "no annoying shit installed" but I'll say that Canonical's OS is my current choice.

You're sort of wrong. Or rather your experience is in a different situation from mine and that of netbook purchasers. My current computer had several driver problems which were solved by a small amount (1 hour - sound card) of messing and six months of waiting (next Fedora release - web cam & full VT compatibility). The difference is that I bought absolute state of the art (1 year ago) since I wanted VT and low power consumption. With old hardware, Linux is always better than Windows. With new, the OEM Windows will normally be badly set up (OEMs always do that; spyware stupidity and overtuning) but at least compatible.

Netbook purchasers are always buying latest hardware. If they don't get Linux pre-installed they can expect some problems until the distros catch up with their new hardware. The solution is to use old hardware or, if you need the latest and greatest buy new hardware from a Linux specialist such as System 76

If you want to support a company that supports selling Linux on their machines, you can always swing by System 76, which now sells a netbook with Ubuntu Netbook desktop environment. Forget the bigger players. With the possible exception of Dell, most netbook Linux providers are just playing the game of leverage against Microsoft and will never properly support Linux or even install it in any half way decent form. Look at Acer and that piece of shit distro they decided to throw on there. The environment looks like dogshit and runs like it too. They are just paying lip service and are hoping to use that as a bargaining chip just long enough for Microsoft to lower OEM prices and cut them into any other deals. Why do you think the Linux offerings look like a Texas Instrument baby toy (i.e EEepc Xandros simple desktop).

http://system76.com/index.php http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/ubuntu?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~ck=anavml http://www.linux.org/vendor/system/index.html

http://www.system76.com/

but, mommy, there's no trackpoint!
how am I going to move the mouse without my hands leaving the keyboard? and how am I going to avoid moving the mouse by accident?

http://www.system76.com/

But you can still get Dell's Mini 9 and System76's Starling Netbook with Ubuntu.
Also, brace for the ARM wave of netbooks this year, such as this 299$ Touch Book from Always Innovating.

Yeah, but there does seem to be a linux tax. Look at Dell's Ubuntu notebook offerings:

• XPS M1530n for $974
• XPS M1330n for $849

(I'm leaving out the Mini 9n because it is a netbook with a tiny keyboard.) The cheapest Windows XPS M1530 is $899, and the Windows M1330 is $749. More importantly, I can get a Inspiron 15 laptop for $399. Less than HALF the cost of the cheapest Ubuntu notebook. (Never mind the specs here, I'm just looking for a cheap box with a real keyboard.)

Let's look at system76 instead. Their cheapest notebook is a Darter Ultra for $739.

Excluding netbooks, if I want a cheap notebook right now, the least expensive option is to buy a Windows notebook and then install Linux!

Wait, since when is Windows easier to install? You do realize those little recovery disks that computer companies give you were set up by a professional, right? Installing Windows manually can be a nightmare due to drivers though.

On the other hand, I don't see what trouble you could have possibly had installing, for example, Ubuntu. I mean, you pretty much just press a button, choose a time zone, and let it install.

Oh, and don't pull that "But you don't have to install Windows yourself, unlike Linux!" crap. There are plenty of places you can buy preinstalled Linux nowadays.

As for Windows performing "smoother" (I assume that's what you meant) than Linux, what does that even mean? Are you trying to say that it's faster? Perhaps that one experiences fewer problems when using it?

As far as security goes, look at all the viruses for Windows; compare to Linux. It doesn't matter what the reason for that is; it simply matters that the case is that, at this point in time, your computer is incontrovertibly less likely to be compromised using your average Linux box than your average Windows box.

Note: I am not the original poster.

Show me a comparable mini PC that's 2" tall.

I never really considered a mini to be mid range honestly. I considered it to be low-end netbook quality hardware which is expensive because of it's size and brand. It doesn't even come with dedicated graphics memory like the Koala mini does. Although you can't really compare Koala mini to it either, because it doesn't have the same graphics chipset and it has dedicated graphics memory on the graphics card too.

Personally, I'd go for the Koala, even if it is a little bit more expensive to get the 120GB, since the superior graphics performance thanks to the dedicated memory means a lot for gaming and certain productivity uses - plus it can be even configured with a much faster processor than the Mini can for the same size (I think that's awesome personally). A computer that just does E-mail, word processing and web browsing isn't really enough for me unless it's a tiny netbook - fortunately the Koala exists as a nice desktop solution for people like me.

http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/linux_3x?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

My GOD, there's three on one page.

And some more:

http://system76.com/index.php?cPath=28

These damned things are everywhere:

http://www.linuxcertified.com/linux-laptop-lctp.html

http://www.thelinuxlaptop.com/products_new.php

http://www.system76.com/

Now what was it you were saying?

Replace it with an Ubuntu machine. Here's some dell machines with Ubuntu Linux pre-installed: http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/linux_3x?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs
Or maybe a smaller company that's been doing it longer:
http://system76.com/
Or maybe you don't really need to replace it. Maybe just put Ubuntu on it. It will probably be good for quite awhile longer.

If you want a not-so-mainstream computer that'll be guaranteed to work with Ubuntu, take a look at system 76

I can't personally vouch for them, but the few things I've heard have all been good.

It's actually easier than Windows, IMHO. It boots into Ubuntu without asking a single question, so you can decide if you like it. If you do, double-click "Install" on the desktop, answer the same type of questions as you would on Windows, and while it loads onto the hard drive, you can continue using it.

Or, if you prefer, stick the disk into a computer running Windows, click "Install", and it will install as if it were a Windows application. After installation, when you reboot, you get the usual grub menu to select either Ubuntu or Windows. If you later decide you don't like it, boot Windows and select Ubuntu and Uninstall from Add / Remove Programs, and it uninstalls.

I really can't imagine anything easier. Well, other than buying it pre-installed. :-)

I can buy an Ubuntu machine from System 76 that does all those things out of the box. And more. For less.

For one , I didn't respond before because I don't wish to start a flame war and degrade the thread to a me VS you scenario ... but my comments were true to my experience.

The prices in Apple Canada store were outrageously high to what I needed to match in dollar/performance .

I'm glad that your Mac Mini works out for you and take a look at this as well:

http://system76.com/product_info.php?cPath=27&products_id=83

Depends.. Are you talking desktop, or laptop? If you're talking a desktop, I'd say build it yourself, put the right hardware in it, and enjoy. A laptop is a bit harder. Buy one preinstalled. I recently went through and searched the various vendors that sell linux-based laptops. I've had dells before that I've put linux on, and 1 HP. They all worked to an extent, but getting wireless to work on them was a pain. I couldn't game well on either one due to the video cards either. After a lot of searching, I found a company that offered the features I wanted, and a decent price. All told, it was worth the time, effort, and money to get the hardware I wanted. http://www.system76.com/ is where I finally bought mine. Serval performance, and I couldn't be happier. They provide online support via the ubuntu forums, and between them and the community there I have had no problems.

www.system76.com if you're into Ubuntu...

But there's no way he could have gotten the wireless working on his own (even in the 8.04 beta, I still had to download and install drivers, then muck around with /etc/networking/interfaces file to make it work).

And he shouldn't be expected to.

Installing operating systems is for 1.) technicians, who can handle it and 2.) hobbyists, who asked for it. The idea that Ubuntu is going to gain a bunch of market share because random plumbers, school teachers, and bartenders will decide to download the install CD and install a new OS themselves on their current computers is absurd. Most users buy computers with the operating system already installed. If you want to do that for Ubuntu, try either System76 or Dell.

On the third hand, the Mac mini itself makes a fine Ubuntu system, especially if you're specifically looking for an SFF box. Depending on configuration a Koala might be cheaper, but if the mini is updated soon it should reclaim the advantage.

Hardware companies care only about selling a product and keeping the customer satisfied for the first 30 days after which they can't return the said hardware. They don't care if the patches to Linux don't get upstream because as long as the hardware works fine with the version of Linux that they hacked up and pre-loaded, they're customers will be temporarily satisfied.

And when it comes time to upgrade the Linux OS in a year or two, the new version won't work, so the customers will be forced to buy more "up-to-date" hardware with more hacks and band aids. Even presumably FOSS-friendly companies like System76 change the pre-installed Ubuntu on their laptops by adding tons of hacks and then don't bother to even report them upstream, much less to develop a sustainable solution.

See the following threads on the System76 forum:

Real Linux drivers for System76 laptops, NO thanks to System76

Merge System76 Driver with upstream kernel and HAL

I attempted to install Ubuntu on my new laptop recently and after several failed attempts to find all of the right drivers (some don't even exist yet) I had to give up.

I was thoroughly disappointed with the capabilities on decent hardware of Linux in general.

Call me when Linux is ready for prime time.

Exactly, and don't forget that it is still very difficult to buy a Desktop or Laptop computer with Linux pre-installed

But how many people would rather spend those two days just playing the game they wanted to play?

Of course I won't be going to Dell, but Apple seems to go out of their way to put difficult rubbish in their machines (WiFi!) - and instead of viewing the enemy of their enemy as a friend, they are as much anti Linux as Microsoft are :/

Take a look at what System76 has to offer. All of their systems are pre-configured w/ Ubuntu and have outstanding support. And all of the computer components are guaranteed to work under Linux. Though Ubuntu is installed by default, the company claims that nearly any distro should work (though getting their support for a different distro is unlikely).

Linux is not a great alternative to Windows.

Poor documentation

still command line focus

hardware compatibility issues

outdated GUI

hostile user community

server-centric makes for a crappy average home user experience

Oh, and lots of choice is not a good thing if 99% of what one can choose from is crap.

Dell needs to take these things in steed. If Mossberg's criticisms are valid - which they seem to be - then Dell isn't far off from having a system perfectly reccomendable to 'non-techies'. Perhaps then Dell can compete with those preinstalled Ubuntu laptops non-techies do seem to find great out-of-the-box.

Perhaps your next computer purchase should be a system (such as a computer from System76) that comes with Ubuntu rather than Windows. It will be fully supported.

you can't really get anything other than Vista on a new PC

Maybe you just aren't looking hard enough.

In the end, comparing operating systems based on how they handle marginally supported hardware is a waste of time. The reason you have the hardware is to run the software - selecting hardware that works with the software should be a blatantly obvious thing to do.

Sure, it's nice to be able to play around installing a bunch of different operating systems on one computer, but that's what that is: playing around. If you're planning on getting work done with a computer, the normal model is this: Buy a computer with an OS on it, use it with that OS, recycle it years later. Linux has the feature that you can frequently recycle Windows machines into Linux machines, but that's getting lucky and should be treated as such.

If you seriously want a Linux desktop, I suggest the following install procedure: Buy one from Dell or System76.

For example: http://system76.com/

why, system76 of course: http://www.system76.com/