Turns Out Ubuntu Dell Costs $225 More

An anonymous reader writes "One week ago this community discussed the apparent price advantage of Ubuntu Dell over Vista. The article linked to a Dell IdeaStorm page with the status: 'Implemented.' Today the status has changed on that page to 'Reneged: Ubuntu Dell is $225 More Than Windows Dell.' The full price of a Ubuntu Inspiron 1420N is indeed $50 cheaper than the identical hardware configuration with Vista — except that a $275 free upgrade to 2GB memory and a 160-GB hard drive is available for Windows only."

Comments

Vista needs the space

[LiquidCoooled]

Haven't people been saying the footprint of Linux is a shitload less than Windows bloat.
You simply don't need the extra on linux.

Re:Vista needs the space

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm guessing you never used KDE _

Re:Vista needs the space

[Anthony Rosequist]

LOL, that's Ubuntu users for you: "I did not have that problem, therefore it does not exist."

First, that's not what the parent was saying at all. It was more along the lines of:

"I did not have that problem, and you didn't give me enough diagnostic information to adequately help you solve it. You can attempt to find someone else with a similar problem, or we can work on it a little bit longer and try and get more information."

Plus, we don't know if the GP was messing around with things that he shouldn't have. People that are new to Linux (especially if you're having problems) shouldn't be messing with their Gnome install, advanced user settings, or extremely experimental beta eyecandy software, despite how tempting it can be.

Without knowing that information, I think that mhall did a great job addressing AC's problems. He recommended that, even though he wasn't sure exactly what the problem was (since he had never experienced them), he should:

• Check his screen resolution (and possibly video card drivers),
• Not mess with Beryl or Compiz,
• Create a new, default, user account and see if that helps, or
• If he doesn't have much to lose, try re-installing.

You're ridiculing him for some advice that he offered (for free) that was more helpful than most customer service departments (where they get paid), especially given the limited amount of information he had.

Re:Vista needs the space

[syntaxglitch]

LOL, that's Ubuntu users for you:

Are you still bitter over that one Ubuntu support thread where you acted like a jerk and people didn't magically fix your problem? Holding a grudge for over a year doesn't exactly give you the moral high ground here, you realize.

Astounding.

[EveryNickIsTaken]

There's two things I need every morning - a cup of coffee, and a blatant "flame Microsoft" Slashdot article. Bravo.

Re:What's the incentive?

[Geek_3.3]

Or Dell really DOES make a lot of money off of the crap-o bloatware (6 month's free AOL etc) and this is their way of compensating.

Re:What's the incentive?

[Shados]

Dell's promotions and stuff is err..."dynamic", to say the least. You can find the same system at like 5 different price depending where you look. So its no surprise that stuff like that would happen.

Re:What's the incentive?

[MoonFog]

Considering it's already down (see my other post in this thread), I guess it's safe to say that Dell's dynamic pricing moves faster than Slashdot's submission acceptance system.

Nothing like a good knee-jerk in the morning...

[Dekortage]

So Dell's base 1420 with Ubuntu costs $747 with these specs:

• Intel® Core(TM) 2 Duo T5250 (1.5GHz/667Mhz FSB/2MB cache)
• Ubuntu version 7.04
• Anti-glare, widescreen 14.1 inch display (1280x800)
• Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X3100
• 2GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 at 667MHz
• 160GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM)
• 24X CD Burner/DVD Combo Drive
• Intel® 3945 802.11a/g Mini-card
• No Camera
• 56Whr Lithium Ion Battery (6 cell)
• Integrated High Definition Audio

Meanwhile, Dell's Windows equivalent has exact same specs, except for these differences:

• Genuine Windows® Vista Home Basic Edition instead of Ubuntu
• Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini-Card instead of the Intel 802.11a/g card

And the Windows version costs $869. So the Ubuntu version is $122 cheaper and has a better WiFi card.

Remind me again... what did you step in?

Bought my Dell-Ubuntu Desktop

[World.Pop(MPAA)]

Being relatively a noob to Linux I decided to purchase a desktop with Ubuntu from Dell and have nothing but great things to say about it. I usually build my own computers, which is an easy process for me using Windows because it's easy to guarantee combatibility with the OS. But now with Vista out, my fears of losing all my purchased apps, plus a desire not to get locked into another cost ineffective software solution lead me to trying Ubuntu.

In the past, I've tried different distrobutions (SUSE, Mandrake, Red Hat, Slackware, among others) and have always taken it off my system because some annoying little hardware incompatibility caused me problems. So, while Dell may be charging a little extra for Ubuntu, I think there's something to be said about getting a Linux computer that will "just work" right out of the box.

I also have to mention that I don't feel cheated. I have a great system, 20" Widescreen Flat Panel, 2 GB of RAM, Core 2 Duo (1.X can't remember), the NVIDIA GFX (7300 Lite or something) card, 250 GB SATA HDD, DVD+-RW Dual Layer and another DVD-ROM as well. As some of the other posters had mentioned, this may have not been the "perfect deal" but I only paid about $1000 for the whole system. To me this is a sight better than paying $900 for the same machine using Vista and then having to repurchase Dreamweaver, Flash and Fireworks; does VS 2005 work on Vista?

Funny enough though, while Vista's having all these compatibility issues with the previous generation's software, I'm using the old Studio 8 suite on Linux under WINE and it's running faster than it did in Windows.