Dell's Precision 5540/7540/7740 Now Shipping With Ubuntu Linux

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Dell's Precision 5540/7540/7740 Now Shipping With Ubuntu Linux

At the start of May Dell announced an Ubuntu Linux option for their entry-level ~$700 Precision laptop while now they are closing out May by offering up Ubuntu 18.04 LTS on their higher-tier Precision laptop models...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Dell-Precision-5540-7540-7740

[Guest]

At least they provide a way to not pay the ransom to Microsoft for a new laptop. It's better than nothing.

[elatllat]

AFAIK, Dell is the largest laptop seller to offer Linux, with System76 taking a distant 2nd place.

[Vistaus]

The Dell Precision 7740 is capable of delivering real-time ray tracing and graphics-based AI acceleration. Sounds like that's going to be uid313 's new laptop

[GI_Jack]

This is pretty good is that it ensures all the drivers work on linux, including all the little stuff like keyboard backlights, media keys, etc...

Dell in the past has been good about making sure all the bits for linux to work are pushed upstream so you can use whatever distro you want.

[linuxlizard]

Back in ~1999 I bought a Dell laptop that shipped with RedHat. Worked amazingly well. Dual booted it with Windows 2000. Yay Dell!

[Cape]

My only "GNU/Linux" laptop (meaning a laptop i bought with Linux pre-installed) is a Dell. A cheapo Celeron 15''.
I might consider upgrading but i want to spend as little as possible.
You guys in America have too much money for europoors standards...

[edwaleni]

At least they provide a way to not pay the ransom to Microsoft for a new laptop. It's better than nothing.

Microsoft's OEM charges are based on total units sold, not on OS actually shipped.

So if Dell shipped 10,000 Ubuntu laptops, it still counts in the aggregate OEM counts for Windows OS licensing.

Several OEM's tried to get out of this arrangement a few years ago and MSFT told them they would triple or quadruple the OEM licensing fee.

So most of the OEM's kind of gave up and agreed to the bulk licensing approach going forward. ("the tax")

Periodically this runs into weird situations where the device purchaser calls the OEM and requests a Windows license key so they can revert.

Some OEM help desks refuse as the device came with Ubuntu. So they call MSFT, who sends them back to the OEM.

Technically every Ubuntu device buyer paid for a Windows license, because the OEM paid for it in the bundled approach with MSFT.

Some OEM's simply leave the Windows license key sticker on the device even if it has Ubuntu to cut down on the reversion calls.

[Marco-GG]

Microsoft's OEM charges are based on total units sold, not on OS actually shipped.

So if Dell shipped 10,000 Ubuntu laptops, it still counts in the aggregate OEM counts for Windows OS licensing.

Several OEM's tried to get out of this arrangement a few years ago and MSFT told them they would triple or quadruple the OEM licensing fee.

So most of the OEM's kind of gave up and agreed to the bulk licensing approach going forward. ("the tax")

Periodically this runs into weird situations where the device purchaser calls the OEM and requests a Windows license key so they can revert.

Some OEM help desks refuse as the device came with Ubuntu. So they call MSFT, who sends them back to the OEM.

Technically every Ubuntu device buyer paid for a Windows license, because the OEM paid for it in the bundled approach with MSFT.

Some OEM's simply leave the Windows license key sticker on the device even if it has Ubuntu to cut down on the reversion calls.

Source? A couple of years ago, In my country I bought a Dell Latitude 3467 with Ubuntu and payed around 10% less than the W10 version.

For the record:

https://articulo.mercadolibre.com.ar/MLA-782304482-notebook-dell-inspiron-core-i3-3467-14-hd-4gb-1tb-dvd-bt-wf-_JM?quantity=1&variation=35580053476

https://articulo.mercadolibre.com.ar/MLA-683737338-notebook-dell-inspiron-3467-core-i3-4gb-1tb-14-windows-10-_JM?quantity=1&variation=35618569024

[Guest]

Microsoft's OEM charges are based on total units sold, not on OS actually shipped.

So if Dell shipped 10,000 Ubuntu laptops, it still counts in the aggregate OEM counts for Windows OS licensing.

Several OEM's tried to get out of this arrangement a few years ago and MSFT told them they would triple or quadruple the OEM licensing fee.

So most of the OEM's kind of gave up and agreed to the bulk licensing approach going forward. ("the tax")

Periodically this runs into weird situations where the device purchaser calls the OEM and requests a Windows license key so they can revert.

Some OEM help desks refuse as the device came with Ubuntu. So they call MSFT, who sends them back to the OEM.

Technically every Ubuntu device buyer paid for a Windows license, because the OEM paid for it in the bundled approach with MSFT.

Some OEM's simply leave the Windows license key sticker on the device even if it has Ubuntu to cut down on the reversion calls.

I knew that M$ is pretty bad about licensing their software to OEMs, but this sort of thing should result in a lawsuit against them. It makes it pretty much impossible to provide alternatives to Windows on pre-builts and laptops.

I guess people who don't want to give their money to M$ for something they won't use are better off going with a manufacturer that doesn't sell devices with windows in the first place. This is pretty bad, as I don't think that current offerings are decent. Librem (ME blobs, crappy modern Intel chips, inferior to old ThinkPads treated with me_cleaner and preferably coreboot) and System76 (NVidia GPUs, enough said) just aren't good. It feels like we're living in a wintel dystopia that's hidden in plain sight. Even when you despise of and boycott M$, you HAVE to support them financially. This should be dealt with via anti-monopoly laws.