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This is a very informative thread for anyone having ACPI problems with a Foxconn board, but it's a stretch to say they've gone out of their way to deliberately

by jm4 18y ago

This is a very informative thread for anyone having ACPI problems with a Foxconn board, but it's a stretch to say they've gone out of their way to deliberately sabotage their own product in order to inconvenience the tiny percentage of their own customers who choose to use Linux. More likely, this is simply incompetence. I've been using Linux for almost 10 years so I'm very familiar with this sort of experience and understand this guy's frustration completely. However, he is jumping to a lot of conclusions based on very little information. Before even asking for help he sent off a complaint to the FTC. Foxconn's support tried to work with him after that to fix his problem and he acted like a total jerk. With these chicken little types of articles and forums threads being plastered all over every social news site it's no wonder a lot of hardware vendors don't want to officially support Linux. When something doesn't work people always assume the worst and they get burned for it. The more likely scenario is that many of these companies don't have enough Linux experience to ensure the same kind of quality they can with something as familiar as Windows.

ajross 18y ago
I don't see where Foxconn "tried to work with him", frankly. They asked one question (which completely missed the point: removing RAM doesn't tell you anything about ACPI behavior) and then punted with "we don't support linux". I don't know about you, but that's not the support that I want from my hardware vendors. I mean, sure, the guy might be a paranoid jerk. But Foxconn is hardly blameless here.
- jm4 18y ago
  Of course they're not blameless. They're just another crappy vendor that, at best, puts a half effort into supporting Linux. Even cursory research probably would have revealed this before the guy purchased the hardware. The first clue that a little research might be necessary is that Foxconn doesn't even claim to support Linux. The point I was trying to make is this is about the worst way to go about solving a problem like this. Assuming, and then treating people as if they're out to get you is going to get this guy and the Linux community exactly nowhere. What do we know? Maybe Foxconn made a genuine attempt at providing some unofficial Linux support and just screwed up. Dealing with them as if they're part of some conspiracy to destroy Linux is not only downright foolish but really hurts the cause. If all a company is going to get is grief from a bunch of rabid bloggers, who can blame them for falling back on the "we don't support linux" excuse? The simple solution is to let them know in a polite and respectful way that you're having a problem with the hardware. They can choose to fix it or not and you can choose to keep buying their products or not.

by jm4 18y ago

ajross 18y ago

I don't see where Foxconn "tried to work with him", frankly. They asked one question (which completely missed the point: removing RAM doesn't tell you anything about ACPI behavior) and then punted with "we don't support linux". I don't know about you, but that's not the support that I want from my hardware vendors. I mean, sure, the guy might be a paranoid jerk. But Foxconn is hardly blameless here.

jm4 18y ago
Of course they're not blameless. They're just another crappy vendor that, at best, puts a half effort into supporting Linux. Even cursory research probably would have revealed this before the guy purchased the hardware. The first clue that a little research might be necessary is that Foxconn doesn't even claim to support Linux. The point I was trying to make is this is about the worst way to go about solving a problem like this. Assuming, and then treating people as if they're out to get you is going to get this guy and the Linux community exactly nowhere. What do we know? Maybe Foxconn made a genuine attempt at providing some unofficial Linux support and just screwed up. Dealing with them as if they're part of some conspiracy to destroy Linux is not only downright foolish but really hurts the cause. If all a company is going to get is grief from a bunch of rabid bloggers, who can blame them for falling back on the "we don't support linux" excuse? The simple solution is to let them know in a polite and respectful way that you're having a problem with the hardware. They can choose to fix it or not and you can choose to keep buying their products or not.