Foolish humans, thinking you could choose your operating system without penalty
Linux devotee Laura Breeden has discovered an obscure condition in the warranty supplied by Hewlett-Packard that lets them off the hook -- even in the case of a purely mechanical defect -- if the customer installs an operating system other than the one that comes pre-loaded. The condition is obscure because it's not actually in the warranty.
An HP representative explained the "You have transgressed the unwritten law!" situation thusly: "It is impossible to anticipate every single issue that a customer can face, so the terms and conditions of warranties can't list every possible scenario. Usually if a customer installs a different OS, it has a big impact on the PC and will void the warranty."
Gateway and Dell won't say how they handle similar warranty issues.
ChangeLog: Run Linux, lose warranty[Linux.com]
