Dell announced the availability of Ubuntu 7.10 on their consumer Linux desktops and laptops in the US as well as out-of-the-box DVD playback today through their Direct2Dell blog. Although Ubuntu 7.10 has been available since October, Dell was still testing the new release until now. In addition to just putting the existing Ubuntu 7.10 code on their computers, Dell has made a few improvements to make the out-of-the-box experience better. New Dell computers will ship with Flash Player pre-installed and, more importantly, new dell computers will also be able to play DVDs out-of-the-box with LinDVD. Ubuntu 7.10 will also be available on some models in other countries this week.

It is good to see that Dell is not just installing the default Ubuntu distribution, but they are showing significant commitment to open-source software by adding features to improve the user experience, even if they are relatively small changes. Hopefully, the Dell and Ubuntu people will continue to work together and get all of the commercial media codecs installed so that Mossberg and other technology reviewers can’t complain about media playback anymore.