Thats a complete and utter load of bull crap. $200? Hardly. Hardly. Hardly. Assuming that Mandrake is giving them the OS for free (and I dont know that we can do that, but lets go with it anyways), they'd probably be saving between $40 and $80 a unit, depending on the configuration. Contrary to popular belief Windows XP is not very expensive for OEMs. The higher the volume, the cheaper the deal for that OEM
It may be true that the savings isn't that great. And as someone else said, $40-$80 a unit is still money (and quite a bit in volume). So, yes it still counts. Another thing to note here is that it is $100-$200 price difference to the buyer. Putting WinXP on the machine raises the price for the buyer, and that does matter (see below).
That's what I don't get. YOU'VE ALWAYS BEEN ABLE TO GET CHEAP HARDWARE. Why this whole crap about the "Windows Tax". Its a lie, a myth!
It may be easy for you and me to get cheap hardware, but what about Joe Average? Why do people buy computers from Dell, Gateway, Walmart, etc? Because they get a package deal that they can rely on. If Walmart can sell you a complete system for $200 (or $40) cheaper because of software differences (or for other differences), that's awesome. There's two twinkies that taste about the same, one costs $4 the other costs $2.. which to you buy?
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Thats a complete and utter load of bull crap. $200? Hardly. Hardly. Hardly. Assuming that Mandrake is giving them the OS for free (and I dont know that we can do that, but lets go with it anyways), they'd probably be saving between $40 and $80 a unit, depending on the configuration. Contrary to popular belief Windows XP is not very expensive for OEMs. The higher the volume, the cheaper the deal for that OEM
It may be true that the savings isn't that great. And as someone else said, $40-$80 a unit is still money (and quite a bit in volume). So, yes it still counts. Another thing to note here is that it is $100-$200 price difference to the buyer. Putting WinXP on the machine raises the price for the buyer, and that does matter (see below).
That's what I don't get. YOU'VE ALWAYS BEEN ABLE TO GET CHEAP HARDWARE. Why this whole crap about the "Windows Tax". Its a lie, a myth!
It may be easy for you and me to get cheap hardware, but what about Joe Average? Why do people buy computers from Dell, Gateway, Walmart, etc? Because they get a package deal that they can rely on. If Walmart can sell you a complete system for $200 (or $40) cheaper because of software differences (or for other differences), that's awesome. There's two twinkies that taste about the same, one costs $4 the other costs $2.. which to you buy?