Dell Offers Ubuntu PC With ATI Graphics

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Dell Offers Ubuntu PC With ATI Graphics

Yesterday we shared that Dell has started shipping Ubuntu 8.04 PCs. Initially there are only three "Dellbuntu" PCs (two notebooks and one desktop) with this Long-Term Support (LTS) release of Ubuntu, but additional models will begin appearing as soon as next month...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=NjYwMQ

[Vadi]

Interesting.

[meden]

I'm wondering if a compositing manager is enabled by default... and I answer myself "No"! :)
ATI cannot play watchable (windowed) accelerated videos and cannot do usable (windowed) OpenGL when a composite manager is enabled as NVidia does; and it seems we have to wait DRI2.
This is not good from a marketing point of view, IMHO. (Average) users want fireworks on the desktop (I managed to convert my friends to Linux showing them Compiz naïf effects...); I do have Compiz enabled when I recompile my kernel, repackage my hacked software and manage my server via ssh. Otherwise Gnome is boring.
But people expect something Vista-like or (better) MacOSX-like.

[Vadi]

Oh that's right.

Maybe they should preinstall Compiz Switch, haha.

[Louise]

I bet, that MS pays Dell to sell those Linux desktops more expensive than their Windows ones =(

[RobbieAB]

I really am not that interested in what Dell are doing with Linux so long as they continue to only do it in the US. The truth of the matter for anyone outside of the US is that Dell are still a MicroSoft OEM. Sure they have the commercial Linuxes on high-end workstations and servers, but I'm looking for budget hardware with Linux.

This is interesting as really, Linux would be an ideal choice for the hardware range that was pushing prices down. 2 years ago, laptop prices here in Ireland were closing on the €300 mark. Now? Finding something under €500 is hard. Realistically, in this price range Linux would be a credible contender with a sensible software stack on top of it, as it doesn't have the massive hardware costs of Vista which is what pushed the price back up!

[Vadi]

Not sure where are you looking, because this is available in many countries outside of the US.

[some-guy]

???
A few years ago you couldn't fine a laptop cheaper than $800 in the US, now $600 is normal, occasionally there's deals for $300

[RobbieAB]

Not sure where are you looking, because this is available in many countries outside of the US.

Ireland, and Dells Irish website states that Ubuntu machines are not available in Ireland. Given that Ireland handles a large part of the EU market, one could assume that this applies to the whole EU.

???
A few years ago you couldn't fine a laptop cheaper than $800 in the US, now $600 is normal, occasionally there's deals for $300

Well, I've been watching Dells prices in Ireland, and the price of their cheapest laptop has gone up in the last year. It has also had a serious spec boost, and changed OS from XP to Vista.

What you will also find with Dell is that the cheapest laptops are not in their home-user section, but in the small business section. For some reason they think most consumers are stupid enough to fall for this. Sadly they are right... :mad:

[bridgman]

"After months of testing and development we are ready to release Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) on select Dell consumer systems. For consumers in the United States, France, Germany, Spain, Canada, United Kingdom and many Latin American countries (like Mexico and Colombia) Ubuntu 8.04 will be offered on the XPS M1330N and Inspiron 1525N notebooks and the Inspiron 530N."

http://direct2dell.com/one2one/archive/2008/07/18/select-systems-now-available-with-ubuntu-8-04.aspx

I guess that means the Ubuntu machines might still not be available in Ireland itself, although I imagine that will change pretty quickly since they're both in the EU so shipping & customs shouldn't be a big deal.

[Kano]

Well Dell Vostro 1000 has lots of problems with the new 2.6.26 kernel. 2.6.24 works - thats a Turion on AMD chipset with onboard ATI graphics...

[Vadi]

Ireland, and Dells Irish website states that Ubuntu machines are not available in Ireland. Given that Ireland handles a large part of the EU market, one could assume that this applies to the whole EU.

Heh, I wasn't aware that "Ireland handles a large part of the EU market". And your assumption is wrong when it comes to Dell Germany, Dell France, Dell UK, and Dell Spain - http://www.ubuntu.com/dell

I'd consider those four countries to be "the large part of EU market", not Ireland alone unfortunately :)

[RobbieAB]

With separate assembly and support set-ups in each section?

Ireland and the UK are heavily entwined with each other I know, and there is a large assembly plant in Ireland. I know that the C&R support for Ireland is provided by an office in Watford in England (my laptop paid it a visit at one point), and I know they do a lot of assembly and finance in Ireland. (Finance is handled in Cherrywood, Dublin, and they have a large assembly operation in Limerick.) That's what I meant by "handles a large part of the EU market". They assemble here for the tax-breaks.

[RobbieAB]

Well Dell Vostro 1000 has lots of problems with the new 2.6.26 kernel. 2.6.24 works - thats a Turion on AMD chipset with onboard ATI graphics...

1: That's clearly a regression in the kernel, and should be bugzied as such.
2: If Dell want to ship a budget laptop with linux, you think they won't be able to find a component set that works?
3: You seriously think Dell can't afford the tech/dev time to fix any problems? After all, these laptops are based on standard components to push the price down...

Of these 1 is by far the most important.

[Kano]

Well Dell introduced dkms, thats an interesting way to compile drivers but I don't know of other big development things which came from Dell. At least I would not think that when a system was tested with Ubuntu 8.04 it will work with 8.10 or similar Linux systems which use kernel 2.6.26 or newer. Also currently there is no way to use Xserver 1.5 based distros with ATI fglrx binary driver like FC9 or Ubuntu 8.10 test versions. So I don't think that the ATI graphics based systems are a so good choice to buy.

[mega_mike]

I currently have a Dell Inspiron 6400 with an ATI Radeon Mobility x1400 card and I am running Ubuntu 8.04.

I gotta say I have had nothing but headaches with this graphics card. I recently upgraded to the Catalyst 8.7 driver and it has yet to fix my issues. Specifically every time I use my laptop (compiz enabled) my system graphically grinds to a halt after roughly 6 hours of usage. Trying to restart the X server results in a hard system lockup where I have to issue direct kernel commands to reboot the laptop.

If Dell is going to start shipping laptops with ATI cards they need to lean on ATI hard to fix up their drivers. Its true the driver performance has improved, but stability has not been addressed. And I agree with Dell that until stability is addressed, these drivers are not ready for prime time.