[freehunter]

>If Microsoft arbitrarily decides to double their license fee, manufacturers (until recently) really have no choice but to comply.

Is this because Microsoft is forcing them to buy a license, or because the market is demanding Windows? We can debate Microsoft's sketchy practices in the past (which they were then punished for), but the here-and-now question is why do OEMs provide Windows? And my answer is, because there's not much else they can do. OEMs offer Ubuntu, and it's a very low-volume seller. OEMs offer FreeDOS, and it's a very low volume seller. When someone buys a PC, they expect it to run right out of the box and with the OS the market is demanding.

I think my point still stands. It's not a tax any more than including (and charging for) a hard drive is a tax. It's just expected that a PC will come with it. It would be cheaper for the OEMs to produce all their PCs with Linux (to the tune of ~$35 per PC), but they don't because the price decrease will not offset the sales decrease. When I bought my truck, I wanted huge 38" MT tires instead of the 31" all season tires that came with it, but I had to buy those separately because the market demands road tires.

[takluyver]

> OEMs offer Ubuntu, and it's a very low-volume seller.

Which OEMs? In the UK, the only way I've got a computer without Windows is to order one custom built in a local shop.

[freehunter]

Dell, at various times, has offered Ubuntu machines (their latest offering is an Ubuntu XPS laptop). I don't know if they've offered them in the UK or outside of the US at all, but they've always been discontinued shortly after appearing. If they were discontinued because of Microsoft objecting, Dell wouldn't have done it at all (and wouldn't keep trying every couple of years). My guess is that they've been discontinued due to not selling in enough quantities.

Dell also offered FreeDOS as an option. Looking online, Acer has offered FreeDOS in the UK, at least in the past. These computers are usually advertised as "No OS Installed" or something similar.

[scholia]

I've talked to some OEMs about this.

(1) They find that offering one Linux isn't much of an advantage even for Linux users, since so many people have a different preferred distro. Even people who buy a laptop running Ubuntu are likely to replace it with something else, currently Mint.

(2) Supporting Linux is a very expensive nightmare, especially if you try to do it in 30 languages across 50 countries. Selling Linux laptops to newbies is a loss-making proposition, so you only want to sell to geeks and businesses that can look after themselves. And they're the people who install their own OS anyway.

(3) It's not such a big deal to sell business machines with FreeDOS or something similar. With consumer laptops, the pre-installed crapware basically pays for Windows. Business laptops don't have (or shouldn't have) pre-installed crapware so OEMs are not losing to much on installation fees. The exception is probably the anti-virus program, which delivers big bucks if the user signs up and pays.