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HP Selling Systems With Linux
jeffy124 writes: "We were all very upset last August when Dell discontinued selling Linux on their machines. Good news - HP's picking up the slack. They're shipping machines pre-installed with Red Hat 7.1. Unfortunately, checking their website shows that only business machines will have a Linux option; home machines are still WinXP only."
Dell is still installing Redhat on its servers/workstations.
here is a link.
I SURVIVED THE GREAT SLASHDOT BLACKOUT OF 2002!
Unfortunately, checking their website shows that only business machines will have a Linux option; home machines are still WinXP only."
As has been said before, Dell is still offering linux on their machines for business and server applications as well. Both Dell and HP have realized that linux is not quite ready for the home desktop, and quite rightly so.
Why are they shipping a distro that is nearly 1 year old! Especially considering it's successor has been out for months.
Also, what happened with this rumoured mandrake on hp i've been hearing about? Were't they putting Mandrake as an option on home PC's ?
What about the HP LHr series, intel based, servers? They have been shipping with RedHat Linux for years.
Sure they are "servers" but they make a decent SMP workstation too with a Matrox G400 MAX installed.
It is not a very big step for HP, packing Linux on the workstations.
Not in my opinion.
The reason that they are shipping a year old system is that that is what they tested with. They confirmed that their hardware will all function fine under that version of Linux. They must have fully tested and configured all aspects of the machine to be confident that what they are selling will work with the minimal amount of fuss.
Since they may have spent six months or more testing, tweaking and then retesting, that is what they will ship. The testing cycle of any new product takes time and care. Simply slapping it together and seeing that is "mostly" works is just not good enough to put your name on something.
HP is probably beginning to test or are nearing completion of testing Red Hat 7.2 on their systems. In another 6 months or so, they will probably have those systems ready to ship.
That is the way that business operates. You will understand when, or if, you get into a position with a company that is looking at updating systems. Knowing that something "works" is not the same as knowing that it works by testing the heck out of it.
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If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
You want to integrate the robustness (is this a word) of Linux in a Corporate environment FIRST. This way, when the people who are running these systems go home at the end of the day, and have to use Windows on their home PC, they will wonder why.
Microsoft dominates the Home User due to the fact that it is what people most run AT WORK. If the foothold takes, and Linux actually gets more than "Geek" approval, it will be a major step towards eliminating the Microsoft dominated users.
It will require applications, and with home access via Broadband, people will also want to use the same applications. this could start a trend towards "If it isn't available, I will create it" similar to what happened under Windows. the development tools are already there. Linux just needs to be a presence and illustrate its effectiveness in daily Business Use.
It would be great if DELL and COMPAQ would get back on the bandwagon, but sometimes you take what you can get.
You keep going until you die..."Me".
Linux is most likely more because irregardless of whether you install Windows or not on a box, the OEM has to pay for that Windows license anyway...
Linux is _more_ ready for the home user than
Windows is...
Each user does need a "sysadmin" or a person
who does "sysadmin" duties. Attempting to
administer your own box without knowledge is
not a terrifically good idea. If there are
people in the neighbourhood who can help with
the administration of a Windows system, Windows
may be a good choice. If the "sysadmin" is remote,
Linux is a better choice.
Many users do _not_ play the latest whiz-bang
games (certainly my grandma doesn't). My grandma
needs a reliable information appliance that:
1 - works reliably
2 - is easy to use
3 - is crash resiliant
4 - software shouldn't cost more than hardware.
Linux fits the bill nicely. Point 1: Linux 2.2
is stable, Windows XP may be stable. 2: Windows
is point and click; so is KDE. I can configure
KDE to "protect" grandma from herself, I can't
do this with Windows 9x, maybe with XP... 3:
Linux offers logging file systems. Last time I
checked (Windows 98), the check-disk procedure
for a 60GB drive took in excess of 1/2 hour.
Maybe XP solves this... Also, Linux handles
application crashes more gracefully than Windows
9x. 4: Here is the big item. Grandma uses a
Pentium 266, purchased second hand, _without_
a Windows license. Putting on Windows 9x (XP)
would run around $200CDN, Office would be another
chunk of money. The entire machine is worth
$600CDN. Can't really justify the cost of Windows
here, given Linux does a _better_ job than
Windows 9x (not sure about XP though).
I remotely administer this box on behalf of
Grandma, and she is quite happy with the result.
Yes, the "why not Windows/Office" question has
come up, because that's what the neighbours use,
and that's what the grandkids _want_ to use
(for those shiny games), but the cost issue put
the kibosh on the idea.
Yes, Linux is READY for mass consumption.
Ratboy
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
Maybe more than $100. Just try to find a PC from one of the big OEMs that doesn't bundle some MS application software, either Office or Works Suite, with Windows. The OEM XP Home I got on my new machine (Hey! I have to have some system to play games and do my taxes.) was $99, although that was from PC Club rather than one of the top 10 vendors. Add in Works Suite and you're talking more like $150; Office would bump that to quite a bit more.
And don't underestimate $100 savings, either. Some cheap machines these days are retailing in the $500 range, so knocking $100 of the price is a relatively large chunk of the cost. Those may not be hot gaming machines, but they might be pretty decent for mundane office use.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
HP was gracious enough to loan me one of these machines for a couple of weeks; so that I could write a review of it. I've only had it for a day, but it appears to be everything that one could ask for in a Linux graphics workstation. It's incredibly fast, has unbelieveable graphics, and has a customized RedHat configuration that just works.
HP has seen the light, too, and is running XFree86 instead of the custom Xserver inherited from their HPUX platforms. Their first Linux boxes, released about a year ago, weren't running XFree, IIRC.
More to follow, of course. One line summary -- The machines are real, and they rock.
thad
I love Mondays. On a Monday, anything is possible.
and from
I think I'll get the windows version and install debian myself.
You haven't been paying much attention to OEM licensing discussions, have you? Linux Refund Day provided a great object lesson. The per-unit price for Windows is negligible. And that price is already paid whether your unit ships with Windows or not. To avoid the "Microsoft tax", OEMs will have to abandon Windows. And as much as I would like to see OEMs have that option, right now they don't.
Someone at the HP booth showed me how at
the Linux World exhibition. Go to
http://bstore.hp.com/ click on Business desktops,
select the 'e-pc 40', and choose customize.
You will have the ability to select Linux (mandrake) and when you do, you will get a
discount of $90.
This is the way it should be. As far as I know, no
other manufacturer has discount from the Windows
tax even if you buy Linux. And for a "business PC",the e-PC models are downright cool - they
are sexy enough and quiet enough to make a nice
home-pc too (much better than the bigger, bulkier
HP consumer PC's).
Thanks, HP for giving us the freedom from the
Windows tax (and while we are expressing
gratitude, thanks for open-sourcing your printer
drivers too - my deskjet kicks ass on Linux
now!)
Alas, it won't be so. The so called Microsoft Tax amounts to about $100. I was a technical support supervisor for one of the major PC manufacturers, so I had some involvment in cost analysis of the PC's we sold. Our licensing costs on the OS was between $35 and $45 (depending on the version) and Office ran about $45. Why so cheap? Obviously volume plays a significant role, but also Microsoft had no involvment in the manufacturing of the media. We received a "master" set of discs that were in turn shipped to our manufacturer who then made the media that we shipped. Microsoft incurred no costs outside of development.
Another reason that you probably won't see "clean" systems is that most computer manufacturers are seeking to reduce the number of configurations available in order to reduce the cost of building the systems. Before I left my job in the PC manufacturing industry, my company had an exraordinarily broad catalog with substantial overlap between home and business systems, as well as a number of configurations that were rarely selected. That variety costs money...and also leads to mistakes, such as an overly ambitious salesperson who happily bundles a DVD drive, CD drive and CD-RW drive into a desktop system that has two 5.25" bays. But I digress...
The number of systems that customers would order blank is vanishingly small as a percentage of total sales. My company would do it, but only for their "key" customers, organizations that ordered systems by the hundreds. Otherwise, it just wasn't worth it, particularly with the razor-thin margins in the business.
I guess one way of looking at it is that because of the rapacious competition in the industry we're paying extraordinarily low prices for computers today. Sure, the extra $80-$90 that you pay for the OS and application software seems unfair, but on the other hand, the total system price is, quite frankly, a bargain, even with the inclusion of the unwanted OS.
My suggestion (and I'm sure there's no shortage of those similar to it) is that if you want a system with a clean drive, you should build it yourself.
-h-