[lug] How to purchase a dual (linux/windows) boot machine

[Elyse M. Grasso]

On Monday 22 January 2007 8:52 pm, Siegried Heintze wrote:
>  I just had a prospective client tell me I might need to supply my own 
notebook computer to work 1099.
> 
> For my work, I need to be able to work with both windows and linux.
> 
> begin horror story...
> 
> In the spring of 2005 I went to PC club and explained that I wanted a dual 
boot desktop machine. I gave them a long list of requirements like dual 
monitors, redundant disk drives etc... They insisted I put money down on the 
hardware and I reluctantly complied.
> 
> When the machine arrived in early May I tried to install linux and I could 
not get it to install. So I took it back to them and they explained that for 
$300 they would install linux. Finally in August I was tired of waiting and 
took home a machine that could boot linux but did not have the linux video 
drivers or linux nic drivers loaded and could not use dual monitors in linux. 
After a lot of work I finally finished the installation of fedora core 4 
myself with the proper drivers.
> 
> end horror story....
> 
> Needless to say, this was an awful experience. The problem was that once 
they had my credit card, I could not get a refund on the hardware (which I 
asked for). I'm not too hopefull that anyone would build a machine with out 
money down. What do you think?
> 
> How can I prevent this from happening again? I was thinking of hiring a 
lawyer to draft a contract so I could be assured to get the features (e.g., 
boot linux (suse) and windows vista via both primary and secondary drive bays 
and via USB 2.0) the retailer or vendor agrees to?
> 
> I wonder if Del, or IBM or toshiba would sign such a contract after I pay a 
lawyer to write one? Lawyers are not inexpensive!
> 
Have you looked at Linux Certified? I'm on my second LinuxCertified laptop. 
This one is pure Linux boot with VMWare (and was sold to me with a warning 
that there are no Linux drivers for the builtin modem), but the previous one 
came dual booting and had drivers for everything. I was very pleased with it.  
(Less pleased with Windows, hence the change in format on the newer machine.) 
www.linuxcertified.com

-- 
Elyse Grasso

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