HP Buys Compaq

MaxVlast was the first to report: "The New York Times is reporting that HP is buying Compaq to form the second-largest computer company (after IBM). Wow."

Comments

Re:Interesting...

[El_Nofx]

Gateway sucks becuase...

1. On March 25th 1999 they changed their entire warranty program and it resulted in the vast majority of computers being purchased with a minimal warranty that forced customers to PAY for service after 90 days / a year if they wanted support. There went 20% of the buisness

2. They went from the company that targeted the enthusiast and gamer, Only placing ads in computer magazines to targeting the first time home user from Stinkwater Alabama. Targeting these people was a mistake in it's self for any computer company. Any computer the first time users buys especially one with windows 98 or Me on it will crash almost hourly and all the problems will not be blamed on faulty ms software and 18 itmes in their startup, it will be blamed on the once good quality computer company. The companies rep's got sick of listening to Joe Bob from Stinkwater yak about his problems and stopped caring. The service went down hill and Gateway lost all it's repeat buisness, which made up about 65% of it's total sales.

3. They never diversified their products.
They tried but it never worked, they offered gimics like the ASTRO (imac rip off) and the profile (laptop on a stand), neither of which went anywhere. They got rid of their best line of computers, the Destination, which offered 36 inch moniters and wireless periferals in '96. They tried to sell servers and workstations but noone bought them because they were crap.

P.s. I just quit working for gateway after 3 1/2 years. best move I ever made

Hp and Compaq will be successful if they can trim the fat and start competing with Dell and IBM. Or else Dell will own the desktop, IBM the server and MS the software

Jerry Ford is a nice guy but he played too much football with his helmet off - LBJ