The problem with too many modern day manufacturers is that they’re too concerned with selling the whole package. I for one would be more than happy to buy a nicely designed laptop from say, Sony, sans an operating system, free internet from AOL or MSN, an office suite, and any other fluff that I’m convinced accounts for several hundred dollars in final cost. In addition, I would like the option to buy a laptop without a hard drive or memory, because from the manufacturer it’s going to be overpriced and I’ll probably upgrade it anyway. Why should I have to pay twice for things like a hard drive or Windows XP when I already own what I need? There are of course a number of third party manufacturers from which I could buy just a laptop shell, or something equivalent, but their design is laughable. I don’t need to give my Mac friends another reason to laugh at me ;).