HP Will Offer Customized Linux in Notebooks

diegocgteleline.es writes "According with Tom's Hardware, HP is working with Ubuntu to offer a customized GNU/Linux version that works 100% - wireless, bluetooth, IrDA, IEEE1394 - with HP hardware. This offer will be restricted to Europe, Middle East and Africa. The CD includes free support through online resources as well as paid support through Canonical, the developer of Ubuntu."

Comments

how can we show U.S. interest?

[yagu]

First, any idea why my scroll wheel doesn't work on the referred page??? (It continues to work everywhere else, weird.)

Second, I wonder why this always starts, and is only going to be available in Europe. I know the article says:

is currently limited to EMEA - a region that tends to be more receptive to Linux than for example the US - and aims to demonstrate that a Linux desktop can be easily transferred to a notebook....

but, this sounds like a chicken or egg, or Catch 22 scenario. How do we break that circle? Is there a way to tell HP we do want linux on a laptop? Or are we too hardy and independent a group/demographic we just insist on doing this ourselves our own way. I'd love for all /.'ers who could, to ask HP for the option in US. I can't think there'd ever be any critical mass to make linux commercially available off-the-shelf unless we make some kind of overture.

Relatedly, and specifically about HP, they don't completely embrace linux yet (though I know some are going to flame me because this may be interpreted as "not about linux"). I have an HP Pavilion ZX5000 -- great little (cough) machine! I configured it dual boot with Mandrake 10.1, and paid the extra to get a Linuxant wireless driver. What a great little (cough) machine! Screen resolution 1920x1200 full color, both OS's. But, when the video connector (my diagnosis) started to loosen and my screen started to flicker I called HP for warranty repair. During the obligatory debugging phase (reboot XP, un-install, re-install video drivers, etc.) it was revealed I had a dual boot setup, and they IMMEDIATELY upon hearing I had linux on the machine refused to do the warranty repair! I escalated three times, talked to three managers and each immediately (by scanning previous call's notes) declined to do the warranty work claiming they had no assurance linux didn't damage the machine. I offered to pay for repairs should they determine in the course of fixing my machine that linux indeed was the cause. No dice.

On my fourth contact, I found a helpful person who agreed with my diagnosis, and agreed it sounded like a loose cable and agreed to do the warranty repair. She did however (bless her) advise me to remove the hard drive because upon receipt, and debugging, as soon as the technicians would see the dual boot she could not guarantee me they wouldn't immediately re-image the disk.

Bottom line, HP is dipping their toes in the linux waters, but somehow I think this community should demonstrate willingness and interest. I don't know exactly what that should be but I'm willing to participate -- any replies/suggestions -- I'm willing to try to take action.

Re:how can we show U.S. interest?

[lakeland]

Interesting; I had something similar but on escalating once (& threatening to sue) they agreed to ignore linux and fix the problem. Of course, linux had nothing to do with the problem. This was back when Bruce Parens was making lots of noise about HP's support for linux so I was pretty pissed to find linux = no warranty.

(Incidentially, my fault was a little different to yours: the parallel port had been plugged into the MB back-to-front and wouldn't work in either linux or windows.)

Just Europe, Middle East and Africa

[saterdaies]

Because I'm sure the GPL'd drivers and hardware support won't find its way into the regular Ubuntu distribution and from there into others. I mean, all that good stuff will probably be tied into proprietary HP graphics included in this system. Without the HP logo, the code will just cease to function.

On a nicer note, kudos to HP for at least putting a little effort into Linux - maybe to counteract the $100 million investment from Michael Dell into Red Hat?

Will people want the hazzle?

[xtracto]

HP does not open advertise the Ubuntu option, but instead lists FreeDOS as optional pre-installed OS. If requested, HP will provide a CD-ROM with a customized and Debian-based Ubuntu Linux free of charge. The CD also includes description of technical support, which includes free support through online resources as well as paid support through Canonical, the developer of Ubuntu.

I don't know, but I am quite skeptical about this, from what I read, people that chose the non Windows option would have to make the Ubuntu installation.

This mean one more step than with the Windows option...

There could be a difference, if the price of both configuraitons (windows, linux) where different. And even with that, the average user would end acquiring the Windows option because just hearing the "you must Install the OS to use the machine" will sound scary...

The question is WHY?? OH WHY!!? isnt Ubunty pre installed? what is wrong with that?

Re:NO USA? - end run around bundling agreements

[whitis]

The lack of support in the US is likely due to the unethical bundling agreements with microsoft. One way to provide a reasonable degree of support without selling machines preinstalled is to publish highly detailed installation instructions. for a few distributions. I log machine installations in such a way that you can practically cut and paste the log into a shell prompt and duplicate the install. Only the occasional reboot or a $%@#$% interactive install program prevents running the entire log as a shell script. All file edits are recorded using diff/patch, sed, cat, etc so you have an exact way to reproduce the changes.

That way, you are covered on your first install, reinstalls, and have a good head start on upgrades. And, this way you don't have to use their configuration. You can partition your hard drive to your specifications, for example. But you don't need to go searching for drivers to download or puzzle out how to install them.

This approach doesn't work very well for grandma but it will work for power users who may be new to linux as well as those people who normally use linux. And it would be a major selling point to linux people if the installation instructions are on the HP web site and they can view them before they even buy the machine.

The link above includes an example for an older HP notebook.