Lessons Learned - Don't use Ubuntu in business if the system is not 100% supported

Over the past month, since I received my new laptop (Acer Timelinex 3820tg) I've been on a mission to (almost) completely use Ubuntu for my business needs.  I have:

• Installed Office 2007 (sans Outlook) through PlayOnLinux (a WINE configuration tool)
• Installed Windows XP in a virtual for when I need to VPN into the office network (sadly, the Linux CISCO client doesn't work on the company network) and also for Outlook (seamless mode works nice).
• Set-up all of the network printers from the domain.
• All of my documents are stored in Ubuntu with the VM having access through shared folders. 
• All critical documents added to Dropbox

Everything had been working well, until today. So imagine, there I was with a client, I was sitting in their office with a number of their colleagues connected via webex (enter dark sinister music). Since I had to VPN into my network I had to use the virtual machine for the demo I was going to provide. I opened up my browser, connected to Webex and then the fun started. 

After connecting (in the XP VM), I tried going to the start menu to select an app, it came up with a shortcut dialog -no app, just a damn shortcut dialog telling me where the shortcut lead to. OK. No issue. Just don't touch the start menu. Improvise I kept thinking. So I switched to the PowerPoint I had open and then the webex connection died. Then my whole network went down! I switched back to Ubuntu, same issue - network dead. I could not connect to anything. I was panicking (internally at this point - with a nice cool exterior). I made a few jokes about technology and how it's causing my hair to turn grey. A few chuckles from the crowd.  Then I realized that the whole webex meeting had cancelled itself. 

So to cut it short , I could go on trust me, I made a few frantic calls to the PA and had a new webex session set-up. I then grudgingly (without the customer noticing) rebooted into Windows 7 (which hadn't been set-up with anything other than dropbox and VPN). 

In the end we lost about 30 minutes because of my blunder. Luckily the demo was a success though :)

The lesson learned? Over the past month I have been experiencing multiple tolerable issues with my laptop. I failed to think that those issues could be problematic in a work environment. It was quite stupid of me really. Up until now I had happily been using Ubuntu at home but I never put it through the stress of a corporate environment... and when I decided to do it, I did it on a system I knew wasn't working right. I was being STUPID. 

Somehow Webex is a culprit. How, I do not know. But for now, I will NOT be doing any webex demos from Virtualbox.