[conspire] No more GNU HP Minis

[Paul Zander]

What Ruben has overlooked is that HP, IBM, and other companies are 
in business for is to make a big batch of computers and sell them
at a profit.

It is one thing to go as an individual to your favorite suppliers of
computer parts, put them together, and install your personal preferences
in software and configuration.

To create a production run of computers, you need to take inputs from 
marketing as to how many can be sold and at what price, then select CPU's,
disk drivers, keyboards, etc that can be had with the necessary combination
of performance, price, reliability, and availability to meet the product 
schedule.  The scale of making 10,000 or 100,000 computers creates a 
very different world from Ruben finding that one dealer is sold out, but another has one left in stock.

When the parts arrive, the company has to put them together and verify
that everything is working.  In practical terms, that means loading 
some software and verifying that everything plays. If you are making one
computer, it is not a big deal to spend a few minutes checking for loose 
cables or having to download a different driver.  In a production 
environment, time is money. Once the combination of hardware and software
has been verified in the prototypes, the rest of the run is expected
to go together like Lego blocks.  There is no value added by trying
multiple software configurations.

So, if you are shopping for a computer, be happy to find one with "Linux".
You don't pay the MS tax.  There is a good probability, but not a
guarantee, that you will be able to find drivers for your prefered
distro.

Maybe someone can make a business case for a kiosk for selecting
the OS downloading
 a selection of OS's to a new computer.  Meanwhile we have installfests.  

Paul

--- On Thu, 11/12/09, Ruben Safir <ruben at mrbrklyn.com> wrote:

> From: Ruben Safir <ruben at mrbrklyn.com>
> Subject: Re: [conspire] No more GNU HP Minis
> To: "Rick Moen" <rick at linuxmafia.com>
> Cc: conspire at linuxmafia.com
> Date: Thursday, November 12, 2009, 9:39 PM
> Rick Moen wrote:
> > Quoting Ruben Safir (ruben at mrbrklyn.com):
> > 
> >   
> >> Pardon me, Rick, but you have never seen what I
> would expect, at least  not since the mid-1980's. 
> I want to see working computers sold with  GNU/Linux,