On Tue, 30 Jan 2007, Jonathon Jongsma wrote:

> On 1/30/07, tclug at natecarlson.com <tclug at natecarlson.com> wrote:
>> On Tue, 30 Jan 2007, Jonathon Jongsma wrote:
>>> One other option: you can get a notebook from dell without windows as
>>> well (it comes with freeDOS but I don't know if it's even installed or
>>> not).  I believe they only offer this with the 'lattitude' series
>>> through the "small business" store, and they're not necessarily any
>>> cheaper than the ones that come with windows, but at least you can let
>>> them know that you have no need for windows.
>>>
>>> http://www.dell.com/content/products/features.aspx/nseries_nb?c=us&cs=04&l=en&s=bsd
>>
>> I just picked up a Latitude D820.. it ended up being $600 cheaper to buy
>> it with Windows than without.
>
> You're sure you were comparing exactly the same system?  Because I was 
> just shopping for a D820 about two days ago and they came out to exactly 
> the same price with and without windows.  The one big difference seemed 
> to be that not all of the same options were available depending on 
> whether you were looking at the with-windows or without-windows options 
> (for instance, without-windows seemed to offer me more choices of 
> processor speed on the higher end and less choice on the bottom end... 
> Don't ask me why...)


Obviously, Dell and most other manufacturers have agreements with 
Microsoft.  Do Intel and Microsoft also come up with agreements?  It could 
work like this:  Microsoft can make their system run slower so that people 
are motivated to buy new hardware.  Microsoft doesn't have much 
competition, so they don't have a lot of motivation to optimize their code 
for speed.  Why wouldn't they help Intel to make a buck?

Related point:  Microsoft is a monopoly, or near monopoly.  When Vista 
comes out, what is its competition?  Well, it's mostly XP.  Wouldn't it be 
nice for Vista if XP wasn't so great?  Sure.  They knew this day would 
come when they made XP.  Maybe that explains why XP isn't so great.  Same 
for Vista and everything else produced by Microsoft.  When you have a 
monopoly, not only is there no incentive to produce a better product, 
there is a disincentive -- it is better to produce a bad product so that 
you can sell upgrades more readily.

Mike