Bad News, Windows Fanboys: Dell Exec States Return Rates Similar

Lately, the general furor and anticipation over the release to the masses of Windows 7 has had the Windows fanboys salivating, and delivering up stories of how OEMs who deliver Linux are going to stop because of high return rates. These high return rates are ostensibly because the users can’t get Linux to work as they wish, or possibly that the free operating system is simply too hard to work with.

An article from down under, on ITWire, quotes a Dell executive as stating flatly that the return rates are totally similar, meaning that the return rates are primarily because of defective parts or installs, not because of customer dissatisfaction with the operating system.

The return rate for Linux-based netbooks is about the same as that of similar hardware running Windows, according to a Dell executive.

While Microsoft officials and spokespeople for some other vendors have asserted that a significantly greater proportion of Linux netbooks are returned than of those shipped with Windows, a senior product marketing manager at Dell says the return rate is similar for both.

Furthermore, the absolute level of returns is a “non-issue”, Dell’s Todd Finch was quoted as saying by Gavin Clarke in The Register.

The really interesting point is that Finch also said returns are typically the result of the buyer expecting Windows but getting something else.

That is at least a partial vindication of the idea that (some) people actively want Windows rather than Linux - just as there are those who actively want Linux.

So if most Linux returns are by people who expected Windows, and the return rates are similar for Linux and Windows, why are people returning Windows netbooks to Dell?

Judging by the Register report, Finch didn’t say. But the fact that he said that “technical reasons” weren’t the reason for Linux returns, maybe they were for Windows.

After all, if you’re used to a certain level of Windows performance on a recent notebook or desktop system, you might be less than impressed with what you get from the limited hardware inside a netbook. If that’s the case, you might well be tempted to return the netbook and buy a ‘real’ notebook instead.

That said, most people are clearly happy with the netbooks they’re getting from Dell, whichever operating system they select.

As I’ve said before, the so-called netbook market is really two separate markets: one for cheap(ish) and light(ish) Windows notebooks, and one for ‘true’ netbooks that are in many ways more like a large smartphone without the phone but with a conventional keyboard. In the latter category, the specific operating system is less material.

According to IDC, around 5% of recent netbooks have shipped with Linux.

It is possibly a testament to the Linux community that the return rates are similar. The more the Linux system, in total, grows, the less dissimilar the actual usage becomes, if the customer wants it. The latest versions of Xandros are becoming amazingly like Windows, and one has to look closely to see what is being used casually. In fact, one might argue that the atavistic changes made to the Windows 7 shell are in response to this similarity, and Microsoft wanting to differentiate itself visually, again.

A point that I have made, in these pages, yet have not seen expressed elsewhere, is that with each iteration of Windows, beginning with Windows XP, Microsoft has taken steps to make the Windows filesystem more and more Unix-like. Anyone who disputes this is living in denial. Clearly, Microsoft sees what is good about Unix, Linux, and the BSDs, and wishes to emulate that goodness, instead of trying to re-invent the wheel.

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Today is Sunday, August 16, 2009

Today in  Beatles History

1962 - Pete Best was fired from the Beatles. Johnny Hutchinson (Big Three) filled in as drummer that evening at the Riverpark Ballroom, Chester, Cheshire.

1986 - Paul McCartney’s “Press” hit #25 in the U.K.

2002 - It was announced that Paul McCartney had canceled his appearance for the Kennedy Center honors and that he would be named on the list of performers for 2003.

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