Windows Refunds in Switzerland [index] [webmaster]

Windows Refunds in der Schweiz
Remboursements de Windows en Suisse

News:

• September 11, 2003: Emmanuel Eckard is asking a refund for the version of Mac Os X coming with his Apple iBook2 bought at FNAC in Lausanne.

• November 20, 2001: Definitive answer from the ComCo to Marc Schaefer (Wettbewerbskommission, Commission de la concurrence).

• March 5, 2001: Marc Schaefer's letter to the ComCo

• November 2, 2000: first Windows refund in Switzerland. IBM Switzerland pays back CHF 109.65 for unused copy of Windows 98.

What's the problem?
In short, most notebooks vendors sell a proprietary operating system (OS) with their notebooks, so that you are forced to buy commercial software even if you plan never to use it.

• If you contact a vendor before buying a notebook, they will not accept to sell a machine without an OS (see section ``Preliminary contacts'', a case-study for Windows).

• Therefore, what you have to do is buy a notebook with a proprietary OS, overwrite it with the OS of your choice, and apply for a refund.

Do not buy the last version of an OS!

• Because you already bought one version together with your old computer that you are now throwing away. Throw away the hardware, but keep one and only one copy of the software! You don't need new software every two years, especially when you see the total lack of originality in the commercial desktop applications.

• Because you prefer to use Linux, the alternative, robust, free, open-source, user-friendly operating system.