Take a look:

!http://threshold-zero.tmanime.com/images/4t.png!:http://threshold-zero.tmanime.com/images/4.png

Notice that? Wow, support for Linux! Now, on your Dell Laptop when you go for support, you can actually choose Linux from the list of available operating systems to get help with! Yay!

But look more closely at the results that it’s given you as available downloads… notice the BIOS updater program? Guess what form you get that in?

A windows executable.

Yeah, Dell is pulling a lot of this “oh look by the way we support linux now too hurr hurr” stuff just to piss of Microsoft. The word “on the street” is that OEM manufacturers do this stuff every few years in order to make sure Microsoft doesn’t try and charge too much for the versions of Windows that companies like Dell pre-install on computers for you.

Take a look at this:

“Even Michael S. Dell uses Ubuntu Linux at home!”:http://www.dell.com/content/topics/global.aspx/corp/biographies/en/msd_computers?c=us&l=en&s=corp

See what I mean? Oh noes! Even the leader of Dell uses Linux! Watch out, Microsoft!

While I would love to see Dell adopting big time support for Linux, it just ain’t gonna happen. They’ve pulled this stuff before, and then when they’re pressured by Microsoft, they back down.