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No more plastic wrap, please

Environment submitted by falbert May 22

In the last shipment of computers I received I was shocked by the amount of plastic wrap used for items like power cords, USB cables, VGA/DVI cables. Do these items really need to be individually wrapped in a plastic bag. I can just imagine the tons of plastic used by Dell annually...

Something to think about 67 Comments »

Reseller Account for Small Business IT companies

PartnerStorm submitted by nathan13 Mar 26

Dell to start talking to the real small business base the companies that really support them. I would love to sell Dell hardware but I can only purchase it at the same price as my customers can buy it. Why? I can buy HP and FSC kit at a cost price and then sell it RRP and make additional profit. If the customer buys Dell I make no money :-) so I tell the customer not to buy Dell and tell it not as good as HP or FSC. So Dell lose money and reputation.

Simple create a reseller program and we will be all happy! :-D Comment »

New Startup Business Initiative

Sales Strategies, Small Business submitted by john_saddington 02/17/07

Dell should provide support for startup businesses and new small businesses, giving them discounts and specialized support. Imagine if every startup business knew that Dell would support them in their brilliant (and possibly audacious and crazy) goals? Dell would become their goto supplier!

Of course, an application process, board of review, etc etc would occur so as to weed out the not-so-brilliant ideas... But, otherwise, support the startups! 3 Comments »

acoustic server cabinets

Small Business submitted by juanzworld Mar 27

I have a rackable hardware at my home that makes just too much noise. Why cant Dell Design an enclosed sound proof server rack with cable managment and power strips.

Not everyone has a seperate room for their hardware.

Currently I found only 5 companies that make them but their all oversees. Dell get on board. I'm sure if you make it they will buy it.
If you like my idea maybe I can buy it at a discounted rate. 4 Comments »

XPS M1330 Laptop with Docking Station

Accessories (Keyboards, etc.), Small Business, XPS products submitted by matto 11/27/07

The XPS M1330 Laptop is a stunning laptop, but is also ideal for a lot of business people on the move. It's lightweight, it's thin, it's got a slot-loading DVD drive. Dell seem to recognise this by listing it as an option in the Small Business section (here on the Dell.com.au website at least). And they're right - it would be perfect for me, except for the lack of a docking station.

I use my laptop both at work and at home. I have a docking station at each location. This means I simply need to drop the laptop in, and straight away it's hooked up to the mains power, to my keyboard and mouse, to the wired network and to my secondary monitor. You can see how the lack of a docking station makes this process a lot more tedious. Fair enough - the keyboard and mouse can be replaced with bluetooth items, but there's still the network (no wireless at work), the power and the secondary LCD. This constant need to plug and unplug would soon take the sheen of an otherwise perfect device, not to mention the likelihood of damaging the delicate connectors with daily use.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who'd love to use the XPS M1330 for work, if only this one little problem could be overcome. I understand the challenges in packaging such a thin and light notebook, but I'm sure that greater minds than mine are able to come up with something!

I know I'm probably just a bit lazy, but the docking station really is one of life's little luxuries. I dare anyone who's used one previously to try and do without!

Thanks for the chance to put it forward.

Regards,
Matto :) 3 Comments »

Avoid Glare On Screens and Notebook Frames

Accessories (Keyboards, etc.), Sales Strategies, Laptops submitted by bobetsue 02/20/07

Glare and reflection from high glare screens, screen frames, and notebook computers is annoying and distract from function and use.

In stores, this may be a marketing ploy. Consumers may not fully understand the problem of glare. Online sellers like Dell should inform buyers when shopping whether the screen and case are "glare" or "nonglare."

When "nonglare" was introduced to television, shoppers considered it an advantage worthy of extra expense. In the art world, nonglare glass is considered worthy of extra expense.

How did we ever get glossy screens?

Dell should offer customers a choice between "glare" and "nonglare." 226 Comments »

switch to LED monitors

Monitors and Displays, Laptop Power submitted by yardsale Jan 16

I dont know why dell hasnt done this yet. switch all monitors on desktops and notebooks to LED. did you know that you can run an LED screen at full brightniess and it uses less power than a LCD monitor at the lowest brighting level?!? its cheaper, its energy efficent, and it needs to be done! promote this, if you demote i wanna know why! 46 Comments »

Use magsafe power connectors

Laptops, Laptop Power submitted by badblood 05/20/07 **UNDER REVIEW**

MagSafe power connectors, by Apple, are magnetic power connectors that pull out harmlessly when the cord is tripped upon.



They are very cool and quite sensible.





87 Comments »

Get GNU/Linux Machines in Retail Stores

Linux submitted by dpic Feb 14

Imagine how successful Dell's Ubuntu offering could be if just one Dell Ubuntu machine was put in retail stores. If people knew of an alternative to Windows, they would go for it! So what do you say, Dell? Why don't you try to put at least one of your Ubuntu machines offered in retail stores? 734 Comments »

Ubuntu Dell Repo

Linux, Service and Support submitted by tekhawk 07/20/07 **PARTIALLY IMPLEMENTED**

basicly a simple idea dell to support the ubuntu community a little bit by running a repo for its laptops and desktop if nothing more to support the software that they install on the system and to provide driver updates theses repos should be setup on the machines before shipping so that the users can get the driver updates quick and easy and offer driver on there for all the drivers that there are for dell machines that are support on linux not just the shipping lines

so that user might find that other machines then the ones you ship with ubuntu can easly be made into power ubuntu operating machines


As matt_d has said below, we have repositories for Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Fedora, Novell/SuSE Linux Enterprise Server, and a growing one for Ubuntu. Check it out here http://linux.dell.com.
76 Comments »

Stop Calling Me During Business Hours

Sales Strategies submitted by aikiwolfie 11/10/07

There are two thing i want to ask for in this idea.

1) Stop calling me during business hours. Every single time I need to contact Dell you always call during business hours when I can't take the call. I could be sacked for taking calls on my mobile while I'm at work. It's not allowed!

2)Make the process of extending a warranty less painful. It should be an on-line process with no telephone call required. Nobody called when I bought the PC?

Recently I tried to extend the warranty on my Dell XPS 700. For some bizarre reason this can't be done on-line. It has to be done by a sales person over the phone. It could be because i refuse to use IE or it could be I was using Firefox + Ubuntu.

From the sales agents accent I'm guessing he was calling from India. I personally found him very difficult to understand and he found my accent similarly difficult to understand. I do speak fluent English as my first language. But I happen to be Scottish and even the English don't understand us.

When the sales agent called I had just left work. It was 3:15pm. I was on a crowded commuter train and had to ask for a call back.

I'm still waiting for the call back.

The sales agent also started waffling something about a photo printer. I don't need a Dell photo printer. I just need an extended warranty! 5 Comments »

Continue to include good, flexible diagnostics...

Desktops, Service and Support, Software submitted by lordcobol 11/12/07

... on a bootable CD.
Our newest Optiplex croaked recently, with Windows saying it had encountered a problem and was shutting down to avoid making things worse.
I booted the diagnostics CD before calling tech support, and was able to tell them that we had problems with memory and cache. This likely saved *HUGE* amounts of time while tech support might have been telling me to troubleshoot a Windows problem, or a bad disk, etc. Things like this can make the difference between my generally good experience with Dell support, vs the complaints I hear elsewhere.

Windows-based diagnostics would have been useless, because we couldn't get into Windows at all.

What really scares me is the crummy diagnostics on the other brands I have recent experience with. I couldn't find any diagnostics at all on a recent Velocity Micro PC. Systemax used to include a bootable diagnostics CD, but you couldn't select which tests to run -- just crank it up overnite and check the results many hours later. Now I find only a non-booting DVD with a Windows-based "stress test" which lets you specify how long to run but nothing else. And like I said about Windows-based diagnostics.... The best non-Dell diagnostics I have seen were Gateway's, but sadly I had to run them too many times for too many problems, so Gateway and I are over.

Systemax & VM are better than Dell in terms of bloatware and power supplies, but I hesitate to recommend them to anyone who doesn't have his own diagnostics CD.

PS, the repairs went ok, and the on-site tech ran the same diagnostics to prove it. 3 Comments »

Start offering DELL products to the general public in Poland

Dell, Linux, Sales Strategies submitted by lukasz.wisniewski 11/12/07

According to today's local newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza [1], by 20th November, 11:30 to be more exact, Dell will just have manufactured their first notebook in Lodz, Poland. Unfortunately, even though I am inhabitant of this city, it is more than unlikely I will buy DELL notebook anytime soon.

Firstly, the current policy of your company in Poland is "Only for enterprises and institutions" (original in Polish: Tylko dla firm i instytucji). Such a approach seems to me to be more than just bizarre. Do you happen to realize Poland is something like 38 milions of your potential customers? Just for instance, in my city, there are two big public universities, several private ones - you see the universities but not the students. Is this of your concern? I guess not but Apple is already there offering discounts for students.

Secondly, start distributing preinstalled Ubuntu for Poland as well. I actually do not see the point why you do this in UK, Germany or France and not in Poland. People of Poland are more eager to install open-source products, just let me remind you that according to XiTi monitor [2] open-source Firefox browser has market share of 39.6% in Poland, whereas in Germany - 38%, France - 23.9% and UK just 18.7%.

Thirdly, by preinstalling Ubuntu I mean making it an option anywhere where there is an OS selection option on your website. I clearly see no reason in the world why you keep offering such a miserable Ubuntu notebook in Europe instead of something more powerful - Inspiron 6400n with Intel T2130 processor. In your opinion, how impressive is that nowadays?

Last but not least, DELL, please stop participating in this devoid of good sense campaign "Dell recommends Vista..." which is sarcastic. You really do not have to put down this sentence on your website as in Poland you force people to use Vista leaving no other choice.

Take all these remarks under your consideration unless it is OK with you that Poles should travel to Germany in order to buy your notebooks. Hear our voice, DELL!

Signed,
Lukasz Wisniewski
student of the Computer Science
Technical University of Lodz

Links:
[1] http://miasta.gazeta.pl/lodz/1,35136,4662983.html
[2] http://www.xitimonitor.com/en-us/browsers-barometer/firefox-july-2007/index-1... 53 Comments »

Plug and play laptop screen

Laptops submitted by badblood 10/30/07

Let us remove the laptop screen whenever we want and use it wirelessly. 5 Comments »

Allow Bluetooth option with Windows XP, even if it is not officially supported.

Broadband and Mobility, Inspiron products, Operating Systems submitted by aaronpau 10/31/07

Some computers (e.g. the Inspiron 1520) come with an optional "Built-in Bluetooth capability (2.0 EDR)" module. When choosing Windows XP and the Bluetooth option, the Dell compatibility checker does not allow you to go forward with your order. This is due to the fact that apparently Dell does not officially support Bluetooth with Windows XP anymore.

I am fine with being told that it is not compatible, but I still want to be able to make the order. I may eventually want to upgrade to Vista, at which time I want to already have Bluetooth support. Additionally, I intend to try to get Bluetooth to work in XP, given that Dell has drivers, and even a custom utility, designed specifically to get Bluetooth running in XP. 1 Comment »

Put a button on laptops to turn off the monitor

Laptops submitted by badblood 10/26/07

Put a little button or switch on laptops to turn off the monitor whenever you want.

Think about one to turn off the processor too, or even boost it.

Thanks 7 Comments »

Retain XP as an option

Operating Systems submitted by tadpole 10/28/07

For months I have been trying to configure a new computer; but I want to do it with XP, NOT Vista. Dell is making it so difficult for me to do so - virtually everything I want (I am a home user and rekatively inexperienced) is only available with Vista. I am so annoyed by this that I have complained to the European Commission's Competition Directorate, suggesting that Dell and Microsoft are engaged in a concerted practice, seeking to boost respectvely hard- and software sales. I cannot imagine that Dell's intention is to lose customers - look at PC World's recebt Vista-related profits drop - but if they continue to foist Vista upon those that do not want it, then this will be the result, albeit reluctantly, in my case. Please, Dell, make XP available as an option on ALL your systems. 18 Comments »

Make the choice of Browser Optional or make it Firefox or Opera

Sales Strategies, Software submitted by badblood 10/26/07

Let us choose our default browser:

Or make Firefox or Opera the default browser, because they are better than Internet Explorer.

Please stop forcing us to use sub-standard software

--------------------

I know this is a duplicate, but it is one of the most popular ideas and has been under review for such a long time that I wanted to put it up again.

I don't know about you, but waiting for an answer to this idea is getting annoying.

Bye 3 Comments »

Reverse Video

Servers and Storage, Laptops submitted by r.pelzer 10/26/07

Hi,

As a techie i'm walking around with my notebook to all kinds of server. Sometimes you want to look at a server, but there is no monitor availible.
Would there be a way to connect a notebook to the vga connector of the server and view the output on the notebook screen?

I would buy a new notebook for that option !

Cheers.

Rogier 27 Comments »

Allow user to disable automatic Dell backdoor hard drive password

Servers and Storage submitted by arlut 10/24/07

Lenovo Thinkpads (and BIOSes from other vendors) allow setting of the "User" and "Master" passwords for your internal hard drive (part of the ATA-3 security spec).

Dell only allows setting of the "User" HDD password, and automatically sets the "Master" password to some function of your system service tag - an automatic back door, in case you should lose your "User" HDD password.

I've verified that you can indeed unlock your hard drive with this alternate password by contacting Dell and simply asking a technician (verification of ownership is luck of the draw, depending on the technician you're speaking with).

Tools also exist out on the web to re-generate the Dell backdoor password automatically, rendering hard drive passwords ineffective on Dell notebooks.

Would be nice to have the option of setting a custom "Master" password, knowing the risks associated with losing said password (Dell - and potential data thieves - won't be able unlock your drive if you forget your password). 2 Comments »