I hate Dell Computer Corporation

[00940]

No brand is immune to problems.... even IBM had big reliability problems with the Thinkpads T40, T41, T42 with discrete GPU. I think it's safer to do extensive research about specific models than just trust a brand.

As for now, I'm a very happy HP Elitebook owner. Their Probook 5310m was also a little gem. And yet, I wouldn't ever buy most of HP consumer line.

For desktops, building your own is often slightly more expensive but the ability to use really standard parts is priceless down the road when you have to replace those.

 

[MCC]

 
Quote:

This is why I avoid Dell and Hewlett Packard like the plague. I know how bad their products really are and their support is worse.
 

It's bad when the domain controller of a small/midsize business is down because of a motherboard failure on their HP server. It's worse when HP ignores the fact that you have a 12-hr (as I recall) extended warranty on said server and decides that they want to schedule a replacement three days in the future. It took several hours on the phone to straighten that one out and even then they didn't arrive until late the next afternoon.
 
Because of HP's incompetence I spent a long night helping to migrate everything to a temporary backup machine- something that would have been completely unnecessary if HP honored their contracts.

 

[SemiAudiophile]

I've never had problems with Dell computers in my experience. I find them to be one of the more reiliable brands of computers out there. I've been using a dimension desktop since 2003 with no issues, doing a reformat every half a year or so and it even runs windows 7 pretty smoothly. They're like Toyota, they last forever. On the other hand, I have had pretty bad experiences with HP laptops. Horrible battery life, gpu/video issues, and loaded with bloatware.

 

[ElectroGeek007]

I work in the Tech Services department of my university as a student worker during the school year, mainly servicing students' personal computers. About 90% of the computers that we service are either Dell or HP. True, there are many user-created problems, but I do find that there is an increased risk of hardware failure on these two brands. 

 

[sari0n]

Lenovo gets some pretty sick deals, they have laptop on sale with the new sandybridge i7's, 8gb ddr3 ram, and a pretty decent graphics card for around ~900 only.  I've never really used Dell stuff that much, I find their computers to be rather expensive and the ones that I do use seem extremely average at best.  Our school also uses Dell computers and they seem alright.  We do get problems a lot and the older computers fail all the time but the newer ones aren't too bad.  
 
I've had mostly good experiences with HP.  I used a HP Pavilion desktop pc for almost 7 years before it died, and I really do use my computers a lot.  I rarely turn my computers off or even put them to sleep, which is probably a bad habit but it's what I do.  That computer was on for months at a time.  I've noticed that HP has been making some really plasticky laptops recently though.  I don't own one but a lot of my friends do and the bodies are ridiculously creaky.  If you get an Envy or one of the Special Editions with the metal bodies it should be alright though.  HP laptops are cheap though, you can easily get a good sandy bridge i7 laptop for under 1k, I even managed to get an Envy for that much.
 
Toshiba I have mixed feelings about.  My Toshiba laptop was full of problems but most of them were software issues.  The thing also got ridiculously hot just idling and it's not like I overclocked it or had some really powerful stuff in there.  I never turned that computer off too, so I suppose it is pretty durable.  No real hardware issues after keeping it on 24/7 for a full 2 years.

 

[MCC]

I'd hold off on Sandy Bridge for the moment, the associated chipset is defective. Intel is going to lose ~$1 billion over this flaw.
 
The problem is with SATA ports 2 through 5- it's possible that laptops will be OK.

 

[sari0n]

Ooh, that is a problem... I had no idea about that.
I guess I'm sort of lucky then, I only just missed out on them so I have an i7 720qm, which is definitely already more than enough for most users.

 

[MCC]

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. When I built my current desktop a few years ago I skipped over the AMD Phenom because of the translation lookaside buffer flaw. I ended up getting an Intel chip instead which I'm slowly burning out via excessive overclocking. I have to bump up the voltage a notch every few months as it degrades, further increasing its acceleration towards certain doom. At some point it'll die and I'll be forced to upgrade. 

 
Intel will need to ensure that there is some way for consumers to easily tell if a machine is affected or not. This flaw will not only cost Intel $1 billion in direct costs but could also give AMD's upcoming Bulldozer uArch a boost.
 
Back OT-ish. I'm reckless with my desktop's hardware because I know I can trust my Lenovo Thinkpad W500. It's a solidly built machine designed to last. I've spilled water on the keyboard (it has a built-in drain!), watched it fall from a height of ~1m while running, and generally tossed it around - sometimes by the screen - only because I know it can handle it. I've worked with business class Dells and they feel like toys in comparison.
 
If my desktop explodes into a ball of flame my W500 will be ready to take over and I can count on that.

 

[Shike]

My Dell horror story:
 
I had a Vostro 1500 with an HDD that went bad, probably after it was poorly handled by TSA.

First they argue what's wrong (I told them my HDD, they screamed RAM. I was right). I had an overnight parts next day service plan. They shipped RAM and sure enough it didn't change the situation. I finally got the HDD a day or two after calling them and saying RAM didn't work, went to replace it and . . . oops, their screws were stripped. Okay, call them and they say a technician can handle that (uhuh, sure . . . ). Low and behold the technician looks at it and says "uh, I can't do jack about stripped screws" (no, really? Say it ain't so!).

 Okay, so now I'm told by Dell the replacement HDD needs to be shipped back in a different box from the laptop and they'd fix the laptop at the factory. Checked on their return form that I wanted it back only when it's fixed.

 Week later, get the laptop with the screws fixed . . . but the HDD wasn't. Lovely. Call them up and the part was out of stock. Called them about every day . . . for three months they dragged their feet.

When I finally got it they shipped it standard ground to add insult. They were absolutely terrible to work with.
 
What I'm trying to decide is whether their support is just that bad, or if it was an issue because they forgot to affix the express service code to my laptop.  Either way it's their fault and the service I received was so awful I doubt I'd want to buy another again (if I do I'll use a squaretrade warranty instead), but it's either that or the fact I didn't have a sizeable business agreement with them.  I seriously find it (un)funny how people that get their laptops through their employer (or an employer affiliated offer) when the company they work for absolutely freaking huge have near zero issues with Dell, but those that don't seem to have never ending issues with support IME.
 
And let's be clear -- this was Dell Business I purchased through since that was the only way to get the Vostro line.  This was apparently their supposed high grade all US support at the time.