2 ms·

Fair enough. *in any physical store.

• JohnFen 7y ago
  In almost all physical stores, I agree. But in my city (yours may have one too), there is an electronics recycler that rebuilds computers, installs Linux, and resells them. They won't be the latest machines, of course, and may not meet your needs, but it might be an option. I would say that I buy around 90% of my computers from them.
  • dTal 7y ago
    That sounds wonderful. I can honestly say that I stick my head into damn near every store I walk past that has a computer in the Window, and I have never - never - seen one selling a computer with Linux preinstalled (with the minor exception of 2007-era netbooks, which just goes to show what a colossal threat to Microsoft those were). I wish this were not so - I would love to support such a place, with my money and with my time. (Even if you donated a Linux machine to a thrift shop, I've no doubt they'd wipe it and install Windows 10 in order to make it (in their eyes) saleable.)
    • JohnFen 7y ago
      Yeah, I guess that I'm spoiled on that front. Should I even mention that they sell almost all sorts of cables and mice for $1 each? They have large boxes overflowing with the things. There are exceptions -- I once had to pay $5 for a 20' long HDMI cable that was still new in the packaging. No, I better not, that would be mean. The odd thing about when I buy machines from them is that I end up wiping the installed OS anyway -- they install Ubuntu, and Ubuntu and I don't get along very well.