Bibek Paudel’s weblog

A couple of my friends wanted to buy a laptop. For the last two weeks, they have been choosing models/brands and comparing prices. We have been hearing a lot about Dell and its good features. So, they also called up Dell’s office at Bangalore. Dell’s customization features were good (that’s what they are known for) and prices were attractive. They don’t have any support center nearby where we are, but they informed us that other laptop vendors in our area would provide support on their behalf. Wow ! Owning a Dell laptop seemed possible and this was a matter of happiness for some reasons. Now we just wanted one more small customization before the order could be placed. That’s when trouble started.

I had read somewhere that the CEO of Dell is a user of Ubuntu. Ubuntu is a GNU/Linux distribution, so we thought Dell would happily ship laptops with GNU/Linux distros preinstalled. So, we asked the Bangalore guys to do the same. They told us that it wasn’t possible. Then we asked if they could ship the laptop without any Operating System preinstalled, because that way we could install anything after we got hold of our machines. Again, that wasn’t possible. The only option left for us was to buy a laptop with Windows Vista preinstalled. For our own reasons (described in another post), we didn’t want to use Vista. In addition, the Dell people informed us that uninstalling Vista would make the warranty void.

Now what? One of the friends discovered that Dell ships Ubuntu preinstalled laptops in some countries (US). So, he started to look for ways to order one from there itself. Then he decided to wait until Dell in India would start shipping laptops with a GNU/Linux distro (or without Vista, at least). He is now buying an old computer for temporary use until his wish of owning a Dell machine becomes possible. The other friend has decided to move to other brands.

Isn’t it equivalent to saying, for example that I can buy a car but can’t change the seat cover whose color and texture I am allergic to? Or say, I can buy a pen, but I must be using a particular kind of ink the pen-seller wants me to use. All these events made me furious and sad at the same time. I deplore Vista and consider it to be the worst single piece of computer software ever made in modern days. But if I want to buy a laptop, it looks like I have to forcefully use it. Microsoft has been proven guilty (during the hearings related to its antitrust cases) for paying royalties to computer vendors. It has been proven guilty of many other monopoly charges too. But what’s this thing with Windows Vista?