Peppermint ICE - Dell Mini 10

So Elly received her new Dell Inspirion 15 last Friday. She got it in preparation for going to American University. I spent my day off Friday making sure that she could dual boot into Windows7 and Ubuntu. The only problem I have so far is that the wireless doesn't work in Ubuntu. It seems like Broadcom hasn't released a driver for Linux. Or at least, none of the packaged (B43 or Linux SAT) worked. So until that driver comes out, it'll be one big MP3 player.

Dell Does A Flip Flop - Windows Cheaper than Ubuntu Netbook

I'm amazed. A few weeks ago I was looking at getting a netbook from Dell, largely because we get an employee discount. Not much of a discount, but a discount. So I login again today since my daughter wants to buy one. One with Ubuntu on it, not Windows. Her choice, not mine - though if you know me, you'd know Ubuntu would be my choice as well.

When I originally saved my cart (cool little feature there on Dell's site), I had selected a Mini 10v, which came with Ubuntu. And it cost $299. The Windows netbooks were like $50 more. So imagine my suprise when I go back today and the Mini 10v is only available with Windows on it, and the Ubuntu version now costs what the Windows version did previously, $349.

No explanation, no nothing. You just can't order the Mini 10v with Ubuntu on it anymore. You only have the option of Windows XP SP3. Which is surprising to me since we all know that Microsoft has been waffling back and forth as to when XP is going to hit the junk heap.

I would be absolutely fascinated with Dell's explanation of this flip flop. The only change in the configuration is the OS. What made Ubuntu, a free and free of charge OS all of a sudden $50 more expensive than an operating system that costs money?

Maybe I need to go back and consider Asus again. But that will be for my next one. We did order the Mini 10v that was saved in my cart. We'll see what actually shows up.