[infra_red_dude]

Originally Posted by szandor

i'm not sure what kind of deal you're expecting but a base vista system is $999 and a base ubuntu system is $949. so don't get all happy happy joy joy and rely on linux to make your hardware cheaper.

Things are not like this here. Its not about making things cheaper. Its like they make us pay for Vista jus coz they think some XYZ will pirate Vista if its NOT a part of the deal. Why should I pay just coz there's some possibility of some XZY pirating it if not bundled?

Originally Posted by szandor

why not just download your distro of choice rather than let some company make your decision for you? i'm running fedora on an m1210. i did not need dell and every piece of hardware works. nvidia, webcam/mic, bt, wifi, cd/dvd ripping/burning, buttons, etc, etc.

Pre-installed systems are always better. Mebbe not for me or you but for a first time user. Why is GNU/Linux adoption rate so low here and piracy high? Coz people who use systems bundled with Vista never bother to give GNU/Linux a try jus coz they fear going thru the hardware drivers would be worser than hell.. and those who buy hardware without vista (here everything either comes with windows or free-dos or no OS), just either use a retail copy or pirate. Nobody bothers to "download GNU/Linux" hunt for drivers and make all th ehardware work. Believe me, if computers come pre-installed with Linux a lot of things would change.

Originally Posted by szandor

i know what you mean. this is how i feel when i call customer service/tech support that's been outsourced to india and i get some guy that doesn't know his buttocks from a keyboard. the only reason i can think of that companies would give you the short end of the stick is, if i was going to sell something to a person that thought a person came back as a cow, i'd try and charge them more money too. or at least try and sell them property on the moon.

I dunno about what you asked but the BPO guys here are quite technically proficient. The thing thats lacking (severely) here is knowledge about GNU/Linux. They know neither the head nor tail of it. For everything else, I've to say that people here are quite helpful and knowledgeable (as far as common things is concerned).

Originally Posted by szandor

...barebones laptops have been around for awhile. even ones with dedicated graphics. also, do you really have to buy it from dell?

Laptops like these are still a distant dream here. Coz all these barebones laptop are not manuf. in India and we gotta order from aboard. Anything coming from outside directly to us (when they don't haf a local office) is gonna cost us almost double!

Originally Posted by szandor

i thought you guys wanted the laptop to be cheaper? having dell customize linux for you is going to cost money. why pay dell for this when other people in the linux community are doing it for free? linux is free. download it, install it, compile your drivers if you need one, and viola! you're done.

Its not for me.. its for the kid in my neighbourhood who doesn't care about piracy. Its for my uncle who wants to use Linux but has no clue what driver/compiling are.. etc.

Originally Posted by szandor

now everyone wants a distro that does this or does that, match the color of my laptop, special icons, work out of the box, yada yada, and then ask, 'how do i use sudo?' or 'when i type 'make install' i get an error. in my opinion, if you rely on someone like dell to make linux work for you, you're more of a hindrance to the linux community than a supporter because you're going to be one of those people posting in a linux forum asking, 'i want to download/install compiz-fusion but i don't know how to connect to the internet!' as opposed to working out bug issues with other users.

And whats wrong if new users want to try/use Linux but don't know anything about it? Does it mean that only the veterans haf the authority to use Linux? This is the biggest hindrance in GNU/Linux adoption. The old hats wanna look elite by shunning n00bs. As long as people are not considerate about new users, nothing's gonna change. Linux is not a privilege only for those "seasoned" users.

That attitude (sense of eliteness/geekiness) is what sux in the FOSS community.

Originally Posted by MetalheadGautham

Mac is just FreeBSD customised(and spoilt)

Mac is just not customized FreeBSD. You've got it all wrong.

Originally Posted by MetalheadGautham

And youdo have a point in saying that the perpose of linux itself is about learning stuff, and doing things yourself.....

That is a wrong notion! Its one of the options with Linux but not the only goal of GNU/Linux!