Ordering Ubuntu on a Dell Laptop

“I called Dell’s Linux support and spent the next hour on the
phone with an understanding gentleman in Delhi, who asked all sorts
of questions over and over. Questions like, “Is the button on the
side turned toward the 1 or the 0?” After repeatedly determining
that I knew how to make sure the wireless/Bluetooth switch was set
to the “on” position, we went into Network Manager several times,
manually added settings, rebooted, turned the wireless switch off
and on repeatedly….essentially went through the same process and
questions, over and over and over.

“Delhi guy didn’t seem to want to consider the possibility that
it was a hardware problem, even though physical layer is one of the
first things that normally gets checked in a troubleshooting
exercise, right after, “Is the system plugged in and is the power
light on?” We soon arrived at the nuclear option – he wanted me to
reinstall using the CD that came with the machine. Sighs.”

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