Why I don't like Dell

Custom home built computers beat any and all manufactured computers any day ;D I know people with $2000 machine they bought where ever yet my <$300 machine is about 4 times better : I haven't ever had any issues with my computer since I made it 5 YEARS ago and it's still better than what you can buy at best buy or where ever you buy computers

jwc said:

I bought a Dell XPS M1330 because I needed a decently priced 13" laptop.  The product itself is okay, but I'm kind of unhappy with the lack of attention to details.  If the XPS series is supposed to be Dell's "high performance" series, I would expect that they keyboard wouldn't be some generic, inexpensive device with surprisingly large gaps between the keys, etc.

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I bought it mostly because it was supposed to be lightweight and small, but also still be decently capable of handling things like Photoshop (and multiple BIG files).  It does all that well while not weighing me down when it's in my bookbag, but that's when it's ACTUALLY working.  So far, so good with my current replacement, but it has also only been 1 day  :


And with desktops, its always better to build your own (and not very difficult).  However, I know they make barebones laptops to build your own, but they really don't end up being much cheaper than buying one without all the add-ons and just upgrading yourself.  And, if you keep an eye out for coupons/deals through different manufacturers, you can end up getting the stuff MUCH cheaper than normal anyway.

Hehe... yeah. Dell's support hasn't ever been it's strong point.

I'm sitting behind a Latitude D620 right now... it's been through more than most shock/weather/spill/abuse-proof laptops could take, and it still works fine. The only computers I've owned in the past decade, aside from home-built ones (still my first choice! ), have been Dells. I can't say I'm dissatisfied at all... all of them have been workhorses, even when run to the ground.

Support, though... Dear Lord... It's awful. I've chatted with a few of their "online experts" when persistent bugs come up... I know more about computers than 8 of them put together. It's terrible. I've also had to replace the screens in a few of the laptops (User error resulting in shattered screens... nothing was wrong with them beforehand). It turns out you can't order replacements from their website, so I had to call support to place an order. I ended up with some Indian guy who barely spoke english, who made me yell my credit card number into the phone 4 freaking times before he finally got it down.  Fun stuff...

My company has provided me a DELL inspiron 640m, which is the same computer I'm using now and has been great for close to 2 years now. However, It has never once moved from my desk, never once unplugged from power supply and it has admin restrictions on it. Anyway, I'm not too fond of laptops anyway because the ALL have problems when they are mobile (unless you're extremely careful with them), which is the main reason they exists in comparison to building your own desk top...IMO.

Hmm, it seems everything works the opposite for me: IE7 works just fine; Windows works for me (it did bluescreen once, but it hasn't since than. ~2 years); and my dell works just fine, I've never had to get anything fixed. Maybe it's just the laptops.

my hp desktop is 4 years old and has been the best computer i have ever used. it is faster than many new computers. it has xp and came with half gig of ram. i added another gig of ram and it is just crazy fast. the stock cd drive was just and i replaced it with a sony dvd-rw a few years ago. it never locks up, no blue screens, its great. it will be even better when i get more hard drive space.

my new hp laptop is also preaty good. the only problem is that even when the ac adapter is not plugged in , it shows on the screen that its plugged in and NOT charging. it will still charge if plugged in though. i haven't had any problems with vista 64 either. 4 gigs of ram also helps. ;D

i havent had any problems from their computers(got an inspiron e1505) but their chargers are crappy as hell. i just threw away 2 that wont even work a few minutes ago...

NEver buy a Dell. These use very cheap components.

Dell used to be a web based company that built systems on demand, meaning theres no old inventory with god knows what bugs stocked up anywhere...then Dell committed to an investment of assembly lines that allowed them to sell bulk at a budget. It was this decision that created an inventory stack, with successive bugs that developed later, it was hell trying to find which systems are clean what which didn't as they were all in boxes.

Kinda like Dr. Pepper...it just went downhill within a couple years, along with bad design, ridiculous customer service...and generally mediocre quality on parts. The only thing I'm satisfied with Dell [desktops anyway] is the price, and the mice [everything else within a year or two would require that you either replace something, or something loosened and started vibrating]

Dunno if I've already posted this, but here's my Dell story. A friend had a computer I was going to borrow for a LAN, and he warned me that "strange colored squares and lines" would appear after playing for some time. Okay, it sounds like a normal heating issue. So I take home the computer, opens it up to take a look inside and boots. The graphic card was integrated into the north bridge, which was cooled only by a small heatsink with no fan. In fact, the only fans in the computer were the CPU fan and a minimal fan on the PSU. After about ten minutes in Windows, no 3D application running, the heatsink was so hot I couldn't touch it. During the whole LAN we had the case open and a fan blowing on the north bridge to keep it from overheating

Most on-board graphics don't have dedicated fans...and North bridge's heatsink is usually undersized imo
video cards aren't expensive now, get a budget one, slap it in then disable the on board via BIOS before it burns a hole on the mudderboard

Illuminum3415 said:

Most on-board graphics don't have dedicated fans...and North bridge's heatsink is usually undersized imo
video cards aren't expensive now, get a budget one, slap it in then disable the on board via BIOS before it burns a hole on the mudderboard

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It was about two or three years ago that happened, and none of us uses that computer now And I would have had a hard time finding a good card, since the case was only made for low-profile cards.

A WILD VILLAGEIDIOT APPEARS!

I have an xps720 and it has given me solid performance for more than a year now. Runs Crysis on very high easily etc.

How do you like the xps720? I've been looking at the Studio XPS w/i7-940 processor.

VillageIdiot said:

A WILD VILLAGEIDIOT APPEARS!

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>_>

<_<

*throws Master Ball*

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3PmewuSb1w[/media]

;D ;D