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80

Stop recommending Vista

80 points posted to by steveoc 11/20/07

One of my workstations died last week, so I quickly got to work on a replacement box. 5 year old machine, worked fine 24x7 for 5 years straight, and one of the capacitors was now ready to pop on the motherboard. RIP workstation.

I stopped by dell.com to check out the offerings, as I wanted something reliable, good value, and a quick and painless sale. Fortunately, Dell have many good products that fit these simple requirements.

However, the blatant and cheesy Microsoft 'recommendations' all over the site made me feel insulted. Im there to buy DELL hardware - NOT Microsoft software. I dont care about Microsoft, and I dont see why I should have to put up with seeing THEIR adverts all over YOUR site.

In the end I gave up, grabbed the car keys, and headed into town where I just bought the bits and prices that I needed to get the old workstation running again (new mobo, CPU, RAM). The whole exersize took a few hours, most of which was trying to find a park on a busy friday arvo, but basically the whole experience was pleasantly free of Microsoft adverts, so I didnt mind.

There was no sign on the parking meter saying 'Adelaide City Council recommends Vista', so I was happy to put money in the parking meter.

At the computer shop, I wasnt the only one with the same idea - the computer shop was absolutely chock a block full of people, all knowing exactly what they needed, and queuing up with armfulls of componennts and the cash to pay for them.

The computer shop had rows and rows of motherboards that were just advertised as motherboards - NOTHING there about Vista.

I grabbed a cheap dual core processor off the table, an AMD X2 4000+ for next to nothing. The packaging described it as a 64bit dual core processor, which is exactly what it was. Not a Vista processor - just a processor, which is all I was after. On the table next to the hard drives I noticed a big stack of free PCLinuxOS CD's with a simple note 'Operating System - Try Me - Im Free'. Nice work !

The RAM sticks I bought were just RAM sticks, not Vista sticks. Thats all I wanted, and so thats all I got.

I then drove back to work at the airport, where the signs all refer to airlines .. not Microsoft Vista. There is nothing at the airport about Vista, thank goodness. Put the workstation back together, booted up fine (into gentoo linux) .. and there was no mention of Vista anywhere in the BIOS boot messages, grub, or the linux kernel.

What is there not to understand ? A computer is a computer is a computer. It is not a Vista machine, its just a computer. We the customers want computers, so why cant you just sell us computers ? Whats with all this Vista nonsense that is not in any way relevant to what we want to buy ? Why should we have to drive into town and do it ourselves just to be free of Microsoft advertising ?

We, YOUR CUSTOMERS, are not stupid incompetent fools who need to be hand held and offered 'recommendations' for things that we honestly do not need. We are quite capable of making our own decisions about what software we need to do our jobs., and quite frankly, our choices with regards to software are not your problem.

Can you please stick to your core business and just offer us great hardware deals, and let us worry about how we use your hardware, without the inferred insult of a Microsoft 'recommendation'.

That would be awesome - Thank You.

matthew2142
11/20/07		 and it;s not dell's falut it crashed its yours..
jorge
11/20/07		 Well I'd expect Dell to at least push it self in the website theme, how about switching all that Vista hype to the new Dell products on offer?
steveoc
11/20/07		 Huh ?? When did I ever suggest that it was Dell's "falut" that one of the capacitor's on the motherboard had passed it's use by date after 5 years of excellent continuous service ? It wasnt even a Dell machine that I wanted to fix, and I never suggested that it was. I only mentioned that part, because it creates the frame of reference that "Hey - Im in the market for some hardware", after which I had a look at what Dell had to offer.

I then describe how the 'customer experience' of trying to buy hardware from Dell quickly turns into a package deal of hardware + (unwanted) software .. and then compared that to what is happening in plain sight at one of many computer shops. On any day of the week, these shops are full of willing buyers who are spending big on hardware, but not with Dell. Why ? Maybe its something to do with choice, value, and not being forced into spending money on unwanted bundled software.

For the deductively challenged - I was simply making the point that Dell's market is not entirely made up of incompetent and uneducated people who need recommendations on things such as operating systems. After reading the comments above though, I may well be mistaken.
steveoc
11/20/07		 correction : jorge slipped in something sensible after I started that reply. My faith in humanity is somewhat restored :)
sugarbear
11/20/07		 Bravo, steveoc. I agree with what you are saying. But Dell and any other manufacturer is going to advertise Vista. That`s what comes from Microsoft partnerships.
steveoc
11/20/07		 sugarbear: too true, they are in 'partnership' with Microsoft, although its pretty much a one way affair.
Dell might recommend Vista, but I don't see Microsoft recommending anything from Dell. Thats the sort of 'partnership' that you have with that hot cheerleader who decides every week at the last moment which guy she is going to the movies with.

In general, those sort of 'partnerships' don't really benefit anybody but the cheerleader at the time. Funnily enough, when you meet again in 10 years at the school reunion, that once hot cheerleader has put on 100lbs, is still single, and has 3 kids in tow from different dads. Not so popular anymore .... And that pretty much describes Microsoft today.

In the civilized world, it is in extremely bad taste to present what is essentially a paid for product endorsement as genuine opinion, without clearly labelling it as 'advertisement' for the more gullible readers in the audience. Bad taste may well have been in vogue back in the 80's and 90's, but these days a little bit of honesty at the corporate level buys a huge pile of credibility with this new internet-savvy audience.

Nobody genuinely believes that Dell thinks that Vista is such a great product. Everyone understands that those Microsoft recommendations are simply endorsements that Dell is paid for. I just think that in this day and age, Dell would earn far more credibility (and business) by being honest about it .. just ditch the whole bad partnership thing and replace the wording :

"Dell recommends Vista"
with:
"Dell used to receive the sum of $XXX,000 per month to push Microsoft Vista in this space, but we really couldnt care less about what you run, since our gear is good enough to run different systems equally well."

The market has grown up, Dell's pitch to that market should grow up with it.
premcv
11/21/07		 Good Idea, steve. But I wonder...
sugarbear
11/21/07		 M$ partnership with any one is one sided.
premcv
11/21/07		 It is always One-sided!
winoffice
11/21/07		 Considering the fact that XP will soon be cut off Dell should prepare to recommend Vista (as it being the only Windows available version after June 30 2008) now, instead of not recommending it now and then being forced to recommend it. Besides, how will Dell sell Windows if they do not recommend it? If they REALLY want to sell Windows (Vista that is) after the cutoff of XP then this idea will not be implemented until the next version of Windows appears.
matthew2142
11/22/07		 by then vista will be stable..... if you dont believe me, why dont you stop complaining and learn to do research before installing vista on a system that doesnt even support it ijn the first place!!! and use old old software and old old hardware with it!
winoffice
11/22/07		 I agree with matthew2142. Some people just blindly choose Vista without doing any research on what hardware and software is supported! And then they start to complain and request that Dell stop recommending Vista.

Besides, steveoc talks about nonexistent "Vista hardware". Just becuase Dell recommends Vista software does not mean that they recommend "Vista hardware". The city not recommending Vista is natural because Vista has nothing to do with a parking meter. It is not surprising that Dell recommends Vista though, because it has to do with computers and Dell makes computers.

I think that steveoc and others on IdeaStorms unfairly scold Dell for recommending Vista. After all, I never saw anyone scolding Dell for recommending XP!
sugarbear
11/22/07		 I totally agree with you winoffice. And would add, would they like Dell to advertise Windows 95 or 98Se perhaps. You advertise the OS`s that are available and used now.
johnpro
11/25/07		 If you want something that will not let you down then buy a Lenovo PC.
 
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