[Beowulf] Linux laptops, and M$ advertisement

[Joe Landman]

Peter St. John wrote:
> While looking around for a laptop I discovered that MS is paying Google 
> for the keyword "linux" to point to a "Get the Facts!" page (reminds me 
> of TheTruth.com) with testomonials about why MS is better than Linux for 
> clustering (!). What struck me was that I wasn't googling "linux 
> cluster" but just "linux notebook", yet the page is about MS 
> cluster installations at research facilitites.

Heh... I notice lots of MSFT adverts on Linux Mag and other sites.

>  
> The ad is http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver/facts/default.mspx?R=cf
>  
> The testamonials all seem to be equivalent to "I"m a PhD in Rocket 
> Science but setting up a Linux Cluster is too complex, so using MS saves 

Yeah, well ...

> me time to do Rocket Science". None of them mention if their MS clusters 
> were in any way subsidized by MS. Also, I assume that essentially they 

Lets ask CTC, UIUC and others.

> are paying their vendor to do the setup & support, and they don't say if 
> that compares economically to, say, paying Joe to do that, only that it 
> saves them time themselves. Sure, if I had that budget, I'd pay Joe and 
> RGB to come and work for me and I would have more time for other things.
>  
> Be all that as it may, I"m wondering what laptop to get. There are two 
> issues: one, that it used to be scary to get all the device drivers for 
> linux (maybe not anymore); and two, that one would prefer not to pay the 
> tax associated with the disk manufacturer contracting to preinstall 
> Vista etc. Toshiba, which used to be a fair linux platform IIRC, 
> promotes itself as the Premier Vista Notebook now (understandably).

FWIW:  We happily run Linux (SuSE, RHEL/Centos, Ubuntu) on our HP 
Pavilion laptops.  I try to stick with the nVidia chip sets, I have 
never had good luck with ATI.

A fair number of our customers have asked us to look into Linux desktops 
(and we sold a pair very recently, nice units ... ).  Haven't had 
requests for Linux laptops yet, though it would be fun.

>  
> I ran into http://www.linuxcertified.com/linux-laptop-lc2100.html via a 
> couple routes but of course it's a no-frills site, dunno what it wouuld 
> be like to find/get accessories etc. Anyone want to pitch me their 
> laptop favorite?

I installed Feisty Fawn on HP Pavilion, IBM T60p, and many others.

Joe

>  
> Thanks,
> Peter
>  
>  
>  
>  
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Beowulf mailing list, Beowulf at beowulf.org
> To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf

-- 
Joseph Landman, Ph.D
Founder and CEO
Scalable Informatics LLC,
email: landman at scalableinformatics.com
web  : http://www.scalableinformatics.com
phone: +1 734 786 8423
fax  : +1 734 786 8452
cell : +1 734 612 4615