Ubuntu Dell $50 Cheaper Than Vista Dell

rhinokitty writes "Dell recently announced that their Ubuntu systems will be $50 cheaper than similar systems running Vista (Home Basic Edition). This will be a good fork in the road for those people who need a little extra push to take hold of their dreams and run Linux."

Comments

"Take hold of their dreams"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please... If it was really anyone's dream to run Linux, I don't think $50 more on a Dell PC is going to stop them.

Re:"Take hold of their dreams"?

[sconeu]

With a LAPTOP?????

Re:"Take hold of their dreams"?

[Stephen Samuel]

I think that the point is that it's no longer more expensive to get a Linux box from Dell than it is to get a windows box from Dell, nuke the Windows partition (and thus lose even hardware support) and install Linux. -- or get the same box sans OS*, and install Linux yourself.

I will note that even just resizing the Windows partition for your 120GB hard drive to make room for a 20GB Linux install is enough to cause the Dell nuke-Windows-and-reinstall script to freak out and stop.

(* Yeah, I'm discounting FreeDos as a legitimate OS -- Have you ever even heard of someone [other than a FreeDos developer] actually leaving their FreeDos partition permanently on their machine and using it as anything other than a launching point for installing another OS and/or claiming HW support from Dell?_

What this really means

[Enderandrew]

Many Linux users are willing to buy their own rigs, or have been content to purchase Windows and then either dual-boot or just format and install Linux.

I don't think this move will equate to widespread acceptance of Linux on the desktop for the home. You're not going to shop Dell's site as a Windows lover with no Linux experience and say, "since Dell is selling Linux, I think I'll give it a try and buy a computer without Windows!"

It is nice that people will save money, however, there is a potential large impact of this move.

Several IT departments in all kinds of large corporations struggle with trying to get corporate suits to accept Linux in the workplace. And while large companies like RedHat or Novell will sell support, corporations like familiarity and standardization. If said corporation has a corporate contract with Dell, and Dell is officially standing behind Ubuntu and selling Ubuntu preinstalled, and you can see it as a cost-cutting move to the suits at the same time, then this might help spread the acceptance of Linux in the workplace.

Re:What this really means

[Enderandrew]

Dell also said they'd never sell AMD processors, nor never sell Linux on their desktops.

If big corporations request it, I'm sure Dell will comply.

Re:What this really means

[timmarhy]

i'd liken it to the first tiny crack in the damn. no water comming out yet, but dell openly selling linux pc's would have been unthinkable even 3 years ago.

Re:What this really means

[gujo-odori]

OK, that argument about the iPods looks like it holds a little water at first, but if you stand there for a minute, it turns out to be a sieve (disclosure: I have both a Mac and iPod; the Mac is company-issue and the iPod was a gift.

What makes it a sieve rather than a bucket is the fact the people are a lot freer to choose their MP3 player than they are to choose their OS. No computer comes with a bundled MP3 player (although I'm sure if Microsoft could find a way to force the major PC vendors to bundle Zunes, it would do it like a shot ). Whichever MP3 player you want, you have to go out and buy it (or someone does, if it's a gift). The MP3 player market was once a pretty level playing field. Then Apple came out with the iPod and the market said that it was good. Very good. It became the top-selling player, and I wouldn't be surprised if over half the players sold are some flavor of iPod. While the iPod line has a level of market dominance similar to that of the Windows product line, it doesn't have the level of lock-in that the Windows and Office product lines have.

If Apple crashed and burned with the next iPod and it sucked, people would stop buying it pretty quickly and their market share would go in the toilet. If somebody came out with a player that was as far above the iPod as the iPod is above everything else currently on the market, the iPod's market share would go in the toilet. Quickly. In that situation, people upgrading from an old iPod would probably buy the hot new player instead.

"What about all their existing songs?" you might ask. My entire iTunes library was ripped from my CD collection as high bit-rate MP3, so no problem. I just load it in the new player. If they bought a lot of stuff from the iTunes store, people would have to go to some greater effort and transcode the stuff to MP3 and burn it to a CD, then load it back in, or so. I haven't tried that, but where there's a DRM, there's always a way around it, too.

Finally, while the iPod is clearly the dominant player in the market, I can go down to Fry's and find a number of competing MP3 players on the shelves. If you walk over to the software section, you're not going to find nearly as much in the way of competing PC operating systems or software for them. If you find any at all, it will take up less than a shelf. Way less. (I'm excluding Mac here because it's also a competing hardware platform, not a PC OS.)

That said, I would agree that the iPod line could conceivably become a de facto monopoly just because it's so much better than everything else and has such a wide range of third-party accessories, and that the Windows line, while still a de facto monopoly, is much less of one that it used to be. It has real competition now and is starting to lose ground; ou couldn't say that 10 years ago when Microsoft was at the peak of its power.

I also completely agree with you about that "taking hold of their dreams" thing. I've been a Linux user and supporter for ten years, but that was embarassing.

Re:What this really means

[Eivind]

True. But this actually adds to Microsofts vulnerability.

We (as in Linux) support a lot of hardware because we ourselves wrote drivers for it. (well, in some cases the manufacturers did, but when the drivers are open source, they are part of "we".

Windows xp supports stuff very poorly -- but is rescued by the fact that the manufacturers themselves release binary blobs that work as drivers.

Which mean we can and will support any and all hardware we support today until the end of time, or more realistically, until nobody cares enough to bother porting the stuff as the kernel changes.

So, Windows-users are at the mercy of manufacturers, which have little incentive for quickly developing high-quality drivers for a piece of hardware they probably neither sell nor produce anymore. -- *they* would much prefer people bougth a *new* scanner/digicam/webcamera/younameit. So, Epson is taking its good time, releasing drivers at *all* 15 months after Vista is released, assuming the announced schedule holds, which I wouldn't assume, really. And that's for a product they used to produce up until 6 months ago. For somewhat older products they don't bother at all.

Microsoft could pick up the slack, start developing and maintaining drivers themselves, just like we do. But it'd cost them. And it ain't done overnigth.

A win for Linux. The new Dell with Ubuntu on it would support all of my wifes gadgets out-of-the-box, Vista supports half of them out-of-the-box, and drivers for the remaining 2 are promised in 8 months. Which ain't very satisfactory. Nor is she inclined to toss away a scanner and digital camera that she is perfectly happy with. None of them are old either, aproximately 1 year.

$50?

[Mystery00]

I don't think that is a big enough incentive, people that have been brainwashed by M$'s propaganda about how great Vista is aren't going to suddenly turn and say "ZoMG! This OS is $50 cheaper! Forget Vista!"

A $50 difference will do nothing in terms of persuasion for the common man, the people that buy Ubuntu pre-installed are only the ones that have done the research and know at least a bit about what they've doing, and what they want, the rest know Windows, and M$'s advertising.

What Ubuntu needs from Dell, isn't a $50 price difference, but some available INFORMATION, look here: www.dell.com/

I don't know about you, but all I see are Vista loaded machines, I didn't check every page, but nobody is going to buy an Ubuntu loaded machine if it's buried somewhere at the back of the site, or the store.

Re:They'll probably choose Ubuntu because..

[Tribbin]

I hope you see the irony of your comment?

With the grand choice you have in Ubuntu alone, the apps, and other distro's.

Re:They'll probably choose Ubuntu because..

[fonik]

At least with Ubuntu the customers can switch around for free. With windows you have to pay more if you find your license doesn't cover a feature you need, like multilingual support or remote desktop.

Target market

[idesofmarch]

Is this the PC for Vista/XP pirates? I mean, why pay an extra $50 when you don't have to?

I hate Vista but for $50....

[syousef]

...if I'm spending thousands on a new laptop, I'll still take the OS if it's optional. I can pick up Ubuntu for nothing later on. Vista would cost me hundreds.

This isn't a push in the right direction, it's a slap in the face!

Re:I hate Vista but for $50....

[Trelane]

Mod parent up! (Lack of) hardware support due to PCs being "Designed for Windows" is the reason Linux has its reputation for being hard to install.

Re:I hate Vista but for $50....

[MojoStan]

Subject: I hate Vista but for $50....

...if I'm spending thousands on a new laptop, I'll still take the OS if it's optional. I can pick up Ubuntu for nothing later on. Vista would cost me hundreds.

Perhaps, but I don't think it's "hundreds." According to the story's scoop, that $50 only gets you Vista Home Basic. Also, it's an OEM version, which means you cannot transfer the license to another computer (like you can with retail versions). An OEM version of Vista Home basic costs $90 to $95 at everybody's favorite egg store.

Also, I think there's significant value in a preinstalled Linux distro that's been tested and confirmed to work with all of the hardware (especially notebooks). Even for supposedly user-friendly distros like Ubuntu, I've read many anecdotes about minor driver problems and manually editing config files. Sure, you can have the same problems with Windows. However, every PC hardware vendor writes Windows drivers first. Linux drivers are almost always secondary if they are written at all. We can at least be somewhat assured that Dell chose Linux-friendly hardware and tested the drivers on these Ubuntu PCs.

Baby steps...

[kebes]

You're right, of course. A $50 difference is not that persuasive. However, at least the Ubuntu machine isn't more expensive than the equivalent Vista one. After all, there was considerable worry that Dell would keep the Ubuntu price higher (for a variety of reasons, such as contracts with MS or kickbacks from craplet installs, etc.).

So, I see Dell's offering of Ubuntu machines as a small step in the right direction. And the fact that they are a bit cheaper than the Vista equivalent is also a step in the right direction.

I highly doubt many consumers will be randomly browsing the Dell website and say "damn, those Ubuntu machines look awesome!"... but at least these prices allow those in the know to suggest to others: "If you're looking for a new computer, consider getting a Dell Ubuntu machine. Ubuntu is very stable and secure and you don't need the most expensive computer to run it. In fact, it's a bit cheaper than the equivalent Windows machine!"

Will this give Linux a 15% marketshare overnight? No. But it's a step towards breaking the current OS monoculture... and that's a good thing.

Trialware

[kylehase]

Let's take a look at some prices:

• Vista Home Basic DSP (similar to OEM) $88

• Dell bulk OEM price about $50 ?
• Dell incentives from trialware/crapware $50 ? (I hear it's better these days)
• Net $0

• Ubuntu price $0
• Dell incentives from trialware/crapware $0
• Net $0

So IMO a $50 savings for Ubuntu is actually impressive.

Re:Trialware

[Hal_Porter]

Do you have any figures for Dell OEM pricing or incentives from trialware or crapware?

The cost per Vista Home Basic OEM is about $99 to end users.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070124-8696 .html

But volume discounts are not illegal as far as I know, so they probably still charge Dell less than the OEM price if they do thousands of installs. Googling around turns up quotes for Vista like "$50 for Home Basic rising to to $100 for Home Premium", but no hard figures and nothing on the record from an OEM.

Looking at the amount of junk installed on Dells by default I think there's probably a significant amount of cash involved. I had a friend in Taiwan who was seriously considering entering her credit card number when the anti virus trial ran out and it started to nag her until I told her it was a waste of time. So presumably the junk companies make a hefty amount of cash out of trialware, maybe fifty companies making a buck each is possible.

On the other hand the fact that Dell discount $50 for no Windows makes me think that the spyware kickback is less than this, and in fact close to zero, since this seems to be close to the rumoured Dell OEM Windows cost.

All this of course makes it very unlikely that Apple would OEM OSX by the way. They'd get $50-$100 off a Dell running OS X most likely at the low end of this, but they presumably make much more off genuine Apple hardware. Dells would also force them to spend more on supporting all commodity PC hardware rather than being able to cherry pick which components like they can do on Apple hardware.

Re:YAY!!

[GregPK]

To be nice, Vista was built with the idea of adding 20 million features to it then trying to make it stable. Which at the moment it really doesn't. Most business customers (Whom BTW account for a vast majority of Microsoft revenues) Want something that that is fast, extremely stable, and consistent. So if it always crashes when you press A 4 and 5 in a sequence it crashes but everything else works perfect. We can work with that. It's stable its easy to predict and easy to fix. Most people in business barely even use those functions in the current windows product. Most companies use a form of exchange server and outlook, word, excel, powerpoint, half a dozen network drives and a dozen or so other 3rd party apps specific to thier field like autocad, Photoshop, testing, etc. All of which slows down when you add in more resource hogging windows functions. The most useful new windows tool I've seen added to date has probably been remote desktop, built in zip functions, run command on the start menu. But even then it has its limits. I'd much rather have a faster way to switch between spreadsheets when I've got 6 open at once, A hotkey wizard for excel and word. A easy hit task manager that functions like the old autoexec.bat file did back in day where all I had to do is just simply take the one I wanted to run doom with and rename it while the old one automatically got named to .bak so I can easily rename it back for other users using other programs. I'd like something that just keeps track of what programs I am or am not using then highlights the ones I'm not using so I can quickly shut them down for more memory. Or even better. A memory saving profile that I can run just the basics when I'm doing work related stuff on the network access to the net. I'm not saying I can make an operating system out of my closet(maybe a computer). But as an end user who looks at a machine for 8-12 hours at a time I know what I want.

Put up or shut up.

[RomeReactor]

This is _exactly_ what most people that wanted Linux pre-installed in their PCs said they wouldn't do: whine about details. Why can't I get a better battery? Why is it only 50$ cheaper? Why is it gray?... We wanted this; now it's time we show we can backup our statements with cash. Vote. Wallet. Now.

Ubuntu IS ready for the desktop

[moosesocks]

I've been a pretty strong opponent of Linux on the desktop for a long, long time now.

The first distro installed was Debian 2.2 off of floppy disks, so I've been at this for quite a while. I'd try it out, work with the desktop for a few weeks, and inevitably move back to Windows. I went through the motions with this for a few years, trying out Red Hat, Mandrake, Slackware, and Gentoo in the process. Each time, I reverted back to Windows.

I eventually got a mac, and that was that. I had my unix, and I had my desktop, and I was happy. At school, I would occasionally use the computer labs (running Fedora Core + KDE) to compile some code, or whip up a quick TeX document. It was usable to me, but clearly not ready for the average user (that's what my mac's for)

Fast forward to last month. My mac at work was acting up, and because I only use it to run MATLAB through a remote X server, I figured that I'd give the Ubuntu PPC port a try.

On first impressions, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that it's just as good as, if not better than Windows for desktop usage. The default install is simple and very well polished. I eventually switched to Xubuntu, which was also extremely simple. The settings/preferences panel is top-notch, and the package manager is flawlessly integrated into the OS.

I still like MacOS for my home computer, if only because of iLife, and all the multimedia and photo/video editing apps that Linux doesn't have yet. However, Ubuntu is a very viable competitor to Windows, even for somebody who's never used Linux before.

Re:Is Ubuntu good?

[ozmanjusri]

I would hit him over the head, and then give him a couple of notes/chapters/howtos on MS administration/security

Aren't you getting a bit mixed up?

Linux is supposed to be the complicated one. If you need to read all that just to use Windows safely, how do you expect a granny to cope?

Re:Nice gesture

[MidnightBrewer]

I think it's nice that Linux users save $50, but I think this will have zero effect on Windows users. People aren't going to switch because it's cheaper; rather, they're more likely to say, "You get what you pay for," and see the $50 extra as a vote for Windows' quality.

that's not the same thing at all

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone who runs Linux on a laptop knows how tricky it is to make sure your distro works with all the laptop features, and the wireless, etc.

When Dell sells an Ubuntu-loaded laptop, you know it's going to work out of the box.
When HP sells a FreeDos laptop, you don't know what's going to happen when you put Ubuntu on it.

It's not 1995 anymore.

[DrYak]

With the grand choice you have in Ubuntu alone, the apps, and other distro's.

You know these "There's too much choice in Linux, it's too hard to make selection" whine-trolls we see around aren't very accurate.

It's not 1995 anymore. The time when either you had to pick manually everything up or when the default installation included 3 different products all in crash-prone alpha version (because all the application where recent and none functioned 100% of the time requiring you to mix the use of all 3 to cover your needs) is over.

Yes, for each task in Linux there exist at least several dozens of possible candidate application.

*BUT* for most mainstream application, if you just Yes-click-trough the installation (something that the EULA-trained Windows user is very used to) you just get a basic set of everything you need. Most distro will provide with 1 default desktop (Gnome or KDE in most cases, depending on your religion), 1 browser (usually Firefox. Or Konqueror) 1 email program (Thunderbird, or Evolution, or KMail) 1 Office suite (OOo or Abiword+Gnumeric+etc. or KOffice).

No need to choose a solution a default choice has been pre-maid to help you. Just hit the icon in the menu and let the default application startup.
Want something else ? Then only you have to fire up the software package manager (Yast, Synaptic, RpmDrake, Anaconda etc. or whatever starts when you click on the icon labelled "Add/Remove software").
And even here, there's still an easy route :
- Most installator provide a "task oriented" mode. Want to make a web server ? Just check the box next to the webserver "Activity" and the installator will take care to provide you a default set of tools.
- Only when you need a specific package will you have to hunt it in the list.

And all that is when installing a distro yourself. Now, I'm sure that Dell has already put the trouble to make sure that every Ubuntu laptop ships with a perfectly functional set of basic application covering all the needed tasks. User don't have to hesitate between 4 different word processors or a dozen of different web-browsers (include a couple of text-mode only).
Just clic on the menu entry that says "E-Mail".

For the lazy user, everything will be, I suppose, set to go. That "burden of choice" some bloggers always complain about is left only for those who actually care to make very specific choices.

Re:I'll take Vista thanks :-)

[PopeRatzo]

I'll take Vista thanks :-) Don't have time to fix Linux problems anymore.

You must not have tried Vista yet.

I took Vista

[camperdave]

I took Vista because I had no choice. It came with the HP Pavilion laptop I purchased, and MS would not allow the store to sell any other MS operating system. No big deal, I thought. I made the system restore disks as per instructions. I then shrank Vista's NTFS partition using the Vista tools, and installed Ubuntu in the empty spot. I left the HP restore partition alone. I was dual booting fine for a couple of days. However, it started taking longer and longer for Vista to shut down. Now it won't boot at all.

I've tried "Last known good configuration". I've tried "Repair your system". I've tried "Safe Mode", "Debug mode", and "Safe mode with Command Prompt". I've tried the HP restore partition. I've tried the System restore disks that I made. I've even tried the Vista Anytime Upgrade disk that came with the machine. Vista refuses to boot up. The closest I get is a blank blue screen with a mouse pointer. I've left the machine for hours, hoping that the desktop would populate, but no dice. Many people are in the same boat that I am. Vista hangs when it loads CRCDISK.SYS I've been scouring the net, but so far the only solution seems to be return the laptop.

Ubuntu and Fedora both work fine, however. No problems with the wide screen graphics. No problem with the WIFI. There's even no problem reading the NTFS partitions.

I'll take Vista thanks :-) Don't have time to fix Linux problems anymore.

I'll take Linux thanks. I don't have time to fix Vista problems anymore.

Re:Dell is always doing half-hearted attempt

[Warbothong]

So what you're saying is:

You bought some laptops with Linux

The Linux system wasn't preloaded

The Red Flag Linux supplied didn't have all needed drivers

This is an unfortunate situation, but the point of these Ubuntu preloaded systems is to address these issues. The rest of your post is some garbage about not being supplied the correct drivers for DOS or Windows XP with you Linux laptops. You know what? I didn't get BSD drivers with my Dell laptop. I'm gonna sue!

Missing the point

[Ganesh999]

To all those bitching about how a $50 discount won't convert any Windows users: you're missing the point.

Dell is in shit, in a very competitive, saturated market. Common business sense says the best thing they can do is to be the first to into a new market.

Headline: the new market is not one of potential converts from Windows - not yet, anyhow.

Dell's hoped-for market consists of :

* long-term linux users with Real Jobs who need a new PC but don't have the time or just can't be arsed to build, install, and customise Yet Another Linux Box.

* The type who sometimes, against their best wishes, might feel themselves lured back to Windows because they feel it's just *easier*.

* The type who would quite like official support on a preinstalled linux box, instead of banging their heads against the ITSupport wall when the Windows box they just bought, wiped, reinstalled & voided the warranty for has a hardware problem.

These types are likely to discriminate in the long term against a company that quoted them *more* for a preinstalled linux box. For these types, $50 is not an outright incentive, but it "is" a nice goodwill gesture. Converting Windows users comes later.

Ladies and gentlemen, Dell's intended market is *us*. And no-one's bothered with us before.

As the man said elsewhere : Vote. Wallet. Now. I know I will as soon as the UK gets the same offer.

Cheers,

C