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Dell's Quest For Gaming Cool
Slate is running a piece looking at Dell's attempt to grab gamer customers via their acquisition of the Alienware brand. From the article: "Gamers want powerful computers, of course, but they also want stylish systems made by a company that they believe understands them. Dell's XPS line of machines certainly provides the requisite power. The PC giant's market clout earns it premium relationships with component-makers like ATI, Intel, and nVidia, often allowing it to be first to market with the hottest technologies. But devoted gamers have still stayed away from Dell. Halo obsessives are not IT managers: They ogle expensive, flashy machines ... and they buy expensive, flashy machines. That's where Alienware comes in."
The fact that the article doesn't even mention the AMD/Intel issue costs it considerable credibility in my opinion. I think it is definitely one of the primary obstacles facing Dell in this regard. Alienware had already gone outside the coolradar for many (including me) when Dell bought them, but its acquisition was like the final straw. "but you are the man". Exactly.
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
The main difference between an XPS and an Alienware machine with the same specs is not how finely the hardware is tuned, it is the software. Dell ships everymachine out with a bunch of crap software bundled, some of which trips off populare anti-spyware software.
Here at work we purchase Dell laptops for our sales force and the first thing we always do after receiving the machine is to reload the windows disk, but not the auxillary software.
Crufty software doesn't belong on work machines let alone a gaming system. Some of the software bundled could even be considered offensive to gamers looking for high performance computers. Why not bundle software that is relevant to your target customers (i.e. quickbooks isn't it).
My inner self is ineffable, so don't eff with me.
I suspect a lot of the folks that buy Alienware are comparable to those rich brothers-in-law who go on the family Canadian fishing trip and show up with all of the most expensive gear (tags still on) and need help from Grampa Joe (with his 30 year old fly rod, dental floss and bent paper clip) to set the tension on the reel.
Wrong. Pure and simple.
In the last week, Dell has been selling QUALITY machines for prices that you can't beat by putting together the components from mail-order-madness from PriceWatch. At the low end, you could spend $370 and get a "basic" machine with a 19" LCD and a licensed copy of Windows. After that, the "basic" computer is free. $1000 machines have been 40% off for weeks, with stackable coupons, free shipping, free 19" flat panels...you're paying $600 for a solid machine, great monitor, licensed software, home delivery, and A YEAR OF ON-SITE SERVICE.
The answer to most people is, in fact, Dude, you're getting a Dell. [And you're getting it at a good price, with solid features.]
It's the same reason you'll see advertisements for impossinly expensive products (say, a $25,000 watch) in magazines. It is put there to elevate the brand, so if someone sees the $400 version at their mall, they will be impressed. The same reason Hermes (or any other brand) makes a mint on severely overpriced accessories. Sure, you can't afford (or don't want to buy) the $970 blanket or the $570 enamel bracelet, but, hey, why not get the $90 scarf? Sure, it's a lot for a scarf, but it's a $BRAND scarf and that counts for something.
So what does Dell do? It makes a limited edition XPS 600 Renegade and sells it for $10,000. How many sold? Only about 31. And what does it get them? Tons of press. And lots of attention, much of it by people who've never heard of Falcon Northwest and maybe heard of Alienware one time they were at Best Buy.
So, in Dell's mind, it goes something like this.
Dad is picking out a computer for the family. He's getting it for his kid's homework and because Mom needs it. He'd like to play some games on it, but he's not sure Dell, the same brand he uses in his office, would work so well. After all, those work PCs are always so slow. So now Dad sees a comment about this Dell system in his local paper's technology section and he says, "You know, maybe Dell isn't so bad after all. I'll be OK with getting that."
Whether or not that thought process is actually carried out I don't think is a question. Whether it will be carried out by thousands of people, that's for Dell to find out.
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.
From a harocp article a few months ago, the Dell XPS 400 gamers rig wont run Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, Quake 4, or The Sims 2 because of conflicts with the bloatware.
After reading their out of the box experiences, and add in their additional customer support ordeal trying to remove the bloat, I think I will be staying away from dell and alienware for gaming purposes.
http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=OTI0LDEsLG hlbnRodXNpYXN0/