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Re: [TCLUG:951] Dell good Linux Box?



I haven't tried to install Linux on any of them yet, but the
company I work for has been using nothing but Dell for about
two years now, and all I can say is that they kick butt (for
the most part). We just had a string of Lattitude laptops
that are causing a lot of grief (seems they actually shipped
a product without even installing the proper drivers for
Windows, then included an image CD with corrupt files...!!),
but their desktops and past laptops have been great. The few
times we've needed to call tech support, they've been
friendly, knowledgeable, and very helpful. We've purchased
about 150 desktops from them and have just rec'd two
Poweredge servers.

The original post for this thread said you were looking at
an XPS 200. Was it a P200V (a Pentium) or an M200A (a
Pentium MMX)? I've had both. If I remember correctly, they
both had S3 video on-board (virge VX w/ 2Mb and DX w/ 4Mb,
respectively, I *think*), and didn't have sound on-board
(the newer PII's do). You can disable the video with one
jumper setting if you want. I think the boards were based on
the Triton chipsets (VX and TX, respectively?). The cases
are Hi-Q...easy to work on, but you *might* run into
problems if you ever upgrade the motherboard. It looks like
standard ATX form factor, but I'm not sure...it is probably
OK, but I can't guarantee it. As an interesting side-note,
Dell NEVER uses CPU fans. My current 333 PII doesn't even
have one, nor does either of our brand-new 350Mhz servers!
They do have some HUGE heat-sinks, though, and
well-ventilated cases. Tech support says removing the fans
is good b/c fans tend to be comparatively unreliable and a
common point of failure on other brands...

If your still with me after all this, I'd say go for it! 

Troy Johnson wrote:
> 
> I don't know what it is like today, but a few years ago Dell made
> some
> resonably nice computers, but made it difficult for a business to
> get
> support when problems arose. Is it still like that today? Anybody
> with
> any experience in that area?
> 
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