Question: Name something which used to interest me whenever I saw it but which now I toss into the trash without even being opened.
Give up?
Answer: The most recent catalog from Dell.
Some background… I bought my first Dell in 2000. It was an Inspiron (laptop) 5000 running Windows 98SE. Windows 2000 had just come out but they were still pushing Win98 for “Regular Users.” I sent it back in a few days for an Inspiron 7500 with Windows 2000. That machine is still functioning, running Windows XP SP2, maxed out on 512MB of RAM. It has some quirks, for sure, but it’s almost 6 years old and was considered a “medium” (i.e. not high end) computer in its day. I think that’s pretty good.
I have another Dell, a desktop, which I bought basically to handle several large hard drives I bought. It works well too. I have bought and recommended Dells for family members (always recommending they get the service contract for as long as possible…although this routinely dismays them as they had hoped to get a computer for $300.) I have purchased about a dozen computers for use in places where I have worked. If I added it up, I would assume that I have directly contributed to the purchase of at least $30,000 worth of Dell hardware.
This is the important thing to note: I haven’t been particularly disappointed with any of it. I have had, overall, a very positive experience with Dell, even when it has taken awhile to get problems taken care of… I don’t think my experiences have been all that much different than they would have been with any other vendor. There is no ideal vendor, not Dell, not Gateway, not Apple. Here’s one example: after my Inspiron 7500 was well out of warranty, the hinges wore out. I called up Dell tech support to find out how much it would cost to get it fixed and determined that it wasn’t worth it. Within an hour after hanging up, I got a call back from Dell telling me that I was eligible for a one-time free replacement of the hinges on my laptop. They even paid for the shipping both ways.
All of this has given me a more than passing curiosity about Dell’s offerings. In fact just last year I purchased a 21" monitor for home, I use it as a TV and external monitor for my laptop. It’s lovely.
So hopefully it is clear that I have been a customer, and a pleased customer, and a repeat customer, with Dell for 6 years.
Why then, did their latest offering spend only seconds on my fingertips from mail pile to trash pile?
Simple. It can’t run Mac OS X.
Now don’t dismiss me as an Apple freak just yet.
I know what I am doing when it comes to maintaining Windows XP. I can avoid spyware and viruses, so that was never my concern. It’s harder to describe than that. It’s the number of “little things” that were hard to do, or harder than they should have been.
I made the switch to Mac OS X two years ago, and have never looked back. Was it the “Switch” campaign? Not really. Yes, first I had an iPod. Yes I’m a halo effect. But in all that time there has been one program which I have not been able to replace: ACT. There used to be a Mac version, but it has been discontinued. No other program (on Mac or Windows) that I’ve found will let me do the things that ACT can do. I’ve been using it for a long time, and it has a version for Palm OS.
Now there are problems with Mac OS X, and some stupid things. I agree with one reviewer who said it criminally stupid to charge extra for QuickTime Pro. But overall, the things that are wrong and annoying with OS X are not nearly as bad as what’s wrong and annoying with Win XP.
More importantly, the things that are right with OS X are very compelling.
Michael Dell doesn’t see Apple as competition. For all my good experiences with Dell (much more extensive than the average person, I’m willing to guess), a Mac running Parallels ($80 software that lets me run Windows inside of Mac OS X on an Intel-based Mac) has completely obliterated my interest in Dell’s catalog. What used to get thrown in my bag to be read the next chance I got now goes in the trash.
Either Michael Dell is very arrogant, very stupid, or pretending not to care.