On Jul 4, 12:05 pm, larwe <zwsdot...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Jul 4, 11:32 am, rickman <gnu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I have to say I am not impressed with Tiger.  I looked at the laptops
> > and found that they only categorize based on price, brand or CPU.
> > With 15 pages of laptops it is very hard to find just the ones running
> > XP.  Further the selection of XP machines is rather limited, just like
> > the other sites I found, Toshiba and Lenovo.  Someone suggested the
>
> You're really casting blame where it doesn't belong. The situation is
> very simple: Microsoft wants to book all the Vista sales it can in
> order to obfuscate the true uptake rate of Vista vs XP and protect
> itself against major competitors MacOS and Linux. Therefore it decided
> to stop selling Windows XP licenses. The only Windows on sale now is
> Vista, and there is a little fine print saying that you can downgrade
> to XP if you wish. And this is 100% Microsoft's fault, not Sony's or
> Dell's or Tiger Direct's.
>
> Any fullsize laptop or desktop you see in any catalog preloaded with
> XP is either refurbished or new old stock; i.e. used or leftovers. You
> won't find the $499 "back to school" special laptops with XP on them.
>
> Your only choices are therefore to select from the limited array of
> "new old stock" computers that were preloaded by the OEM with Windows
> XP (deal with the price), or buy a used machine (shop around; I bought
> a ThinkPad R51, 1.6GHz/WiFi/40GB/1GB/combo for $175), or buy a Vista
> machine and downgrade it one way or another. Plenty of XP retail boxed
> editions are available on eBay, Craigslist et al.
>
> You may also want to consider one of the ultraportable machines that
> fall into Microsoft's category where XP is still allowable (but you'll
> complain that these are expensive and slow and too small and maybe the
> wrong color and smell bad).
>
> Or of course there's the piracy route. Enjoy.
>
> There's nothing shameful in buying a used machine, though. Most of my
> computer equipment is purchased used; the only new computer in my
> office is my MacBook. (Well, "new" = "1 year old but I bought it brand
> new").

I would consider used equipment, but I want something that will last
as my needs for processor speed and especially memory grow.  1 GB is
not enough on my desktop machine currently, so I don't know why it
would suffice in a laptop.  It is not cost effective to buy a machine
only to supe it up with memory and hard drive.  I'm better off paying
for a new machine.

The idea of buying a machine with Vista (pay MS for it) and then
buying an older versions of XP or 2000 (and paying MS once again)
really rankles me.  I am at a point where I am willing to consider
running linux although I understand that it will have a painful
learning curve and there are any number of programs that won't run
under it.  Still, I have my old windows machines so Linux may work for
me.

As to the small form factor machines having a smell... I don't know
how you can pick out day old fish in a skunk's nest!  I am saying that
this whole thing stinks to high heaven.  I just hope I haven't
offended any skunks by comparing them to MS.  :^o

Rick

On Jul 4, 3:08=A0pm, rickman <gnu...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I would consider used equipment, but I want something that will last
> as my needs for processor speed and especially memory grow. =A01 GB is

But there is no machine that will meet that requirement indefinitely.
If your needs are so gargantuan (I should point out that my Fortune
100 company has me on a five-year-old, 2GHz single-core machine with
768MB RAM, and it's MORE than enough, and no machine I personally own
has more than 1GB of RAM) then you're at best getting two years life
out of a new machine instead of one year out of a used one. This is
trebly applicable to laptops, which are not very upgradable.

> would suffice in a laptop. =A0It is not cost effective to buy a machine
> only to supe it up with memory and hard drive. =A0I'm better off paying

Is this intended to be a desktop replacement? (I operate entirely off
laptops, btw. I have a machine with a big external USB drive that I
use as a fileserver, and I keep only what I'm working on on the
laptop's hard drive).

> really rankles me. =A0I am at a point where I am willing to consider
> running linux although I understand that it will have a painful

The learning curve will be particularly painful if you choose a
bleeding-edge brand new machine. You'll have a much easier time with
Linux if you buy hardware that's a little behind the crest of the
wave, because there will be much better FOSS driver support.

> learning curve and there are any number of programs that won't run
> under it. =A0Still, I have my old windows machines so Linux may work for

Since a c.a.e poster pointed me to VirtualBox, I've moved 100% of my
development effort into that environment, running within MacOS on my
MacBook (2.16GHz Core 2 Duo, 120Gb HDD, 1GB RAM). It's just amazingly
good. Previously I had tried and abandoned all hope of using my
various JTAG hardware within emulation, because of USB
incompatibilities. VirtualBox has eaten everything I threw at it, both
in MacOS and in Linux.

Inside the emulated box, I'm using a Windows XP license salvaged off a
defunct laptop. When I see people throw out computers, I also
generally try to salvage the CoA's if they're still on the case; I
take the whole case, salvage any useful bits, and scrape off the
sticker to be archived. Once I had to reactivate a license of this
type over the phone; I explained that the guts of the machine had been
changed entirely (which is true) and there wasn't a problem activating
it.

I do have a Toshiba convertible/tablet machine that I use to take
handwritten notes. I also have an Eee 2G Surf, but really I just
bought it because it is such a fun toy. It's so cool to be in a bar
and whip out this pocket-sized PC, hitch a ride on the bar's WiFi [I
have no idea...] and telnet into a machine to check something or demo
something to the people I'm talking to.

On Fri, 4 Jul 2008 00:00:11 -0700 (PDT), rickman <g...@gmail.com>
wrote in comp.arch.embedded:

> I missed my chance to get a Dell laptop with XP and have been looking
> around to see what is still available.  Lenovo offers some models with
> Linux or XP, but the prices are a bit high and selection is limited.
> I think I saw a few at Toshiba with XP, but again limited selection.

You are mistaken, Dell still sells laptops with XP.  Try this page:

http://search.dell.com/results.aspx?s=bsd&c=us&l=en&cs=04&k=laptop+windows+xp&cat=all

They have what they call Vista Business Downgrade service.  The
"business" versions of XP come with downgrade rights to XP Pro.  What
they actually sell is the machine with XP installed and running, and
both XP and Vista installation media.

Since the OEM price for Vista to manufacturers like Dell is the same
as XP was, you can look at it like this.  You pay the price for XP Pro
(installed and ready to run) and get a Vista Business upgrade disk,
for the remote possibility that you would ever want to, for free.

Starts at $498.00:

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W300&l=en&oc=bqcwi1s&s=bsd

And there are higher cost, higher featured models as well.

You don't actually have to prove that you own a business to buy online
from Dell small business.

-- 
Jack Klein
Home: http://JK-Technology.Com
FAQs for
comp.lang.c http://c-faq.com/
comp.lang.c++ http://www.parashift.com/c++-faq-lite/
alt.comp.lang.learn.c-c++
http://www.club.cc.cmu.edu/~ajo/docs/FAQ-acllc.html

On Jul 4, 7:42 pm, Jack Klein <jackkl...@spamcop.net> wrote:
> On Fri, 4 Jul 2008 00:00:11 -0700 (PDT), rickman <gnu...@gmail.com>
> wrote in comp.arch.embedded:
>
> > I missed my chance to get a Dell laptop with XP and have been looking
> > around to see what is still available.  Lenovo offers some models with
> > Linux or XP, but the prices are a bit high and selection is limited.
> > I think I saw a few at Toshiba with XP, but again limited selection.
>
> You are mistaken, Dell still sells laptops with XP.  Try this page:
>
> http://search.dell.com/results.aspx?s=bsd&c=us&l=en&cs=04&k=laptop+wi...
>
> They have what they call Vista Business Downgrade service.  The
> "business" versions of XP come with downgrade rights to XP Pro.  What
> they actually sell is the machine with XP installed and running, and
> both XP and Vista installation media.
>
> Since the OEM price for Vista to manufacturers like Dell is the same
> as XP was, you can look at it like this.  You pay the price for XP Pro
> (installed and ready to run) and get a Vista Business upgrade disk,
> for the remote possibility that you would ever want to, for free.

I think you are mistaken.  What you are calling "downgrade rights",
Dell calls "Windows Vista Bonus".  You pay ***extra*** for this.  It
may be the same price as the "business" versions of Vista, but it is
still an increase from the base price and an increase from the price
with *just* XP.  The ***LAST*** thing I want to do is to reward MS for
putting out a crappy OS by paying them for both the old and the new
OS.


> Starts at $498.00:
>
> http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&kc=6W30...
>
> And there are higher cost, higher featured models as well.
>
> You don't actually have to prove that you own a business to buy online
> from Dell small business.

I am very familiar with Dell and am a "small business" customer.  That
is why I know that I can't buy a machine with XP without paying for
Vista as well.

Thanks for pointing this out though.  I expect there are others who
are not familiar with how the "downgrade" program works.

Rick

rickman wrote:

> I would consider used equipment, but I want something that will last
> as my needs for processor speed and especially memory grow.  1 GB is
> not enough on my desktop machine currently, so I don't know why it
> would suffice in a laptop.  It is not cost effective to buy a machine
> only to supe it up with memory and hard drive.  I'm better off paying
> for a new machine.
> 
> The idea of buying a machine with Vista (pay MS for it) and then
> buying an older versions of XP or 2000 (and paying MS once again)
> really rankles me.  I am at a point where I am willing to consider
> running linux although I understand that it will have a painful
> learning curve and there are any number of programs that won't run
> under it.  Still, I have my old windows machines so Linux may work for
> me.
> 
> As to the small form factor machines having a smell... I don't know
> how you can pick out day old fish in a skunk's nest!  I am saying that
> this whole thing stinks to high heaven.  I just hope I haven't
> offended any skunks by comparing them to MS.  :^o

After many years (about 8 as far as I can make out) I have just changed
my old Dell Inspiron for a new Dell Inspiron 1525 with 2Gb memory, 120Gb
HDD, DVD read/write, Ethernet and Wifi in a case colour of my choosing.
Vista was pre-loaded on the machine but I wiped that in favour of
Mandriva Linux. It makes this machine seem to fly along much better than
under Vista (yes I had a little play with it). I got the feeling that if
Dell were to deliver without Vista it wouldn't have been any cheaper but
may have delayed the order a little by insisting on it.

Applications wise, I am usiing VuTrax for PCB schematic and layouts; I am
using VfxLinux Forth for programming; I am looking at installing VariCAD
for the mechanical design aspects (not free but reasonable price for
what it does). Will be looking at Open Project for planning. I already
have enough stuff for editing sound and videos and Open Office and the
KDE mail/news/RSS/Calendar and Journal are a nice bundle to keep track
of most things in comms and scheduling.

-- 
********************************************************************
Paul E. Bennett...............<email://P...@topmail.co.uk>
Forth based HIDECS Consultancy
Mob: +44 (0)7811-639972
Tel: +44 (0)1235-811095
Going Forth Safely ..... EBA. www.electric-boat-association.org.uk..
********************************************************************

rickman wrote:

> I have to say I am not impressed with Tiger.  I looked at the laptops
> and found that they only categorize based on price, brand or CPU.
> 
> Rick

I don't understand...

I just typed in www.tigerdirect.com. I chose "Laptops/Notebooks" on the 
left hand side, then chose 'XP Pro Laptops'. Two clicks and I was at a 
list of 22. Yes, most of them are Off-Lease (used) but I think that's a 
function of Microsoft, rather than the laptop manufacturers.

Many of the laptops available in the market can be 'downgraded' to XP. 
One of the folks at my church just bought a Dell with Vista Home Basic 
without checking to find out if we could put it on our network. After a 
call to Dell, we used one of our VEU licenses to load XP Pro, and it 
works just fine. We also found out that Dell would have shipped it with 
XP Pro, if they had been asked to.

RB

On Fri, 4 Jul 2008 00:00:11 -0700 (PDT), in comp.arch.embedded rickman
<g...@gmail.com> wrote:

>I missed my chance to get a Dell laptop with XP and have been looking
>around to see what is still available.  Lenovo offers some models with
>Linux or XP, but the prices are a bit high and selection is limited.
>I think I saw a few at Toshiba with XP, but again limited selection.
>
>Are there any sources of laptops that have decent selection and don't
>require that you pay MS for their crappy Vista OS?  It is looking like
>I might have to build a compact desktop to get a decent PC without
>paying MS for an OS that I don't want.
>
>Rick
You could save a bit by making friends with you local airport security
staff
http://blogs.usatoday.com/sky/2008/07/survey-10000-la.html


martin

On Jul 5, 10:17 am, Rube Bumpkin <Some...@somewhere.world> wrote:
> rickman wrote:
> > I have to say I am not impressed with Tiger.  I looked at the laptops
> > and found that they only categorize based on price, brand or CPU.
>
> > Rick
>
> I don't understand...

I don't either.  I didn't see anything like that.

> I just typed inwww.tigerdirect.com. I chose "Laptops/Notebooks" on the
> left hand side, then chose 'XP Pro Laptops'. Two clicks and I was at a
> list of 22. Yes, most of them are Off-Lease (used) but I think that's a
> function of Microsoft, rather than the laptop manufacturers.
>
> Many of the laptops available in the market can be 'downgraded' to XP.
> One of the folks at my church just bought a Dell with Vista Home Basic
> without checking to find out if we could put it on our network. After a
> call to Dell, we used one of our VEU licenses to load XP Pro, and it
> works just fine. We also found out that Dell would have shipped it with
> XP Pro, if they had been asked to.

I'm told you can downgrade only with the business version of Vista
which costs $100 more.  I really hate the idea of giving MS more
money.

What is a VEU license?

They may have bought their laptop before Dell stopped selling XP.  If
I have wrong info, it is because Dell has been lying to me.  I had
read in EETimes that Dell was committed to providing XP on "select"
laptops until 2010 when the next version of Windows would be out.
When I asked Dell about it they got cranky and insisted that it was
the last day to buy XP on their products.  In fact, when I pressed the
issue and quoted the article, the guy hung up on me.  I think they
were under pressure to book as many sales as they could that day and I
wasn't a sure sell.

I would consider some of the other vendors more seriously, but Dell
actually seems to have much better prices and I had gotten my sense of
laptop value looking at their stuff.  Now all the other machines seem
to be overly expensive and lacking in value.  Maybe when my next
invoice is paid the prices will look a lot better to me... :^)

One thing that bugs me is that Dell does not provide presales support
by email.  I have to either use the "online" chat or phone them.  With
email I can ask a question and not have to wait on the phone for an
answer.

I use Freecycle here and someone was offering several PCs around 7 or
so years old (P3-500).  He is willing to provide Ubuntu on them.  I
have asked for one in the hope that I can use that to learn a bit
about Linux without changing my main machine.  But I still have the
same problem that for whatever reason, buying a laptop with anything
other than Vista seems to greatly limit selection and cost a lot
more!  Someone had suggested a company that sold Linux laptops and a
machine I can get from Dell for around $600 is $1000 from them!

Maybe I'll build one of those really tiny PCs that are almost as small
as a laptop and use it as a portable machine rather than a laptop...

Rick

larwe wrote:

>You're really casting blame where it doesn't belong. The situation is
>very simple: Microsoft wants to book all the Vista sales it can in
>order to obfuscate the true uptake rate of Vista vs XP and protect
>itself against major competitors MacOS and Linux. Therefore it decided
>to stop selling Windows XP licenses. The only Windows on sale now is
>Vista, and there is a little fine print saying that you can downgrade
>to XP if you wish. And this is 100% Microsoft's fault, not Sony's or
>Dell's or Tiger Direct's.
>
>Any fullsize laptop or desktop you see in any catalog preloaded with
>XP is either refurbished or new old stock; i.e. used or leftovers. You
>won't find the $499 "back to school" special laptops with XP on them.
>
>Your only choices are therefore to select from the limited array of
>"new old stock" computers that were preloaded by the OEM with Windows
>XP (deal with the price), or buy a used machine (shop around; I bought
>a ThinkPad R51, 1.6GHz/WiFi/40GB/1GB/combo for $175), or buy a Vista
>machine and downgrade it one way or another. Plenty of XP retail boxed
>editions are available on eBay, Craigslist et al.

I haven't been able to prove it, but a suspiciously large number of
websites for laptops, printers, scanners, etc. seem to have deleted
their XP drivers, and it always seems to be the vendors that sell
new systems with Vista on them that do this.  I strongly suspect 
that Microsoft is trying to make it so that if you switch from Vista
to XP, it will be very difficult to get your your ethernet, sound, 
etc. working.

-- 
Guy Macon
<http://www.GuyMacon.com/>;

Jack Klein wrote:

>Dell still sells laptops with XP.  Try this page:
>
>http://search.dell.com/results.aspx?s=bsd&c=us&l=en&cs=04&k=laptop+windows+xp&cat=all
>
>They have what they call Vista Business Downgrade service.  The
>"business" versions of XP come with downgrade rights to XP Pro.  What
>they actually sell is the machine with XP installed and running, and
>both XP and Vista installation media.
>
>Since the OEM price for Vista to manufacturers like Dell is the same
>as XP was, you can look at it like this.  You pay the price for XP Pro
>(installed and ready to run) and get a Vista Business upgrade disk,
>for the remote possibility that you would ever want to, for free.

I haven't tried it, but I am pretty sure that you could then run
the copy of Vista in a virual machine under XP using either VMWare
or whatever MS is calling their virtualization this week.  That 
would take care of any Vista Only apps you might run into.


-- 
Guy Macon
<http://www.GuyMacon.com/>;