I realize that they want to narrow the gap. Where only major sellers of
PC’s (Such as HP. Dell, and Gateway..) keep creating the “Throw away
PC’s” and avoid patents and universal PC standards to reduce the
options for customers to just replace parts to maintain their PC’s.
They are planning to help them “Macify” the PC market. Removing
generics such as Elitegroup, PCChips.. you know them. They sell
frequently on sites like Tiger direct etc.

Distributors like ASI, DHL, & many more rely on the PC enthusiasts,
system builders, and small IT professionals to use their parts for
system upgrades, and main board replacements.

With the new Vista licensing, this effects large companies who purchase
part replacements to maintain systems, expecting to keep them running
for 5 years. IT now will have purchase completes with Licenses, in
order to use new volume licenses, which they purchased in the first
place to REDUCE unnecessary costs. This increases costs for the
customer. Also, with the limited branding of Vista, computer
enthusiasts, and game fanatics who just upgrade their computers on a
frequent basis, may consider buying cheaper PC’s since they may in 1
year replace their motherboard and processor twice a year to handle the
latest PC titles.

This increases the sales of more affordable PC’s, with copies of Windows
Vista, but it is going to cause a backlash.

I have already joined the Ohio Ubuntu Linux chapter as of 4 days ago,
and plan on not re-registering my partnership with Microsoft because of
this. I will be able to compete still with Dell and HP with affordable
desktops with Ubuntu, which will soon support by April all major chip
sets and printers. Since many of my customers who buy PC’s are not
power users, the desktop environment and “ease of use” will draw
customers. I would able to sell a PC with a fully operational office
suite and educational packages for the cost of under $500. plus for
only $50.00 add Cedega, which supports many Gaming platforms, or even
wine, which now supports many static windows applications.

I will still have customers coming in for support, as they might need
assistance to use printers and cameras with their new systems, and
since I know about looking at system logs in Linux, I will be able to
diagnose minor (but soon to be ) hardware failures.

This is going to be an interesting year. Smaller computer stores are
going to have to compete with larger computer manufactures, and generic
brands and Distributors are going to support this effort. Since now even
states like Indiana has made a demand to put their schools on all Linux
platforms, this is going to be also a new thing occurring here in Ohio.
The chapter here has already made headway. You can review the meeting
notes at http://ohio.ubuntu-us.org/node/2