Buying Thinkpad without Operating System

[patton73]

Well this is not a war.

The fact is that they will not receive my money until they will ship thinkpads without Operating System.

I would not agree even if they shipThinkpad with Novell Suse linux. I would like to have "No OS" choice.

And note that this is not my personal war, this is something relate to freedom to choose the operating system without spending money (if i do not want to) or paying a tax to someone else than a State.

[Eudoxus]

Anyway, it seems that Lenovo does not care about your money. Moreover, when Dell preinstalled some of their laptops with Ubunut there was no big difference in the price.

Of course, I know, taht this is not war. It is rather a matter of principle. My point was that this is not that important matter as far as I am concerned. There are some hardware producers who sell their machine without OS preinstalled. So you are free buy your computers from them. I do not see any reason to blame Lenovo for not doing that kind of thing. If they see no profit in that they will not move their rear. Thats it.

[patton73]

Infact it it is a shame that they do not care.

Anyway adding a "No OS" option is free for lenovo. There is no expense in doing so. Apart the fact that they will go against MS will.

Pheraps half day of work on the shop online and nothing more. The production line won't be affected at all.

So i really do not see the point in not offering such an option. well i can only imagine.

[Eudoxus]

I wonder, why shold it be considered a shame. If there is no profit, they just do not do it. Thats the way it is. I presume that the reason why lenovo do not sell their machines without OS is that that would amount to selling half-baked product, that is of no use to average customer.

Bu as I said, you still have your freedom not to buy Lenovo. Although I doubt that Lenovo will have any misgivings about that.

[Mark_Lenovo Administrator]

Patton73, Eudoxus,

I realize that this is a very sensitive subject, so  I'm sharing my own personal view and not representing a Lenovo position on the matter in any way.   I want to be clear about that.

Lenovo has sold some DOS preload models in Europe, but I think most have been models like the Lenovo N500 model rather than a ThinkPad.   

In my opinion, it seems like there are several reasons why a top tier manufacturer might be reluctant to sell an OS-less system.

In the case of ThinkPad, many of the features / differentiators vs competitor systems are at least partially dependent upon software in the preload - ThinkVantage Technologies.  Having no preload forfeits some of these advantage points of the product and some software aplications like Rescure and Recovery.  

Will the Active Protection system function properly under another OS?     How about the hot key functions? Power manager (and battery run time)  How about switchable graphics on a W500, or other model specific features like the digitizer on the W700, or the tablet functions on the X200?  Fingerprint scanners, cameras, multi-mode stereo microphones and advanced audio, etc,etc, etc.

Sure, some alternate OS's might offer drivers to support most of the main features on the unit, but perhaps not all.

What happens if there are problems and the customer wants to make a warranty claim?  This creates new demands on support - they are going to need training to support more OS's and diagnostics are going to have to be development that will allow accurate problem determination, etc.    This adds potential cost burdens to the OEM, (more testing to know what does / does not work, so as to give correct answers)   or causes it to either risk increased part use (using multiple parts while "guessing" - is it the memory, or a bad system board, or just a bad driver?) or be more limited in how it supports the system, which can create satisfaction problems.

As it stands now, when shipping with a supported preload, the customer can always go back to the preload (assuming they made their recovery CD/DVDs) for test purposes if something is in doubt.  If a unit were shipped with no OS, what would they go to? 

In short, when an OEM ships a complete system with a preload, it knows the system - the combination of hardware and software do work together.  It is easier to then support when things aren't working as expected.

I realize there are counterpoints to many of the observations I made, and ultimately an individual wants what they want.  It is their prerogative to do so, and I fully respect that.   I'm not saying you or others are wrong for wishing to purchase an OS-less system, just suggesting some other considerations.

Best regards,

Mark

Message Edited by Mark_Lenovo on 08-03-2009 09:27 AM

[Eudoxus]

Thank you Mark for sharing your take on the issue. I share your point of view and somehow tried to gesture at similar point in my previous post. In spiete of what some uncritically thinking linux fans may say, you are right, no existing linux distribution can support all funkcions that make ThinkPad so good machine for me. I regret that in a way, but this is the case. I have tried linux on my machine, but after a while a gave up as I had a crippled ThinkPad with poor power managment and other essential ThinkPad goodies.

[patton73]

Hi Mark,

thank you  for sharing your thoughts about this topic.

Even if Exodus thinks that i am only a "Linux fan" i will try to explain better my point of view.

1) I Like thinkpads for many reasons and none of them are related to the software installed.

    I can understand that lenovo thinks that the gap between thinkpads and others systems can relay also on the thinkvantage

    system and software. To me thinkpad are the best laptop i have ever touched. Best Hardware, and absolutely the best

    keyboard. Thinkpads (mostly the T series) are light weight, indestructible and made of good materials.

    That is thinkpad to me.

2) As for the warranty, I cannot believe that Lenovo checks the thinkpad hardware only if there is windows installed. There

    should be obviously a different hardware check in the construction line that is independent from the Installed OS.

3) I am talking about power users, people who use different operating system in their life as well as different hardware, not about

    the normal users or firms with a fixed internal politic.

4) I would never ask for a preinstalled linux distribution because i know there is a huge work to do about drivers and software

5) Formerly IBM never added the windows key to the keyboard, now lenovo does (this is a clear point to understand the

    actual lenovo's politic)

So that said, i am still convinced that a "No OS" option (or free Dos option if you want) could be possible without bringing Lenovo problems related to warranty. 

Anyway i can only wait and see what happen in the future.

[Eudoxus]

Still you are free to chose between you love for thinkpad and your anti-microsoft principles. No offence, but it seems to me that your anti-microsoft passion is far too irrational.

[lead_org Microsoft MVP Contributor]

2) what do you mean Lenovo checks the thinkpad hardware only if the OS is installed?

3) Power users?? Even power users use OS of some sort.... and many power users have several OS installed on their machine.... Maybe power users with too much time on their hand.... If you don't want use Microsoft OS, then don't use it... its only one hundred dollar difference... not that much of a big deal. Or you can take up the issue up with Microsoft.

Or find people with similar distaste for any OS, and buy through the corporate channel with no OS.

5) IBM is the people whom made the Microsoft rich, read a bit about IBM/Microsoft business dealing. The reasons that the no windows key was included was pure politics on IBM parts in the latter year, when everyone else was using it on their laptop. 

Maybe for you Microsoft OS can be avoided, but for many industries where softwares are only written for windows, this is not a option.... try using HYSYS in Linux...  

[JDobmeier]

Check out this link for a taste of what you have to go through to get a Windows refund:

http://equiliberate.org/node/3

Seems like alot of work but still possible. The personal satisfaction alone would be worth much more than the token monetary compensation. 

W500 / Kubuntu 9.04

Message Edited by JDobmeier on 08-04-2009 12:11 PM

Message Edited by JDobmeier on 08-04-2009 12:16 PM