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The whole juggernaut that is now Linux on Dell started as the brainchild of two core individuals, Barton George (Senior Principal Engineer) and Jared Dominguez (OS Architect and Linux Engineer).
It was their vision that began it all back in 2012. It was long hours, uncertain futures and sheer belief that people really did want Linux laptops that sustained them. Here is the untold story of how Dell gained the top spot in preinstalled Linux on laptops.
[...] This first attempt at Linux on laptops failed mainly because most non-technical users were blinded by the cheap price and didn't understand what they were actually buying.
[...] This time the duo had the right initial market. It was big, commercial web-scale operators and their developers who were crying out for a fully supported Linux laptop.
People who do technical work, like Linux. People who don't, don't.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @05:55PM (36 children)
Several manufacturers have offered Linux laptops, most notably Dell, and the Linux price has frequently been higher than the Windows price. This isn't because of a "Windows tax" (Microsoft forces the manufacturer to pay a license fee for every Windows laptop), it's because of the "Windows crapware subsidy": those Windows laptops don't come with a clean copy of Windows, they come with a special version of Windows that's preloaded with a bunch of crapware from various companies like McAfee, Symantec, Adobe, and others, usually some kind of "starter version" of software, or some kind of small promotional executable which encourages you to put in your credit card number and purchase a copy of their software. For every one of these, the software maker pays the laptop maker a fee, which frequently ends up being more than the Windows license fee. So in effect, those crapware makers are subsidizing your laptop purchase in the hope that you'll buy their full version of software.
Linux laptops don't come with crapware, so there's no subsidy. You might save on the Windows fee, but it's possible they're paying a small fee per machine to Ubuntu (or whoever), and with no crapware subsidy, the final price ends up a little higher than the Windows version.
(Score: 5, Funny) by Freeman on Friday November 17 2017, @06:05PM (14 children)
So, what you're saying is, we need more crapware for Linux?
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @06:45PM (3 children)
Honestly, it wouldn't hurt. I wouldn't mind having tons of crapware on a preloaded-Linux laptop, including crapware that sends all my private data to some company's server, as long as they're paying me by reducing the purchase price (perhaps down to zero...).
It doesn't matter to me, because I'm just going to wipe the HD and install my preferred distro anyway. The distros they choose are always some bullshit distro with some bullshit DE like Gnome. And no one ever partitions HDs right anyway.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @09:59PM (2 children)
Ubuntu is ready for you now.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @10:23PM (1 child)
The April 2016 release disabled the Ubuntu Shopping Lens by default. [google.com]
It was something they tried and they responded to the negative feedback appropriately.
Get over it already.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by requerdanos on Saturday November 18 2017, @02:43AM
After fighting *for* it furiously for a time, they finally realized they were not going to get away with it and disabled it.
That's absolutely, completely false. Among other things, Canonical's Shuttleworth said at the time "Don’t trust us? Erm, we have root." and that this crap was necessary to make Ubuntu "World Class." Canonical has never, ever said anything then or since that indicates that they "get" that hijacking your local queries by default (rather than knowing, intentional opt-in) is wrong in any way--only argued incessantly that it was fine, not a problem, a desirous feature, etc. It was the least appropriate responses imaginable. As bad as no response other than "Get over it".
That would be exactly the wrong reaction. We already know that Canonical--and Shuttleworth personally--believe that spyware for profit is a good and noble thing and the only question in their minds is, how to do it and get away with it (not whether it's the right thing to do). "Never Forget" would be more appropriate, given Shuttlworth's rants about not getting his way.
The fact that they have thus far not found a way to get away with it does NOT mean that it's all good. Rather, it means, we know not to trust them and know that they have not changed any. at. all. They will spy on you for profit if they think of a way, and based on what they said at the time, they are doing plenty of thinking trying to come up with a way.
Please do not spread lies about them now being 'over it' just because they didn't get away with it. They aren't over it, and their potential users shouldn't be either--no one should use Ubuntu without making an intelligent decision with eyes wide open about Canonical's attitude on the matter.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Friday November 17 2017, @06:45PM (8 children)
I don't think he's saying that. No need to put crapware on Linux. I would be happy to pay the higher price to not have crapware and ads.
Of course, I'd be even happier to pay the lower price and not have the crapware or ads.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @07:36PM (4 children)
I'd be happy to get a laptop for free that's full of crapware and ads and even sends all my private data off somewhere. Why would you not want this?
In short, what kind of Linux user uses the OS that's pre-loaded by the manufacturer? Crapware and spyware doesn't matter when you just wipe the HD as soon as you get the computer and install a better distro.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday November 17 2017, @08:37PM (2 children)
It depends on whether the "Ubuntu" option is the same price as the "FreeDOS" option. If I'm going to wipe the preinstalled OS first (which I am), then FreeDOS may be the actual choice I want.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @08:44PM
Yeah, if the FreeDOS option cost more, why would you pay for that if you're going to wipe the HD anyway? In fact, hypothetically speaking, if you could get the exact same laptop with Windows preloaded for $100 less, why bother with those more expensive options? Just to prevent MS from getting a license fee (which effectively is being paid by the crapware vendors, plus an additional kickback to you)?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @10:56PM
OTOH, if it ships with Linux, you can check to see that all the hardware is supported under Linux before paving over the pre-installed distro.
N.B. Yeah, this is pretty ancient lore.
Most whitebox vendors have learned to just avoid hardware manufacturers who won't support Linux properly.
(Some years back, AMD muffed a quarter-billion dollar contract because they didn't offer Linux drivers.)
The partitions are probably already ext4 as well.
.
Heh. The thing that amused the hell out of me was when the vendors would pay to have their crapware installed on Windoze boxes then, after collecting that fee, the whitebox vendors would offer a de-crapped box to consumers^W suckers for an additional fee.
.
FTFS: People who do technical work
...in addition to those who don't want to paste a new layer of security^W band-aids on their OS weekly^W daily^W hourly.
...nor wait until the 2nd Tuesday of next month for patches
...nor defrag.
It's been quite a while since I had to maintain a Windoze box.
I may have (gratefully) forgotten some of the nonsense that I had to tolerate back in the day.
It took several years for them to catch up, but I understand that MICROS~1 now offers virtual desktops (multiple workspaces).
I liked those from the 1st day I used Linux.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 20 2017, @03:22PM
Reminds me of the punchline to an old joke: "We've established that you'll prostitute yourself. Now we're simply negotiating the price."
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday November 20 2017, @03:29PM (2 children)
I honestly don't understand why any serious Linux user would object to having tons of crapware and ads, in exchange for a lower price. What exactly is your objection? Are you really going to use the distro that comes pre-loaded? If so, you're not much of a serious Linux user are you?
(Score: 2) by cykros on Monday November 20 2017, @04:06PM
Even using pre-loaded Windows instead of a wipe and fresh install always struck me as immensely lazy and potentially costly down the line. Before I moved to Nexus/Pixel phones (which are 100% pure vanilla Android, so it's clean), I didn't even treat my phone with such carelessness.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday November 20 2017, @05:04PM
You're right. On the only box I ever got that had Linux pre-installed (1999, with Red Hat), I promptly installed SuSE 5.1.
Getting Linux pre-installed from the factory, instead of FreeDOS gives a level of confidence that all of the included hardware is supported by Linux -- even if you're going to wipe it.
I had not thought this through very carefully. Really, the price matters more, since I am convinced I would wipe it.
In more recent years, I have gone with Windows boxes, wiped and reinstalled. And most recently a very nice custom built box (not built by me). I built one back in the early 2000's. It was a fun adventure. But I'm a software guy.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @10:14PM
Well, you get systemd, don't you?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday November 17 2017, @06:12PM (16 children)
"crapware from various companies like McAfee, Symantec, Adobe, and others,"
You mention only programs that have some minimal redeeming value. When the first Athlons were hitting the market, the wife decided to buy a computer, and settled on a Compaq. Windows XP, Athlow XP, enough hard drive and memory to make a respectable machine. It really looked good - it had some of that crapware you mention. But, performance really sucked! I was still on a Super Socket 7 machine (we couldn't afford to get hers, and mine too) and my AMD 450 mobile with less than half her memory actually seemed to perform better.
We started the search for malware. The antivirus found nothing, and we were kinda stumped for awhile. Oddly, there was a process that used CPU all the time. Turns out, it belonged to an online game thing - there was a little black raven in the toolbar for it. Wife only played it occassionally. I took a good look at it, and uninstalled it. Things went kinda haywire, and we did a system restore. There's that game again. Uninstall it, things go haywire again. So, I do some searches, and find that many people are complaining about that stupid game. So, I search some more - turns out that game was utter bullshit. They only had a few games on the site, most of them sucked, the others only moderately interesting. But, the game site was slurping data, all googlesque.
It took a couple days to finally track down the method to get rid of that game system from her computer. And, at last, her computer did noticeably outperform my Socket 7.
Compaq may have been the worst for installing malware - I've heard and read where people say that. Worst or not, they really sucked because of it.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday November 17 2017, @06:31PM (15 children)
Nothing's changed in that regard with Dell.
You still to this day get a machine so bloated with crapware they run dog slow.
My HOA association purchased a machine for association business. All new and shiny and Windows 10. It literally took two days of crapware removal to get it to the point it could run quickbooks and Office Libre at the same time.
And dell is forever pushing updates to their service and support app which sneaks some of those microsoft malware back on. At any given power up, you never know how long it will take you to be productive.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @06:42PM (14 children)
It literally took two days of crapware removal to get it to the point it could run quickbooks and Office Libre at the same time.
Can't you just download a clean corporate copy of Windows and install that instead? Heck, even buying a license for a full clean copy is cheaper than 2 days of your time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @07:04PM (4 children)
> even buying a license for a full clean copy is cheaper than 2 days of your time
Haven't tried this with a Dell laptop, but did try it with a ThinkPad (Win XP years). No go, something(s) were missing and installing WinXP Pro from a Microsoft optical disk would not boot into Windows. Didn't go further, but maybe Lenovo added some drivers or something?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Friday November 17 2017, @07:38PM (2 children)
Now that you mention it, that was a big problem with Windows for a long time: you couldn't just install a clean copy, because you had to get a bunch of driver discs or download drivers from the manufacturer's website(s), and then go through a bunch of rebooting cycles to get all the drivers installed and the OS installed.
I thought new versions of Windows had mostly built in drivers for most common hardware so this wasn't so much of a problem as it was, but I haven't messed with Windows installation in a very long time so I don't really know.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @08:37PM
Most hardware now comes with drivers distributed through windows update and it's been this way for some time. This usually works fine (though reboot cycles are still a thing).
It has also been possible for a long time to add drivers to the installation medium (this was very important if you wanted to install Windows 2000 on a SATA drive and didn't feel like digging out a 3.5" floppy disk to load your disk controller driver).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by choose another one on Friday November 17 2017, @08:52PM
Worked in Microsoft or mixed shops for years, clean installs were a problem with NT and 2000 but from XP onwards were typically straightforward, particularly once the "slipstream" tools were available (not sure they were out with XP at the start, but certainly used with XP) to merge drivers and updates into install images. For many years first job for anyone on the team getting a new machine (and they were typically Dells) was to reinstall clean windows, less technical teams (sales, marketing, etc.) tended to live with the Dell install or beg a dev to do it for them.
Dells as I recall came (maybe still do) with a drivers folder on the root disk, if not a drivers CD, worth copying that before you reformat the disk - although they can usually be downloaded from Dell direct it's a bit of a pain if the driver you need is networking...
Having MSDN or Technet available possibly helped, but since Win 7 I am pretty sure downloadable releases were available to anyone. Then you just need the licence key, typically stuck on the machine somewhere. On Dell laptops the sticker may be under the battery, worth noting it before you start the install.
Clean installs are no big deal, as long as you have done a few and have relatively recent practice (reformat and reinstall every year is good practice anyway, reminds you to organise your data properly separable from the OS, which isn't always obvious in windows, and can be used to test your backups) unless you haven't done them for ages, or ever, in which case there is a big fear factor - but no different to Linux in that, or restoring from backup!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @11:31PM
With closed-source proprietary stuff, you don't actually -own- anything.
The word "buy" is inappropriate in those cases.
I prefer the term "pay for".
...and it would be M$ getting the money. 8-(
.
quickbooks and Office Libre
Heh. They were half-way to dumping Windoze.
My question WRT payware apps is always, "Are you actually -using- features that are -only- available in those?"
...or would a gratis and libre app do all that you need?
I'm wondering how long ago that experience was.
(FOSS) FrontAccounting [google.com] has been around for a bunch of years.
Jack Wallen was praising it going back to 2011. [google.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @08:17PM (6 children)
You don't even need to buy a new license to reinstall Windows on a laptop that came with preinstalled with Windows. The computer comes with a license.
On older versions (Windows 7 and older) you had to do phone activation when using the OEM key from the sticker (which was easy enough) but newer versions have the license stored in nvram so it "just works" (although I assume this makes it harder to transfer the license to another computer, which was possible before).
Even better is to install a free operating system.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Friday November 17 2017, @09:13PM (5 children)
Allegedly, once activated, the license is tied to bits of the hardware config (and the pairing is stored on MS servers) - change too much and it doesn't just work anymore. Change the motherboard and I think you are guaranteed to need to ring up and beg - officially I think you need to buy a new license (but even MS knows that is stupid and that if you've just had to warranty-replace the motherboard you shouldn't be out the cost of a license).
Some OEM license keys are allegedly locked to the BIOS so they'll only work on machines from that OEM (or that model), however I have also seen said allegedly locked OEM keys work absolutely fine on new custom build gaming rigs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 17 2017, @09:33PM
I had a computer motherboard die on me at work. I bought the parts for a new system (SuperMicro chassis, new motherboard, etc.), but no OS. I wanted to just install a clean copy of Win7 and activate it with the license key that was on the chassis of the computer that died. I had an OEM install disk and I used that to load the software, but it wouldn't take the software key nor activate.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by edIII on Saturday November 18 2017, @02:14AM (2 children)
For the record, I've never, ever, not once, been turned down by the clearinghouse when I called them. I did have an issue once, but it was a typo in the key relayed to me by a 3rd party (our fault).
They just activate it for you, Every. Single. Time.
Maybe I've been lucky, who knows.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 18 2017, @03:01AM
When Win 7 first came out it was in preview in technet while I was in school with access to tech net. I Installed it once but was having issues so I went to reinstall and it made me call the clearing house. Took me a while to explain to them that I was just fiddling with my own computer and was a student. They did eventually ok it though.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Sunday November 19 2017, @01:16PM
Actually, nor have I. I have never had a licence transfer fail either. Stories of failure or refusal to activate are always hearsay or rumour at best.
Maybe I too have been lucky, but I don't have that much first-hand data, and I haven't actually been trying to do anything dodgy licence-wise.
However, every time I have to call because the automatic route has failed I get worried, I feel I have to plan my explanation / defence of my actions, and (see above) I don't think I'm doing anything I shouldn't be able to. And then I start to think, maybe I should be using a Free OS for this job... (and I shouldn't have to think that - if I am not doing anything wrong, surely the automatic route should just work).
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 18 2017, @12:22PM
OEM activation. Bit more to it than the marker in the BIOS (do a search for SLIC table) - you also need an MS-signed OEM certificate installed in the OS for the auto-activation to work this way. So of course, changing the motherboard breaks activation since you changed or lost one part. Unless you know how to and have the tools to add the correct marker to the new motherboard's BIOS, or it's already present in the new BIOS, plus you have a matching OEM certificate, you need to activate via another method or use a different licence. There are tools to extract the certificate part from existing working machines.
For Win7, there is no online part of the OEM activation, so as long as you have both the BIOS markers and the certificate matching, and use an OEM licence key in Windows for whichever edition you feel like using, it will activate regardless of hardware config. For virtual machines, the BIOS marker injection is easily done for some hypervisors like Xen or Virtualbox, so means unlimited activated Win7 copies in these environments. I'd expect KVM to be similarly easy. I've also heard it's possible to do this on VMWare/ESX/ESXi, but never done that myself. Also note the OEM licence key you put in Windows is not the same as what you find on stickers stuck to cases - the stickers are NOT OEM keys.
(Un)fortunately for Win8 and later, yes it all gets tied to hardware config and stored online on MS servers, so the above trick no longer works reliably if at all.
(Score: 3, Funny) by aristarchus on Friday November 17 2017, @08:41PM
It's frojack! More likely than not, he tacked the lappy to the side of a shed, and years later when they moved, it still had crapware on it.
(Score: 1) by ElizabethGreene on Saturday November 18 2017, @03:02AM
Most vendors now offer bloatware free "signature" editions of Windows. Yes, smh, they charge extra for it.
(Score: 2) by jimtheowl on Saturday November 18 2017, @12:10AM
The crapware issue is indeed a well known subsidy, but why do you state it as if you know that it excludes a sole vendor agreement?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 18 2017, @03:50PM (1 child)
I think you're missing at least two other reasons Linux isn't cheaper than Windows at Dell:
1. Dell sells millions of Windows PCs per year, so their internal costs to configure, package, and install a Windows image for each hardware skew on a per-unit basis probably amount to less than a dollar. Since Linux sales are dramatically lower, the the per-unit costs of building and maintaining the install images is probably $20 or even $50. If sales go up maybe that price could come down.
2. I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft negotiated some kind of deal that allowed Dell to sell alternative operating systems provided the sticker price was never lower than the Windows sticker price. It's the kind of thing they did in the past.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday November 20 2017, @03:25PM
Your reasoning on #1 is wrong, I'm pretty sure. If this were actually a factor, then the vendor could offer the FreeDOS or barebones option (no OS) for significantly less. But they don't.
As for #2 (which you'll inevitably use to say my line above is wrong), first any such deals should be leaked at some point by a disgruntled employee (that's not something only a few people would know about), and second, how do competing brands compare?
It would be really interesting to get access to a line-item breakdown of costs in a modern laptop, including the crapware and Windows OS.
(Score: 2) by Marand on Sunday November 19 2017, @01:50PM
I see nothing wrong here; you do tend to pay more for a higher-quality product. ;)
Maybe instead of trying to convince people Linux is better because it's free, we should be telling people it's better because it's a better product; if it weren't, OEMs wouldn't be willing to charge a premium over the cost of Windows for it. What you save buying Windows you lose later in maintenance and upkeep. (e.g. virus scanners, unwanted updates, unexpected reboots, random breakage.)