My main computer died about a week ago, which is the reason for the lack of posting. For the record, it’s a Dell.
I’ve been using them for hardware fairly exclusively over the past ten years, ever since switching from Gateway back in the late ’90s.
At the moment, the building that I’m in has no fewer than eight systems with Dell logos on them. The last startup that I did was also Dell-powered, as was the last large-company job that I had.
In dealing with a number of large technology companies over the past years, a predictable pattern emerges:
1. If they consistently do well by me, I eventually become a huge fan of whatever service it is they’re providing. Back in the early Gateway days, I even had a Gateway-gamers community help mini-site that I ran on the side. (Hey, everyone needs a hobby.)
2. As do many other people. The company succeeds and ends up expanding considerably. Fans rejoice.
3. As a result, they end up needing to do That Thing They’re Good At on a much larger scale.
4. Eventually, they grow so large to where they can leverage their dominance by exploring new ways of maximizing shareholder value. Tragically, most choose to do so in ways that are harmful to consumers:
- incomprehensible telephone contact systems
- gimmicky partnerships that have a net negative effect on the customer
- decreasing value of warranty support
- lower overall quality of company support (never the fault of the people who actually talk to customers for a living - these people generally deserve unfailing politeness, regardless of how poor/frustrating the overall experience becomes - It’s the organization that’s failing them as well, hence this article’s title)
- shipping used products and components to unwary or unknowing consumers
- comically bad upsells
- I just gave you a chunk of money for a warranty extension and am paying you another chunk of money for a replacement part that will arrive in worse shape than the one I’m replacing. It has taken me three hours and seven department transfers to do so.
- No, I do not wish to buy a new stick of RAM, a larger hard disk, or upgrade to Vista right now. (At least we both found it hilarious that you had to ask those questions.)
5. People still use said service, but do so more out of habit, until Something happens that incenses them enough to find a replacement
- (Wonder what that could be…)
6. People find a new service to replace the old one, and the cycle continues.
Extending it out past technology, is this the fate of all organizations that have “won” their corner of the game?
I don’t think it has to be, but it seems to be a common sign of anyone operating a large scale business in the 21st century who has wholly failed to transition from a product company to a service company.
If I had one thing to say to any of them, in any industry, it would be this.
- Your product is, or will become, a commodity. It’s the service, stupid.
After having Dell screw up the fourth thing with regards to this particular repair, it occured to me that I’m at the same point with them that I was at with Gateway so many years ago.
Dear Dell,
Glad I could help make you a huge success in whatever microscopic way that I was able to. I did thoroughly enjoy evangelizing some of the cooler things you’ve done over the past years. Alas, it’s time we went our separate ways.
It’s not me — It’s you.
- Scott
Any suggestions for where to go next? Is anyone happy with the systems they buy, or are we down to buy-from-the-hugest, or build-it-yourself as the only remaining options?
Mac folks: I promise that I will try one just as soon as they give me the option to press keys like Alt-F to activate the File menu, and have accelerator support built in by default, or at least as something I can enable, system-wide. To some of us, saving files is hardwired as: Alt-F, S, and so on.
(Yes, my Mac-converted friends all laugh at me for this. You are more than welcome join them in doing so in the comments below.)
Kendricke said
April 22 2008 @ 12:07 pm
Though they had some customer service problems in the past (per internet searches), I decided to take a chance on CyberpowerPC after hearing how pleased a friend of mine was with them. Personally, I haven’t regretted the decision, and turned around and bought another one for my mother for her birthday.
On the office front, I’ve been seeing and hearing better things about HP these days. Their latest desktops have been fairly solid, relatively easy to work on or upgrade, and the prices aren’t unreasonable (especially if you don’t mind a refurb).
Naladini said
April 22 2008 @ 12:44 pm
Hey, give Alienware a try … oh wait.
Actually, I was pretty happy with my Alienware experience, but I haven’t had much interaction with their service folks, and I’m not sure how integrated it is these days with the Dell mess you’re describing. I’m still running strong on the Alienware I bought during the EQ2 beta, so I’m looking forward to seeing what else folks suggest.
In my experience with a variety of providers on the business side of things, the big-boys behave like you describe, but in a somewhat cyclical manner. If you’re seeing articles on the web describing how poor a company’s support is (particularly on less “technical” sites), they’ve probably already corrected the problem. From a business standpoint, it may be easier to deal with a company that specializes in service, and buys the hardware for what it is, a commodity at commodity prices. The catch is, that’s not always the cheapest equation on the market.
Vargen said
April 22 2008 @ 12:55 pm
Windows is more “keyboardable” by default than OS X is, I’ll give it that.
I do know there’s a way to turn on keyboard access to various UI components as a system-wide option, but I don’t know if it’ll support your exact key preferences. I always just use the ubiquitous command-s for saves and skip the menu entirely.
Brian 'Psychochild' Green said
April 22 2008 @ 3:15 pm
There seem to be a fair number of customizable PC companies online. I recently bought a desktop from a company called AVA Direct. They were a bit pokey getting the machine to me, but I’ve been relatively happy with it so far. But, a friend had some troubles getting them to troubleshoot a problem he had with a relatively obscure part of the computer (a “media center” option). On the bright side, there was a lot of options for customization.
On the laptop front, I’ve actually quite liked Toshiba. I had a monster desktop replacement computer for a few years. Rather durable, and it had a really nice, big screen. My better half got a tablet PC from them which has been really reliable as well. We have an “authorized repair center” nearby, too, which has given us prompt and friendly warranty service when we’ve had problems with either computer. It’s nice to be able to drop off and pick up the computer on your own terms instead of having to mail it somewhere.
My current laptop is a Dell, which I got on discount from a friend of a friend; however, from the stories I’ve heard, I’m rather glad that I have not had many problems with it. It has worked really well for what I wanted: long battery life and enough horsepower to do document editing and light gaming on the road.
Some thoughts.
Sisca said
April 22 2008 @ 4:07 pm
My last desktop was from IBuyPower because the guys at PC Gamer and Maximum PC were giving them good reviews. The first box they sent me died within a week but they replaced it promptly and it’s been running fine ever since.
I think if you want to avoid the same customer service frustrations you’ll have to find a smaller vendor. I know my wife had similar problems with HP so we refuse to deal with them anymore.
As for Macs, I’m using a MacBook Pro as my laptop now and loving it. I can do most of my day to day stuff in OSX and a quick reboot lands me in XP and it’s a fine windows machine. I know several people that have MacBooks that they use exclusively as XP machines. Oh, and most importantly it can easily play EQ2 and other games as well as almost any laptop out there
Zygwen said
April 23 2008 @ 8:25 am
When it came time to buy a new computer, I went with a local computer store this time because they could get me better components at a cheaper price. My last two systems where Dells and they have served me well. I might still buy monitors and laptops from them but it just didn’t make sense to get a gaming machine from them.
At work most of our computers are Dells. For a time we where buying from IBM instead but had nothing but problems with them. HP has been trying to get us to switch but our desktop guys haven’t been impressed.
Captain Angry said
April 24 2008 @ 5:57 am
Doesn’t anybody just build their own computer anymore? I am by no means the tuner-crazy overclocker type, but I just order parts by reputable brands off the web and build my own new computer every three years or so.
I recently built a 3.0Ghz Intel C2D with 4GB of ram and a Radeon 8800GT for about $750 after shipping. The cheapest I can price out that PC from dell today is $1179, without any kind of additional warranty.
I am my own warranty. I’ve never had a major problem with the PCs I’ve built; the parts either work out of the box or they don’t.
Obviously in the business world, when you need multiple workstations, you gotta go with dell or compaq but for your own personal PC, DIY is the way to go.
Pixhell said
April 24 2008 @ 4:39 pm
Check out GamePC (www.gamepc.com), they have always been pretty good to work with in my experience. They will build to order and will even do partial builds (for example you only want a mobo, ram and a hard drive, etc). WidowPC (www.widowpc.com) make some mean systems as well and come highly recommended by many. HotChip isn’t bad either but I haven’t used them in many many years (www.hotchip.com). Worst case buy parts from NewEgg (www.newegg.com) and build your own.
So far as laptops go … I dunno, MacBook Air laptops are really really nice, they run Vista/XP and most flavors of Unix just dandy. MacBook Pros are nice too if you need more umpf, and they run Vista/XP/Unix fine as well. I’ve had a MacBook Pro for a year and some now running Leopard / Vista with pretty much no issues. It’s a year old so it’s not the fastest thing in the world but I’m not using it as a primary development platform, I still use a desktop for all of that nonsense (laptop monitors are too small for art!). All in all Leopard is pretty nice (shhh don’t tell any of our friends I said that!).
There are a lot of UMPC models around now too that are pretty swank if you don’t need something ‘life size’. =)
The Hiram Key said
April 24 2008 @ 5:22 pm
Customer service sucks no matter where you get your merchandise from, and the reason for this is; everyone defines good customer service completely differently, and on their own terms. Your “bad” experience might be average for someone else, or even for someone who has had terrible luck, who would call it excellent.
Accept that Customer Service is going to be bad, and shop based on price, hardware and support agreements, much less dissapointment that way.
Phoenicia said
April 25 2008 @ 8:10 pm
I build my own — it makes upgrading components easier also I know what is inside. Too many companies give you junky or bottom line compnents or a nerfed OEM version.
Also I happen to like a big tower case and must companies want to sell you a half tower or a mini-tower. I just prefer to buy the components I want.
Also nowadays I believe if you buy a stock computer it comes with Vista preloaded and I sure don’t want to be saddled with Vista.
I still wish they made bigger cases to make them easier to work inside of !
Phoenicia said
April 25 2008 @ 8:19 pm
I build my own — it makes upgrading components easier also I know what is inside. Too many companies give you junky or bottom line compnents or a nerfed OEM version.
Also I happen to like a big tower case and must companies want to sell you a half tower or a mini-tower. I just prefer to buy the components I want.
Also nowadays I believe if you buy a stock computer it comes with Vista preloaded and I sure don’t want to be saddled with Vista.
I think having Vista installed is a BIG NEGATIVE.
I still wish they made bigger cases to make them easier to work inside of !
Brian 'Psychochild' Green said
April 27 2008 @ 3:18 am
I used to build my own computers. I was lucky in that my good friend and housemate at the time did hardware tech support, so it was a bit easier to get good help. Even with my latest machine, he helped me pick out the bits that would give me the best bang-for-the-buck.
The reason I went with a built system this time is because my time has become increasingly short and valuable to me. My last computer I spent a lot of time fixing a problem hard drive (Windows loaded fine, but if it lost power everything went out of memory and the hard drive barfed.) If I have a problem, I can still do basic trouble-shooting, but no more spending a week swapping in and out parts to figure out which one of the parts was bad. I spend a week waiting for the computer to get sent back. As a bonus, the company loaded up a lot of things that I would load myself; there was a pleasant lack of crapware on the machine, too, a big bonus over a lot of the other larger companies. The company also did a “burn in” test, so I knew I’d at least get something that’s been started up a few times.
I bought this computer so that I had a faster computer to work on a contract I was just starting. So, getting something that would let me get to work quickly was a huge bonus.
Thankfully, I still know enough about computers I can upgrade if I need.
In fact, I pulled out some parts in the new computer to test my old one when the video card died. :/ But, I was able to find the problem quickly!
Some further thoughts.
Moorgard said
April 27 2008 @ 5:10 pm
We use HP systems at work. They seem to be working out well.
Our initial purchases were Dell laptops, but after a couple poor service experiences we stopped ordering from them.
Babs said
May 3 2008 @ 6:34 pm
From the dawn of computers I’ve been a fan of building things my way so I get the best components at the best prices. It then only takes a couple of hours of breaking fingernails and cussing out the location of JP23 before I have a killer computer that’ll far outlast the hardware wars. All you young folk with your USB ports and Bluetooth…you’ve no excuse for not building your own =P
So naturally my advice is to hit up Tiger Direct and newegg.com and build the system of your dreams.
Babs said
May 3 2008 @ 6:36 pm
By the way, you’re absolutely friggin’ right about SERVICE. More power to you, Scott!
Winter "Winwin" said
May 4 2008 @ 9:19 am
Oi… My hubby and I stick to newegg.com and Tiger Direct like Babs recommends. And ya… I’ll never buy a Dell again based on the service alone. ^_^;
Danowolf said
May 14 2008 @ 7:32 am
Found you because of eq2 flames story.
I use Dell and have found the Precision line with their separate tech support line is best. If your pretty demanding in your expectations pay them the extra bit of money for the Gold tech support package its worth it.
Wonder what line of product and level of support you’re paying for?
Btw this is my first chance to say thank you for all the work you did on EQ2. I play all the time and think it’s an amazing piece of work!
Dan
Noah said
May 25 2008 @ 5:30 am
Falcon Northwest has never done me wrong.
Seen in May at Kill Ten Rats said
June 2 2008 @ 9:03 pm
[…] about (the apparently nearly most influential person in the MMO world) Scott Hartsman on being organizationally broken? Bonus chance to hate on Dell, if you like. I have commented previously on an outsider’s view […]
Andric said
July 6 2008 @ 11:04 pm
For usiness I’d say HP are doing pretty well atm.
For personal - building your won is best imo or get a friend who knows how to do it for you.