Great to hear.  You're on your way back onto my vendor list.

I heard that you have to pay Microsoft for every PC that is shipped, regardless of whether it has Windows on it or not.  Is this true? 

"Dell hasn't tested any particular Linux distribution and doesn't offer software support for running Linux on these"

We really don't need Dell to support us; there are many forums for that purpose.  What we need is for Dell to identify unsupported functions and features in the hardware Dell sells as being for a Linux audience, when used with the latest currently available kernel.  Ideally, there should be no hardware in that category in a product intended for use with Linux.  There should be no requirement for proprietary software.

We also need you to specify that as a requirement to your upstream ODMs.  This will in no way impact the suitability of the equipment for use with Windows XP/Vista, it just insures that your Linux customers can expect an equally good experience.

If you treat Linux customers as second class, they will treat you as a second class vendor.  Remember that there have been vendors catering to the Linux market for almost a decade now; why should a Linux customer buy from Dell, if Dell doesn't really want the business?

I just went through the Lattitude D420 configurator and could find no way to select the laptop to not have vista preinstalled

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W300&l=en&oc=blcwg1s&s=bsd 

37000 "votes" are meaningless.

What actually matters is sales.

Just don't cater to the vocal minority at the expense of everybody else.

I would like to clarify, a computer/laptop with no OS installed does *not* qualify as Linux preinstalled.

 Additionally, you are claiming that these machines are *not* tested with Linux, how *exactly* does this satisfy a desire for a choice of Linux?

 Do these systems have known working hardware with Linux? Do you state this one way or the other?

This satisfies the #6 request, but please, how does this have anything to do with Linux preinstalled?

I have just looked over your nseries pages and see no way to determine if the computer I am about to buy is going to be brick as far as running Linux goes.
 

Honestly, kudos on opening up IdeaStorm and starting a dialog with customers, but how can anyone know if they can buy a Linux machine from your company if you don't give any information?

If you want a preinstalled Linux notebook/laptop, go here.

 http://lxer.com/module/db/index.php?dbn=14

IMO Dell doesn't give a crap about desktop Linux. 

i think 'the linux community' would be happy with ubuntu pre-installed. Dell just has to select hardware which works with 6.06 or 6.10 and forward the customer to canonical for a service contract. i can't see this taking more than a few days of work for one employer. the result would probably be in the region of 50000 sales.

now dell, hp, etc. aren't stupid, and they've certainly known this for a long time and have done nothing. the question is, why? what we now see is a resurgence of sun microsystems precisely because sun has open-sourced its software.

do not underestimate the morality of the average person. gnu/linux (or foss in general) is primarily a moral decision. if dell certifies systems for ubuntu, people will pay for the chance to be moral. i most certainly would.  

Link for n-series is below.  You can select Open-source Notebooks or Desktops from the blue menu bar at the top of Dell.com

http://www.dell.com/content/products/features.aspx/nseries_nb?c=us&cs=04&l=en&s=bsd&~ck=mn

"working to bring Latitude notebooks to the n-Series lineup. n-Series are Dell products that ship with no operating system pre-installed."

Which really does *NOTHING* to satisfy the need.   If someone wanted to deal with their own installation and roll the dice with hardware components to see if they're configured - they already can and already do so with a laptop pre-installed with XP Home.  The problem is that you're never quite sure if that Dell laptop has a winmodem or a obscure graphics card or a odd power managment system that prevents linux from enabling the LCD backlight coming out of suspend or an unsupported wireless card, etc.

 The main reason for people asking for Linux from the OEM is so *YOU* who best knows what hardware and hardware hacks are in your system can check that it works or helps the community make it work.

 The other reason for people asking for Linux is that they use Linux at work on servers, and would like their  laptop to be a similar environment to what they use at work.  We don't want to fool around installing OS's (and neither does our IT department).  We want to buy a computer that "just works" and use it.

That NX series "we don't support Linux but we support but don't bundle Windows" (it evens says 'Dell recommends Vista' when you go to buy one) seems like just a channel for encouraging software piracy.  If you wanted this to be a channel to answer the needs of Linux users who want a no-hassle Linux system, you'd pre-install it.

Thanks Matt for this nice news !

Folks, why can't you really read what Matt is writing and looking the links in the post beofre ranting ?

Click on the "linux engineering" link , and you'll have on the right pane a nice link to a n-series notebooks ... a page where any of us can customize and buy the notebook of choice WITHOUT WINDOWS ... happy shopping - I've already put mine through ;) - easy enough for people able to play in command line mode and path kernels I think.

You guys really should check your prices

OK:
Latitude D620, D820: 30$ less without Windows License
Optiplex 740, 745: 30$ less without Windows License

Doesn't make sense at all:
Latitude D520, D420: CHEAPER with Windows License
Precision: Same price with or without Windows License
Optiplex 320: Same price with or without Windows License

Why is the no-OS machine more expensive? 

(more info here: http://buranen.info/?p=77)

I'll just stick to putting my own computers together, then ... I'd rather pay extra for that.

Yes, unfortunately the reality does not match the promise.

1. The lack of appropriate price savings by choosing a system without a Microsoft OS.

2. The analysis is very US-focused. Somebody has mentioned the systems are not available in Canada, nor are they available in Australia. Of course, even if they were, without appropriate price savings, the offer is a farce.

frank


 

It wasn't that hard to find...

n-Series notebooks (Open-Source Notebooks)

Please consider offering Ubuntu Linux pre-installed as an option on *all* desktops and laptops --even if you do so on an *unsupported* basis.

I understand that Ubuntu Linux has grown to nearly 10 million users very quickly, primarily through word of mouth -- that is, despite having no distribution deals, no advertising, no major corporate partner, etc.

What I am really looking for is a guarantee from Dell that all components (or only all critical components, if made explicit) work with drivers included in the official Linux kernel. That means no binary drivers and no third-party open-source modules, because they are a pain. That means that, in practice, you have to force your chip vendors to publish specs for the devices. You may have to employ a few Linux driver developers, or see the offer from one of the main Linux developers: http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.kernel/487536

I want to buy a computer (desktop and notebook), slap my Linux distro of choice on it, and *know that it works* out of the box, without fussing around.

I don't need customer support at all. But I do need a complain department when Dell doesn't live up to its promises.
 

This isn't exactly a "solution" to the requests; they (and me) are asking for PREINSTALLED linux, not OS-free computers. The point is to have an easy-to-use computer, out of the box; the no-OS option still forces us to install and configure our own OS.

Perhaps Dell thinks that by supporting just one distro, like Ubuntu (what everybody wants) or OpenSUSE (what  Dell seems to be leaning towards) they'll "alienate" users of other distros. This is simply not true. Benefits to any Linux distro increases the success of Linux as a whole. If Dell provides any linux distro preinstalled, all open-source suporters will be satisfied; the only thing that will keep them unsatisfied is to ship with Windows alone, or force them to install their own Linux distro on a computer that isn't even fully compatible with Linux.

As just about everybody in the Linux community agrees, preinstalled Linux please, any Linux distro, just make sure it's preinstalled. 

Chris: That n-series notebooks if for "small business", and it has been available already for some time.

But where are these new laptops, n-series for consumers? I can only find the desktop n-series still.
 

Diarmuid: I heard that our company was already able to order n-series laptops to Finland, somehow, even though they don't show up on European sites. So maybe it's possible via the international site.

That still doesn't say anything about the consumer n-series laptops I asked a link to.
 

Could you put these somewhere more prominent?  It's very much squirreled away.  If you want to sell these, you'll need to position it where people can find them!

Also, why are these their own model?  What is different between a D520 and a D520N, aside from the FreeDOS load instead of Windows?  It seems like  they're the same, but for some reason you can't just select "FreeDOS" as the OS load for the D520.

"For the last several weeks, we’ve been working to bring Latitude notebooks to the n-Series lineup. n-Series are Dell products that ship with no operating system pre-installed. We now offer the Latitude D420, D520, D620 and D820."

I would like to order D620N from Switzerland, could you send me the swiss link to this offers.

Many thanks in advance.
 
 

Well, I just bought the e520n and I am pretty happy with it. I bought it because I already owned a retail copy of XP and since I always do a clean install when I receive a computer, it was just as easy to start with a blank slate.

 

The Latitudes are OK for business users I guess, but what I really want is a Linux laptop that has a working Web Cam and Microphone.  They seem to be hard to find. :-)  If Dell can say, "Here's a Laptop with WiFi, Bluetooth, a web cam, speakers, and a microphone, and it will work under (K)Ubuntu Linux with little to no hassle" then I'll buy two of them the next day!
 

After looking into it a little further I realise your Latitude n-series notebooks are more expensive than those shipping with Windows. To me this is scandalous, are you trying to rip off Linux users or appease Microsoft?

I think this blog summs it up http://buranen.info/?p=77%3E 

Linux users must be among the more astute consumers or they would not be choosing linux! A definitively poor strategy is to treat people as if they were stupid.. In order to succeed the offerings must be cheaper than a windows installed alternative and the hardware must be compatible with the major distributions.

For pitys sake its not rocket science. There must be someone in Dell with an  I.Q. in three digits 

When I look at the postings for this "Enterprise" blog section, I have to ask the question "Does Dell really know the practical definition of Enterprise Computing?" Does the Data Center Manager or CIO spend his day concerned about the cost or color of the next laptop? What does this have to do with managing 7x24 data centers, fault tolerance and access to company resources?

Dell has done a remarkable job in lowering price and the expectations of small businesses and government accounts to make them even more costly to manage and operate, but I don't see Dell as a technology leader, and this blog section reminds us that to Dell, a laptop is the enterprise.

Truly Dell: To answer your question, yes. It takes me some time to get through comments, so they may not appear right away.

 We launched this blog back in July last year to allow customers to tell us what they think—whether the feedback is good or bad.
 

I'm impressed that Dell puts up a site like this for comments.  It's fairly obvious that it will attract a lot of zealotry and generally unconstructive comments.

Me, I'm in the process of buying a laptop.  My employer prefers the big vendors, so there are few options without Windows.  I don't want it, and I must admit I find the ubiquitous "recommends Vista" on Dell's site mildly offensive, but, whatever.  I can always add another Windows CD to the pile - especially if sponsorships and adware junk (that I'll never see anyway) lowers the total price.

I don't care to have Linux pre-installed, I'm going to install a selection of software anyway, I can spend the half an hour to pop in my favorite distribution. 

What I do want, however, is a bit of help on which laptop works well with Linux.  How hard would it be for Dell to have a selection of models that have been tested with some of the popular distributions?  The distributions already do a lot of the testing work, but a prospective buyer still has to sift through lots and lots of data, trying to weight whether a working webcam is more important than a working card reader.

So all I'm asking is for Dell to take each model, pop in the latest Ubuntu (or Fedora, SuSE, whatever) CD, install, and check what parts of the hardware works and what doesn't.

-k

Like others have pointed out, the main thing I would like to see would be a laptop that

* Doesn't require me to buy  an OS I'll never use

 * Has hardware that works well on Linux

I don't think support is that important, many Linux users are self-sufficient when it comes to support. Your plan of making the user run the diagnostics CD to verify that it's a hardware problem sounds quite sufficient to me.

And please make your non-Windows laptops available in Canada.

Hello everybody

Thanks to Dell for publishing this forum .

I will be buying a new laptop on may or june 2007. Latitude D 820 looks nice to me, and I can afford as much as 1 800 $ for this purchase.

But, two conditions must be met FIRST by this manufacturer :

• The model sold whithout an OS must be quite cheaper than those sold whith the current propietary closed

• Dell must guarantee in written form, that ALL the hardware included in it's laptop does work whith open source drivers.

ELSE : no Latitude for me 

Best regards        A.GOMEZ 

My Dell Inspiron 1300 *IS* a linux laptop since I installed Ubuntu by myself; it's a very good laptop and linux works almost perfectly. My 2cents are the same as many others:

The first point is: preinstalled Windows.

I have paid a Windows XP license for a piece of software which I am not using AT ALL - you should STOP pre-installing not requested software on your machines. You want XP? you pay for Xp. Otherwise, a free Ubuntu Linux cd shipped in the box... then we will see the users' choices.

 The second point is: what kind of hardware support under linux.

Togheter with my laptop, you gave me *for free* (thanks a lot!) a Dell AIO 924 printer --- which is NOT working under linux! More: the wireless led on my Inspiron 1300 is NOT recognized by linux so I have to remember when I turn off/on my wifi antenna with Fn-F2. More: the headphone volume is not recognized directly by the sound driver (alsa) and I know I should patch the source to make it work... but I have no time to do it for now. Small things but.. quite annoying if I can say it.

 Thank you!

Thanks Dell, 

Good to hear at least some distributor is doing something about this. Monopolies are wrong and unethical.

Next laptop myself and my friends get will be a Dell without Windows and with distributed drivers for its hardware. 

Kind Regards,
Ivan.
 

I sent my suggestions to Dell for having a good quality Webcam in Latitude notebooks, and must have all memory card reader, i got reply from them too that they sent the same to Development team, but no update i got till today about this regards. See all company like toshiba, sony, hp and lenovo have webcam, but dell dosent have. Now some company are giving tv tuner also, but dell do all things in last when others comes out with some good new features.

It´s very easy.

1.    Make sure your laptops work with Linux.

2    Sell the system without an OS and sell the same systems perceptibly cheaper. In the past notebook companies thought their customers are stupid. Notebooks without OS cost the same or more than notebooks with preinstalled OS from Redmond. Or the hardware was not the same (less memory, smaller HDs, DVD/CD-Combo drives instead of DVD+/- burners etc).

That means the customers paid for M$-tax nevertheless.

Dell thinks his customers are stupid. Just have a look at the offers:

 Latitude notebook D520n with FreeDOs:    669 $

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W300&l=en&oc=blcwdn1&s=bsd

Latitude notebook D520 with XP Home:    599 $

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W300&l=en&oc=blcwc1s&s=bsd 

(same or better hardware)

friends,

i have bought an used dell laptop inspiron 1300,1.7ghz,256mb.40gb, and it is written 'N' series on the laptop.what is this 'N' series? can anyone define it? pls mail me.

regards

anil

Why can't I buy a XPS M1210 with an nVidia graphics card without windows.

I am buying a new laptop in one month.  I would love to support dell/  However all I really want in this world is a laptop with an nVidia graphics card, a 12.1" monitor without windows.  Why is this so much to ask?

I have a Latitude D810 and i think it short circuited.  Whenever I try to turn it on, the green power light goes on for a second and then goes off.  I've held the power button down, but it still does the same thing.  Also my screen remains blank and does nothing when I press my power button.  Any thoughts to what may have caused this.  Also, I have a broken usb port with one of the grounds missing,  Any help would be greatly appreciated.

RE: Max

 Whenever I try to turn it on, the green power light goes on for a second and then goes off.

I have the same problem, except that I only have this only occurs when my laptop is running only on the battery.  To solve this (temporarily), I plug the power supply to the laptop and turn it on.   I think it could be a problem with the battery.  Have you tried to remove the battery first, plug the power supply and turn it on ?