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Michael Dell Says Windows 7 Will Make You Love PCs
ruphus13 writes "In a recent talk at the Churchill Club, Michael Dell addressed several topics, including the fact that Windows 7 is poised to take advantage of the upgrade cycle. Dell has always been a strong MS OEM ally and it is now hoping to cash in again from the impending upgrades. From the post: 'Dell made plain several times that he sees the installed base of technology as very old, and sees a coming "refresh cycle" for which he has high hopes. "The latest generation of chips from Intel is strong, particularly Nehalem," he said, adding, "and Windows 7 is on its way." (The operating system arrives Oct. 22nd, although Microsoft's large-volume licensees are already getting it.) He pointed out that many business are running Windows XP, which is eight years old. "I've been using Windows 7 for a long time now," he said, "and if you get the latest processor technology and Office 2010 with it, you will love your PC again. It's a dramatic improvement."'"
I can't put my finger on it, but loving my PC seems narcissistic somehow.
I've been using Windows 7 for a long time now, and if you get the latest processor technology and Office 2010 with it, you will love your PC again. It's a dramatic improvement.
Microsoft Windows 7 Professional Full - Retail: $299.99
Cheapest Nehalem Processor: $279.99
(note, can't buy Office 2010 yet)
Latest Office 20xx: $399.95
Total: $979.93
So Michael Dell, the CEO of the company that is the largest dealer of PCs to businesses and individuals, suggests you opt for the extra grand in order to 'love your PC again.' You don't say. I would be shocked if anyone was willing to fork over more than $900 for an entire computer these days. How am I to differentiate this from any salesman saying, "Buy the most expensive one for the best experience."
My work here is dung.
All my Dell boxes run Linux.
It is a well know fact that Michael Dell uses Ubuntu exclusively at home, and only trots out the pro-Windows stance when paid to by Microsoft, so none of this should be taken seriously. Not that anyone sensible would take anyone saying 'Windows is good!' seriously.
It seems if you run a Vostro (like me) Windows 7 might not be your friend if you want your touchpad and video card to work.
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7itprohardware/thread/cf9bc301-e3c2-4c5b-b9cd-9eab8582f45f
Or maybe they will fix it in the next week, but I doubt it.
hmmm.. the figurehead of one of Windows' largest distributors, probably a company hurt the most by lagging sales of the last product, says that you should buy the new one because it's all better now. Conflict of interest, anyone?
For a /. geek, what does Windows 7 have that's *really* useful/desired/cool vs. Windows XP? Not trolling, just haven't had the time to install it/play with it yet.
body massage!
I don't think Office 2010 could make me love anything but older versions of Office.
Translation - Buy stuff from me. I won't sell you poison again, honest. You can trust me and my stuff is less bad than last time.
Kinda funny that Michael Dell supports Win 7 being neighbors and all with Billie Boy. What I find interesting is that Win 7 still can't run 64-bit well. Still have wacky affinity issues, one processor will be pegged out and nothing on the other cores. I agree with mbone (558574) - "All my Dell boxes run Linux". Except I have never bought a Dell nor have I recommended anyone else. Linux Rox the soX of Win 7. Its amazing that it takes Micro$oft 6 years to what the Linux, community can get done in 6 weeks. I will always hate Proprietary pigeon holes that say throw money at your problem and fixit Microsoft has never impressed me, except starting to release OSS..............Guess that is why are most phones going the android way because Proprietary is DEAD and always has been in my eyes.....
Thanks Michey I don't want a Dell & Win7 thanks but no thanks.
W7 is a great product and all, but the penguin and Steve Jobs came along while MS were faffing about trying to fix Vista, I've already switched and I enjoy it far more now with the fruit thanks!
Sorry too little, too late!
you'll love your PC, does he mean the same love that gynecologists give their patients?
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Revenue Q2 2008: $14,147m
Revenue Q2 2009: $10,623m
Profit YTD 2008: $1,400m
Profit YTD 2009: $762m
Yeah... If I was Michael Dell, I'd be working to sell the idea that Windows 7 is going to make you love a PC too. Especially if you bought a lot of other expensive shit.
i recently installed win 7 (move up from XP) and I can't say im loving any of it. The thing makes my head hurt. They've changed enough of the setup to make it a real pain to perform basic configurations and system mods.
I'll keep using it but my i'll stick to XP and my macbook for being productive.
...much like Ike loved Tina (or Chris loved Rhianna for our newer readers).
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
My experience with Dell is that the company is tricky. I try to avoid Dell because for me the company does not make a good business partner, which is the relationship you have when you buy something technologically complicated from a company.
Quote from the story: "He pointed out that many business are running Windows XP, which is eight years old." [Should be businesses.]
That's a bit tricky, in my opinion. There is no migration path directly from Windows XP to Windows 7. If you are using Windows XP now, it is necessary to re-install ALL your applications, and re-configure ALL your settings. For us, that easily takes 40 hours. Windows XP has had a VERY high cost of ownership for us, and here we go again. Microsoft did not want to finish the work, apparently, and provide a way to convert automatically from Windows XP to Windows 7.
Also, Windows XP is not 8 years old, in my way of perceiving the matter. Windows XP was very troublesome until service pack 2 was released on August 25, 2004. So XP is actually 5 years old, because that is the date of what could be said to be the first release candidate.
It doesn't matter how old an OS is! We are not in the OS business. We are happy with what works for us.
In our experience it is better to buy components and build our own computers. The inside of a mass-market computer is amazing. Everywhere costs could have been cut, the components have been made a little cheaper, and sometimes a lot cheaper.
NFM
While I agree Windows 7 is a leap forward from XP, I think Intel are going to struggle to get people to see Nehalem as the same category for upgrades. The Nehalem processors (and the associated required DDR3 RAM) are significantly more expensive than the Core2Duo processors, without providing any noticeable benefit for the vast majority of users. Unless you are a gamer or into heavy video/photo editing, the current Core2Duo generation is more than sufficient to outperform your needs. Ironically Windows 7, by running better than Vista on lower system requirements, will actually hurt Nehalem sales, by breaking the "software bloat"-"hardware upgrade" cycle
After installing Windows 7 (started using it at RC level, I think), everything just feels smooth. It actually made me want to use Microsoft's included products for everything. It definitely has more appeal to me than OS X now.
Disclaimer: I am not affiliated in any way to Microsoft or its subsidiaries. I just really like Windows 7.
Here's the problem: Windows XP, for the majority of normal use cases, works. There is no business case for spending the kind of money necessary to upgrade everything, just so that your CEO can have "that big task bar".
I upgraded to a decent middle/upper home built and overclocked system with a cheap video card when Vista was first released. Using it mainly for gaming and serving virtual servers and frankly besides a newer video card I don't need an upgrade.
I usally did the 2.5/3 year desktop upgrade cycle but I can run modern games with high graphics on a 21 monitor, and don't see a need to upgrade that. Windows 7 is suppose to running faster then Vista, if I decide to upgrade, and I can run multiple virtual machines with memory being the problem.
There is no need for average consumer upgrade if they have purchased anything with a dual code processor, and since a new windows upgrade was a major money point for Dell in the past they must be running scared and you can expect them to make comments like this.
I have first hand experience. I've used Windows 7 RTM, and office 2010 technical preview I can honestly say that this advice is nothing more than a joke. In fact the 'type mismatch' errors that Autodesk Inventor throws up when syncing to Excel, make me lean more towards hateful feelings. Win7 / office 2010 are good and expensive, but i don't see how they are justifiably better than XP / office 2003/7. The love inducing factor comes from Michael Dell rubbing his grubby mitts together.
And I say that Micky D can fuck off. Who's right? Only time will tell...
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
8 yrs and XP still meets all our needs.
They always say the new features will change the way we do things but they never do. Collaborative features only go so far and 80% of what spreadsheets are used for was available with VisiCalc. Word still unexpectedly screws up bullets, lists, line spacing etc. There will be some new auto-correct feature that wastes time until the hidden option selection is found to turn it off.
It seems that we have to pay a lot of money to do the same things with new software that requires an expensive upgrade/rollout cycle for both the s/w and supporting h/w.
At least there is a reason for the h/w upgrades: after five or six years notebooks, keyboards etc are getting pretty beat up. Also energy efficiency has improved (LCDs vs CRTs, better CPUs).
Mostly, we would just ignore Windows 7 if we could, even if it is nifty. Vista passed by with hardly a second glance but there are difficulties with getting more than two major versions behind.
Oh well, I guess most people out there do much more than email, docs, spreadsheets and file transfers. I'm sure they really are thrilled with the new offering. We're just stuck doing mundane business to earn a living. Sigh.
I wonder if the window theme has changed: move the close to the center and make it an O instead of an X. Or... arbitrary spline curves to shape the dialog boxes instead of boring rectilinear crap. Note boxes at odd angles, like on a desk, instead of all of this horizontally aligned s**t.
A whole new class of system calls.
Yeah that would make things better.
That Dell PCs and laptops bought in last 3-4 yrs should run Windows 7 so well that people don't need upgraded hardware - all they do need is better support from Dell for the existing hardware.
/. will have at least 1 anti-Microsoft story today. They have to counter this story.
This is true, the rule is that the Universe will tip off the end of the stick it is spinning on like a plate if ./'s front page is ever pro MS for more than 24 hours.
I'll love Windows again when they switch to LF for newline, '/' for file separator, and ':' for path separator.
Go green: turn off your refrigerator.
I put 7 beta on my Dell E1505 laptop when it came out. Problems ZERO I wiped it, put RC1 on the same laptop when it came out. Problems ZERO I put the release version on the same laptop about a month ago Problems ZERO. (I'll be at the store on Oct 22 to buy it). XP, when I installed it, had issues that were not resolved with bluetooth and wi-fi until SP1) XP, I loved you, but, it is time to give you up. Win7 installed, found 100% of my hardware and has had absolutely NO problems. I just built a new home computer, to replace my 6 year old P4 HT processor. The new box is a Intel Quad core 2.66ghz, 4 gig ram, 500GB hard drive & an Nvidia 9800GT video card. Win7 found 100% of everything and set it all up perfectly. After I got everything set up, installed AV etc, the first time I connected it to the net, it found "updated driver" for the chipset, sound & video card, installed them all perfectly. The only mod I made was to install the new Nvidia video card driver. It even found my Hauppage TV tuner and set it up PERFECTLY. Win7 is a BIG improvement over XP. XP was a BIG improvement over windows 3.11
hello,
I have been running XP since it has been available as a beta....
Why change? Ihave 4GB of ram and no swap file, I never fill up that much ram... why do I need 64 bits?
with the latest intel core, my office 2003 run fast and snapy, and is consistent with every other window app that has ever been (menus, easy to find functions, text in the menuallowing me to lear keyboard short cut for functions)... the latest "ribons" are slow, and do not help me learn how to work more efficiently...
sure, a win7 desktop looks like a peice or art... but is that what we want of our PC? or do we want a functional tool?
using old style theme (win95) gives small window border that are a clear demarcation line from window to window, allowing to separate multiple windows with no confusions!
XP is a hammer, it works, it is efficient and fast.
Win 7 is a glass hammer, it is pretty, but try to put a serious nail in and you will run into troubles...
regards, cyrille
I don't think I've ever wanted Windows less having read that.
"Dell has always been a strong MS OEM ally and it is now hoping to cash in again from the impending upgrades." Wow, so we can expect a unbiased opinion then? PREPARE FOR SHPIEL!
"Dell made plain several times that he sees the installed base of technology as very old" which is to say, people are not fond of buying Vista packages "and sees a coming "refresh cycle," for which he has high hopes" and that Dell is planning on making plenty of money off this, after Vista's disappointment.
"The latest generation of chips from Intel is strong, particularly Nehalem," So technology advances then, yes? Took some long-term observation of the industry to determine that factoid, I'll bet.
"I've been using Windows 7 for a long time now, and if you get the latest processor technology and Office 2010 with it, you will love your PC again." So you buy Windows, but you'll need a new computer (let's face it, the majority do not know what a CPU is) and hey, whilst you're there, why not buy a new version of Office for the giggles? "It's a dramatic improvement"
Improvement over what? Being able to carry out tasks 95% of which we did 8 years ago on hardware with perhaps, oooh, 50% of the capacity of modern tech?
You'll have to excuse me if I'm not enticed into reading the article after that. I've had quite enough of reading about tech. going backwards.
Do you see what I did there?
...if you get the latest processor technology and Office 2010 with it, you will love your PC again. It's a dramatic improvement.
Ok, I'm a graphic designer who often works with photoshop files that are 500 meg or larger (files in the 1 gig+ range are not uncommon at all). For me, having a fast processor, a lot of ram, and the other bells and whistles that go along with it will make a "dramatic improvement" because we're talking about a massive file and long processing times for each action I take. When you're using Office - you know, a word processing program, a spreadsheet program, and a presentation program - you shouldn't need the latest and greatest. Sorry, but I just feel that needing the latest and greatest so that you can "love your PC again" when all you're using is an office suite just might be a sign that the office suite is bloated well beyond what is required.
My two cents. They're Canadian cents so take 'em for what they're worth, eh.
Lets hope so because I plan to wipe my XP 32bit install in my gaming rig (which should have been done 6 months ago) and perform a clean install of Windows 7 when my disc arrives. It'll be nice to actually be able to USE all that RAM I have installed in it for a change.
Tell me again why I need to upgrade? Oh yeah, I'm missing a bunch of DRM. And I can't run the latest IE. Hmm... that's a shame...
Jesus told him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me. - John 14:6 NLT
Has he borrowed Steve Jobs' Reality Distortion Field? :D
I use Windows Vista (at least I do when I've somehow broken X on my Linux install) and I don't see why people hate it so much. Almost all hardware comes with compatible drivers these days, I have a reasonably powerful mid-range desktop with 4GB of RAM and I'm used to logging in as root every 5 minutes so the "are you sure" messages don't really bother me. Given all that, I think Vista is a good operating system (although I did upgrade to it directly from Windows 98).
Can someone who has used Vista extensively and tried Windows 7 RC let me know if it's actually very different from Vista or is all the "it's so much better than Vista" hype just a reaction to the now accepted (but I argue ill-founded) view that Vista sucks? From what I can tell it seems that Microsoft slapped a new wallpaper on Vista and called it Windows 7 just to get away from the name Vista.
So if this is the future...where's my jet pack?
... which runs Slackware.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
and if you get the latest processor technology and Office 2010 with it, you will love your PC again. It's a dramatic improvement
The idiocy of the "Office 2010" remark aside, that's one scared man.
What's the point of saying anything as the CEO of a company when everyone who listens is thinking "yes, this is just him talking as the company, so well biased"?
Those who would slavishly follow what the COMPANY wants anyway will listen but there was no need to say something in that case. And everyone else will consider the source and ignore it.
So if what the CEO says is always and necessarily expected to be not his personal opinion but what the current incumbent of the CEO post of that company would say to make that company profits, there's no point talking at all.
"Dell made plain several times that he sees the installed base of technology as very old..."
Ummmm... There are people who still run mainframes. I imagine alot of them are relatively old but they just work. Why would any organization want to spend money, introduce risk and give them unneeded headaches to put in something new and shinyshiny?
Sorry, Michael. Sometimes other people's bottom lines don't mesh with yours.
Sanity.html - Error 404 not found
If Michael Dell said that Windows 7 would cause you to hate your computer. This is not news, it's propaganda.
If I buy myself new hardware with a spanking new top-of-the-line CPU and just re-install Windows XP, then I still get to see "a dramatic improvement".
That's not due to the version of Windows I dump on it, but the new hardware which happens to be a lot faster.
The TRUE question here is, do companies want to upgrade their CURRENT hardware, just to be able to run a new OS...
Essensially he is saying that Windows 7 will force lots of consumers (and companies) to upgrade. Which is good for him. But this is not love. (Buying "love" is otherwise called prostitution.)
Bring back the menu bar, the task bar, the simple start menu. Adding more layers of spam to the user interface doesn't make me happy. Simplify, simplify, simplify...
Same pig, new dress.
The difference between Canada and the USA is that in Canada healthcare is a right and gun ownership is a privilege.
and you WILL use all that memory you bought.
Obviously, Windows isn't ready for the desktop...
I *knew* it. They're using mind-viruses now.
[signature]
Instead of B.S.-ing us re: Windows 7 how about laying off fucking with the FDIC & U.S. housing market?
http://housingstorm.com/2009/10/is-the-fdic-killing-short-sales/
Windows is good? That isn't allowed on /. RAWR!
Troll article is a troll.
*SCHLORP*SCHLORP*SCHLORP* "Is that how you wanted it sucked Mr. Ballmer?"
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Since i started using Linux full time the need to upgrade for each new version of the OS has disappeared. I do upgrade when a new fun game or applications comes out that can use the hardware but upgrading for the sake of the OS is just stupid. Movie editing made me buy a new computer for example.
Dell should be focusing in getting more applications out that drives upgrades, not an old servicepacked Vista with new shiny colours. Its as exciting as wet bread because once you scratch the surface of Windows 7 its all Vista behind the curtain.
Dell is hurting themselves in the long run by letting the OS take away all the processing power leaving nothing for the applications developers to use.
HTTP/1.1 400
And he really, really needs you to buy his PCs. Any reason will do.
Take out a loan and buy two or three. Encourage your friends to do the same. Encourage strangers, too.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
is the only thing that will make me "love" pcs
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The box makes such a good target at the firing range.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
In 2007 Michael Dell said that Vista will win out in two years. It's 2009 now.
OK, MS dumps millions -- tens, maybe over a hundred million, anyone? -- into antipiracy efforts for Windows 7. I'm talking direct work on Win7 to stop piracy (activation codes, backend infrastructure, employees, coding specific to Win7, etc).
We know it won't stop piracy, although we don't know if it will slow it. And then they turn around and price the product at outrageous prices, which only serves to punish and/or discourage the users who would purchase it and encourage fence sitters and experimenters to pirate it.
Why not price it much more generously and make it "one" product versus many, with installation options for multimedia, and make "home" a mode or something?
I'm thinking single copies at maybe $50 and five license packs for $150. I think they would probably sell more, and in the long run probably *make* more versus dumping a ton of money into antipiracy efforts and then pricing it sky high.
Michael Dell recommends Windows 7 Ultimate Edition.
(I figured there was a requirement that statement appear anywhere Dell is involved, based on the last several catalogs I've received from them)
#DeleteChrome
How much do you think Microsoft paid him to say that?
Also, I've used Windows 7 a little trying to test it against some of the crap I have to support and I find it better then Vista. But That is like saying getting kicked in the head is better than getting kicked in the nuts.
Life is too short and too important to { take seriously | use windows }.
Given that /. isn't representative of the world, there are still lots and lots of posters here who have realised.
'poised to take advantage of the upgrade cycle' .. or time to get back on the upgrade wagon again. You need a computer with twice the power and costs twice as much to do the same as what you did last year.
Some of the amenities are nice - the Explorer changes (mostly done in Vista) are very helpful, but at the same time the Explorer interface now takes up much more room than it needs to. The only thing I actively like about 7 is the new taskbar -- but even that has its frustrations, primarily that it's not friendly for running applications that are configured based on command line options. An example is java -- while it recognizes java apps that you "pin" as JRE-based, it loses any additional information/parameters when you attempt to launch a jar file from the pinned menu. Another is putty, which lets you specify a parameter controlling startup profile, but this is not available to pinned instances.
All in all - it is definitely better than Vista. Whether it's better than the XP-based configuration that Dell is talking about... I think that's very much up for debate.
If you have a laptop and hop around, Windows 7 actually has a good wifi manager. XP and Vista suck at wifi.
Actually just today I got a free copy of Windows 7 ultimate from Microsoft's marketing launch events, for which generosity I'm very grateful. It is a little out of character for me to be saying these things since I've been (and remain) a die hard UNIX & free software fan for decades. I've been running Win7 since the Beta was out several months back either in a VM or on a test PC, and generally I'm pleased at its overall stability, usefulness, and benefits. Functionally I've ALWAYS considered Windows as sort of a dumbed down toy compared to UNIX being a developer and not being able to 'live' without routine use of bash, emacs, diff, grep, od, ssh, g++/gcc, growisofs, sed, awk, find, sort, less, tracker, tcpdump, iptables, ... and hundreds of other things for which there is often no easy / built in equivalent on Windows. On the other hand like it or not there are lots of tools / programs from Visual Studio to video games, photoshop to office 2007 that don't run well or at all under UNIX, so pragmatically I need the ability to maintain a Windows environment too.
The thing that has me changing from being hopelessly disgruntled about the incompatibilities, non-portabilities, lack of lots of powerful UNIXish tools / utilities on Windows, et. al. is that the new generations of OS capabilities, applications, PCs, et. al. are starting to directly or indirectly evolve to ameliorate what's lacking in one environment versus the other. More quality programs like Firefox, Thunderbird, OpenOffice are cross platform. Many useful utilities are web applications or are increasingly becoming portable via the use of things like QT, CLR/.NET/Mono, JAVA. Though it isn't bash, I think MS has a good thing with PowerShell 2.0, and it is powerful and compelling for its own virtues; FINALLY it is part of the OS!
Dell was right, modern mid-range PC hardware does give new reasons to love one's PC for someone like me (who is harder to please than the average user). Now a commodity PC with 4GB or more or RAM and a dual core CPU is mainstream, and most support 64 bit computing and virtualization. It is nothing difficult to just run a responsive and almost fully transparently functional copy of LINUX in a VM underneath Windows Vista/Windows 7. Conversely it is no problem to run a copy of Windows in a VM under LINUX, though given difficulties with GPU virtualization, et. al. that's not a good gaming solution, but works well for most other desktop application uses. Though they may be INCOMPATIBLE, at least they can start to COEXIST NICELY, which is wonderfully better than the days of dual booting or having multiple PCs just for that purpose.
I'm impressed by what's going on with CLR/.NET in 3.5, 4.0, and the better added support of Python, Ruby, F#, C#, et. al. under the CLR, as well as the fact that there's at least some useful amount of cross platform portability of such programs to UNIX via MONO, albeit 1-2 years behind the cutting edge functionality on the Windows platform in some cases.
Adding multiple CPU support, multi-core support, well supported 64 bit support to Windows in Vista/7 lets people run Windows effectively on fairly powerful systems and not be so limited by OS limits that were plaguing XP 32, Win2k, et. al. in times when LINUX 64 was readily available and vastly more powerful for high end workstation / server support.
Somewhat cross platform GPGPU / HPC solutions like CUDA, OpenCL, BLAS / LAPACK et. al. give promising capabilities for improving computing, DSP, media processing, et. al. dramatically in the era of Win7 but also benefit LINUX. Windows centric solutions like DirectCompute / DX11 offer similar though less portable benefits. In any case things like multi core CPUs, multi-GBy of cheap RAM, virtualization, big screens, better multi-monitor support, powerful and inexpensive GPUs, 64 bit OSs do give lots of reasons why Dell is right and that a new era of software / platform evolution is upon us and will provide lots of new "killer applications" and user benefits
Does Michael Dell mean he is intimate with his PC? If so, then Apple will have a new commercial, John Hodgman clothed as a Dominatrix over his business suit. Now that I think of it, that was more knowledge than mankind should know.
The more they promote W7, the more wary I become. Maybe MS thinks the problems with its products are not bugs, and shoddy design, but customer perception. Maybe they are trying to build a Steve Jobs reality distortion field sans Steve Jobs. Two problems: Balmer is not Steve Jobs, and Apple, in many cases, lives up to the hype.
photosMy Photostream
Seriously. What do you expect Michale Dell to say? That Windows 7 is crap? Why is this marketing drivel being reported on Slashdot any way?
Participatory Governance : The only feasible option for a real democracy, where everyone really does have a say.
There's a reason I left the PC in the first place, it was not an abundance of love.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
..assuming they're running Mac OS X or Ubuntu.
Really?
When you consider that way back in the 1980's, people were shelling out upwards of $2000 for a new computer, what makes you think it's so "shocking" that people would still pay over $1000 for a new system in today's dollars?
Although the market has been flooded with "entry level" systems starting as low as $300 or so, that doesn't mean everyone has decided there's no reason to spend more. And although I realize the cheap PCs have been great from a standpoint in getting more people on-board with using a computer at home, they've also resulted in lower standards across the board. I, for one, am tired of the garbage that passes for a power supply out there. You've got the same problem as cheap, imported car and home stereo equipment, where the wattage ratings mean nothing. I can remember when you could pull a power supply out of one of the original IBM AT machines and it might say something really low, by today's standards, like an 85 watt rating. Yet you could add a bunch of power splitters to the thing and hook it up to a FAR more modern system that needed at least a 250 watt power supply to run, and it would still power it! These days, you get power supplies with a 450 or 500 watt rating that conk out if they're asked to output more than about HALF of that rating!
I'm equally tired of the way manufacturers cut corners on things like cooling fans (cheap sleeve bearings, so the fan quits spinning after a year or two, risking destroying far more expensive components), or sourcing the cheapest motherboards they can find that have the ports and connectors they require. (Again, where's the real savings when your new machine gets flaky and starts refusing to power up half the time, risking all your important data?)
All of this (and shoddy software!) are reasons I've been "loving my PC" for years now by switching to higher-end Macs. Yep, they cost more.... a lot more in the case of the Mac Pro. But I've had practically NO headaches or hardware issues. (My first Macbook Pro portable did arrive DOA, but it was swapped immediately and its replacement worked great. Even there though, the things were shipping direct from a factory in China. Back when people were conditioned to pay more for computers, all the way around, these things would have still been assembled and QA tested here in the USA.)
Yes but now they're in Windows. That's the point and I'm sorry you don't get it but it is pretty nice.
It's one thing if you can work with linux/bsd/osx/foo on the desktop but for those of us that can't, or don't want to, Windows progressing is only ever a good thing.
As far as the cost is concerned, there were numerous pre-order deals available and if you're a student or MSDNAA eligible you can get it for free or cheap as free. I picked up W7Pro/XP preorder for $80 iirc, and, not that I'd use it, it came with a vista license too. Some of my co-workers picked it up for $30 just because they had a .edu e-mail.
--- Do you believe in the day?
or some free copy because i sure as hell am not going to spend money on it if i decide i dont like and/or dont want it, better consider that, do YOU want to spend a large sum of folding money on an OS that you might not even like and end up being just another ignored CDrom on a bookshelf gathering dust?
Linux is still FREE!
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
" and if you get the latest processor technology and Office 2010 with it, " Haven't we seen this movie enough?
Again?
What a bunch of hype.
Your average Pentium-4-class Office PC running XP is all the average office worker will need for years. There is no compelling reason to upgrade either the software or the hardware simply because it was bought 4 or 5 years ago, and running an 8-year-old operating system that went through 3 service packs in the interim is no issue. Upgrade the RAM, blow the dust out of it, and wipe the system with a fresh disk image is about all such a machine really needs for a "refresh". Regular office workers don't need Nehalem-class CPUs or Windows 7 in order to run Word and Excel. Oh, and here' s one word that also makes it a big waste of time and money: retraining.
If office workers were re-encoding video or playing games, maybe it would be justified, but that's more a case for refreshing home machines than work machines.
SP3
Dell sucks?
/problems/ with the Dell we received as a gift (no, I would not have bought one myself, I would have assembled something better for the money)... memory going bad, not enough power coming from the power supply to support the components factory-installed, having to endure a totally "behind the scenes" re-rooting of Windows on reinstall which makes sound drivers a nightmare to set up properly. When I was in college and had days at a time to hack on a driver problem, that was fine, but I work full time now -- I'd like my PC to /work/.
I can't help but agree with the comment above dating XP at 2004 (w/SP2, when it finally became the relatively stable platform we know today), and everyone rapping M. Dell for simply marketeering... but furthermore, I have had
In spite of all these difficulties, I already "love" my PC... all that Word 97 goodness was all I ever really needed in terms of wordprocessing power and the changes that came with Office 2003 were essentially polish. Does anyone else out there love the fact that Office 97 apps come up in about 0.25 seconds even on a P4?
This is the exact kind of "joke" that rightly annoys women from getting more involved in technology.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
In other startling news: car makers say it's a good time to buy a car, NASSCOM claims the US needs more guest workers, and Apple claims you will love the new iPhone.
... because the "old" hardware is very capable.
It is a waste, Microsoft should be working to make the software work better in the same hardware, they should not be allied with the hardware manufacturers to ensure they force you to do artificial upgrades.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
How many "betters" are there?
Do you realize that saying something is better is something entirely subjective?
So bar a few improvements required to use newer hardware, there is actually nothing else.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
When you consider that way back in the 1980's, people were shelling out upwards of $2000 for a new computer
When I started college in 1998, the package I got from Dell totaled close to $4000. I got a top-of-the-line P2-400 system with a 19" CRT monitor and a color inkjet printer.
Businesses will go volume license /.
I see statements like this all the time on
I would just like to point out that most of the companies in this country are not big enough to bother with a volume license. If you have 25 ppl or less, it doesn't make a lot of sense unless you are a heavy MSFT shop or a development house or something. For the average sales business, copier business, dry cleaners, mechanics, or whatever.....they are not buying volume licensing from MSFT.
All of this to say: the retail prices matter. LOTS of business have no other choice than to pay retail. They just aren't big enough to do otherwise. And I can speak from experience when I say MSFT is losing MAJOR ground on this front. Over the years, they have managed to make it harder to do business with them. So lots of small companies are switching to free solutions. The same is just now beginning to happen with MS Office and I expect that trend to continue.
You know, I have been a Dell customer for a LONG time. I typically buy about 5-10 PC's each year for my small company. Up until 2008, they have all been Dells.
This past year, during Vista, Dell quit selling Windows XP. I can't remember how long this went on before the market forced them to sell XP again but it was several months. During that time, it was impossible to get XP on any machine that Dell sold. No exceptions.
I remember talking to our account exec about XP and flat telling her that we could no longer do business if they only sold Vista. So we parted ways and I bought from another vendor. I have never, and will never, forget that conversation or these circumstances. Dell decided to "play the Vista game" and now they are paying the price. Plenty of business customers told Dell the exact same thing I told them but they continued to force Vista on people despite our calls for XP.
Sorry Michael. I went to school down there in Austin so I hold Dell close to my heart (even worked there for a few years during Win 95/Win98). But I can not buy from you after Vista. You chose not to give your customers what they wanted and now that they have revolted on you, you come back to beg. You should have had the guts to stand up back then and perhaps you could have helped your customers. Instead, you chose the party line and that's a shame.
It is no surprise to this observer that numbers are way down. That is what tends to happen when you stop serving your customers and instead, only serve your suppliers.
The best part is that they're only eighteen years behind Apple. Give 'em another ten years, and they'll re-build WIndows on a Unix foundation.
OK, now I have a good reason NOT to buy a Dell computer! bb
You don't need a mac to have a well built PC, I build my own desktops and in comparison to a Mac it would cost nearly 2x as much. Which is silly because I have higher quality components in my own desktop.
Remember when he told Apple that they should shut down and return investor's money? Yep, I'd venture to guess he is talking out the same orifice when he praises Windows7. I'd put Apple's Market Cap up side Dell's any day.
photosMy Photostream
I mean, really, why upgrade at all if you are an average user?
If you are on Windows using XP, what is the real motivation? Anything that came out in the last 5 years, hell probably 10 years is plenty beefy to do just about anything you do - surf the web, email, docs, spreadsheets, etc.
Computers have gotten to the point of appliances for many people. If your dryer is still working, do you go out and get a new one? Oh yeah, that new lint filter came out, better "upgrade"!
The only remaining reason would have to be lack of sceurity patches for older OS versions. But then again one might have to ask how secure the current crop really is.
I already love my PCs, all of them, and they're all running Linux of various flavors, devices, and duties (and two of them are dual-booting the Win7 RC...*may* go buy a full copy when it comes out, depends on how much use it gets which currently isn't much). Right about every person I've ever put Linux on a system for says the same thing, if they ever switch back it's because of some necessity (like certain software for truckers for instance).
I don't want to have to "love my PC," I want my PC to love me back. Every time I use Linux (and remotely, sometimes, when I use a Mac) I get an experience that I am not fighting with it, that it wants to work with me and help me do whatever it was that I wanted to do. Every and I mean EVERY single time I use Windows I get the impression it's a system that doesn't like me, doesn't want me to touch it, and I had best follow its rules or else it will make my life absolute hell.
I understand Dell wanting to sell systems since after all that's what they do but seriously that kind of message is not helping.
"Just a fox, a whisper."
Hmmmmm can you please provide any more info on how to get it dirty cheap with a .edu e-mail address? I work in my college, so it would be damn nice to upgrade things here!
Dell made plain several times that he sees the installed base of technology as very old, and sees a coming "refresh cycle," for which he has high hopes.
While the ultra-rich have been largely unaffected by the current economic situation, the people in the middle are being very badly hurt by it. Guess who the overwhelming majority of people who would by a new computer simply because their older, still responsive and functional computer was merely "old" are? That's right, the middle class.
He can have all the high hopes he wants, but people aren't going to be rushing to replace their 1-3year old computers this Christmas simply because Windows7 is going to be out. While there are a lot of old computers out there, a lot of them are like the ones I have sitting in my closet right now; laptops from 5-7 years ago that I turn on and use for particular projects/tasks.
For the most part most people on slashdot are not the target audience, and most people who will ever touch Windows 7 will get it the same way they got XP, etc. with a new machine. Given the current economic environment, I doubt very many "consumers" will be part with hard earned cash for a PC they don't need at present.
it will be interesting to see what the conversion stats are once we're beyond the initial release though.
@Work we have had a genuine landslide from Linux, Vista, and XP to Windows 7. Everyone wants it, and it seems everyone are happy after switching. Try to believe it: Microsoft got something right for once.
You see, it's not just about base technology. 7 feels snappier, nags less, looks better, and has several of the utilities completely rewritten. They are small things, but small things are what counts.
I have to say that I was skeptic myself too, but after being a Windows 7 user for a week now I wouldn't even consider Ubuntu or any older Windows anymore. And that's with 3 years old laptop by the way, I got significant performance boost by upgrading.
I don't think we've reached some kind of "technical satisfaction plateau" for PC's such that we don't need to upgrade every 3 years. Rather, laptops and netbooks are keeping the hardware requirements lower than they otherwise would be. Bloated software will not sell well on laptops and netbooks, which are are growing market, and so vendors keep things under control. They simply no longer target fresh-from-factory PC's as their performance guide. Portable devices changed the rules.
Table-ized A.I.
yeah, a new processor, new office, new windows...THEN i wont get viruses, huh?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
I LAUGH IN YOUR FACE DELL
be more specific. I have been running Win7 on my Vostro 400 desktop and it works superbly. Perception is about twice as fast as Vista ever was (came pre-installed) and all the drivers were discovered. I really actually enjoy using a windows OS for the first time in a very, very long time for my day to day work.
I don;t care if it is really 'Vista SP2', they could call it Mac OSXI for all I give a shit. It works, well and I have yet to have any kind of crash or hang (I've been running since RC was out and then reinstalld the full ultimate version a few weeks back from MSDN).
there is one complaint.
The pretty-good calendar that was in vista is gone. They want you to use their 'web based' apps now. So I am using Sunbird which has come a long, long way since I last looked at it.
Don't knock it before you try it.
Regardless of soundcard, and regardless of settings, Windows Vista and the last Windows 7 beta I used (though this was some time ago now, around December last year) had absolutely awful sound quality, when compared to XP or Linux. It seems that the mixer and all the other parts of the sound engine interfere with the sound causing it to lose fidelity and bass to the point where I could identify a Vista machine in a blind listening test. Has this been fixed? As a musician it's kind of important...
The Geek - always - quotes retail list.
For parts.
Call it the system builder price - if you are inclined to be charitable.
Dell's consumer product is the OEM system bundle.
Which - coincidentally - is pretty much the whole of the consumer PC market. Heathkit died about thirty years back.
Dell will gladly sell you any flavor of OEM Office.
But the chances are really quite good that your employer supports Microsoft's Home User program, or that you are eligible for academic pricing or other discounts.
You said, 'Business users don't "Upgrade" operating systems in the classical sense anyway. When it's time for an OS upgrade, the disk gets nuked and re-imaged.'
We are BOTH correct. In possibly every business, there are computers that are clones of each other, and there are computers that are very specialized. The accounting department needs a variety of special accounting programs. Administration needs a copy of anything installed anywhere else in the business, so they can manage the work of other people. Marketing needs image editing programs and page layout programs. The specialized images have perhaps hundreds of configuration differences. It is VERY expensive to develop all the specialized images again.
We might not want to do the work of developing the specialized images again immediately, especially if everything is already working well. We may be willing to move the more standard computers to Windows 7 by developing a new standard image. But, if we do that, we MUST update the specialized images, also, because we can't economically support two operating systems.
So, the fact that we can't just move all the special programs and configurations from Windows XP to Windows 7 automatically tends to prevent or delay our adoption of Windows 7 at all, because the cost of developing specialized images is so high.
Of course, the fact that it is extremely expensive to migrate programs is entirely because of the design of Windows. Apparently to accomplish copy protection, Microsoft designed Windows to put data and files in lots of places, making it very difficult or impossible to just migrate a program.
Also, in our experience Windows XP was not really ready for normal use until service pack 2 was released and installed and tested for more than a month. Before that there were terrible problems with imaging, for example. Sysprep had bugs. Windows has been crippled by Microsoft so that it cannot copy some of its own files!
Many people say Windows Vista was NEVER ready for general use. Many people say Windows ME was NEVER ready for general use. So it is reasonable, in our opinion, to wait to install Windows 7 until other people have experienced all the bugs and pain and expensive hassles. Microsoft has a history of releasing VERY buggy software.
Or maybe we will wait for Windows Really It's Amazing This Time, the version after Windows 7. There is no hurry.
Apparently Microsoft has always realized that if the company released one good version of Windows, most people would never want to "upgrade", particularly when "upgrades" also include methods of making Windows slower so that people and companies will need to buy new computers. Microsoft has always been much more attentive to the needs of the big computer manufacturers than to the actual users, in my opinion.
"Never do upgrades, it's the best opportunity to clean the trash out of the registry."
The best way to avoid Windows registry problems may be to use Linux.
The registry trashing problems could be easily fixed by Microsoft, if the company wanted to do that. For the apparent reason Microsoft doesn't fix the registry trashing problems, see the New York Times article Corrupted PC's Find New Home in the Dumpster. Corruption and vulnerability to malware is apparently very profitable for Microsoft and its main customers, who are computer manufacturers.
WIndows 7 is just patched Windoze Vista. Time for Dell to grow up and come up a linux distro OS for their own PC. Wndoze is still a POS.
http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?sduid=0&t=1562761 is the slickied thread, there's an in-thread wiki if you're not familiar with sd. It's only good for one person/one address, but I suppose if you ply students with free sodas you could get a bunch of keys.
--- Do you believe in the day?
Features (that I could see in 1 hour of use) - - A bit better then XP, a lot better than Vista - New splash screen - Start button lights up with lots of colours - Can't change the start menu to XP style Overall, please stop ramming Windows 7 down our throats, if it really is that good let it speak for itself.
Seems that /. slowly becomes one of that paid Windows fans site.
I work for a government body. I was new to the job and our dell rep offered us a M1000 and two dual M600 ~3Ghz blades in a mirrored sas 72 GB hot swap config. "Try it. BTW, we don't want it back!" It came with 3 Yr pro support etc.
We tried it for like a couple of days, and comparing this to a proper HP C7000 chassis at twice the price (actually, a proper HP blade centre with FC4 ports is a LOT more expensive) is much much better value. The dell stuff sits unused in the corner now, until we can write it off.
This led to us placing a $220,000 HP blade order within weeks of looking at the dell crap.
Unfortunatly, I do have a Dell E6400 laptop, but I am not responsible for desktops!
http://www.writeitfor.us - Writing IT for the IT generation.
I've been running Windows 7 on my Dell Mini 10 Netbook for around 5 months now and I've been very pleased with it. I wouldn't have tried putting Vista on the thing at all with the 1 gig of ram it has but Windows 7 doesn't give me trouble really. I enjoy it more than Vista by far. It just seems more agreeable (if that's possible when talking about an OS).
My Xbox Live Gamer Card
Way back in the 1980's, a new computer that cost $2000 wasn't useful (to the average person) for much more than spreadsheet applications and the occasional Pac-Man knock-off.
Today, a $500 computer will let you store/edit/manage an enormous quantity of photos/music/videos, play most games, run any full-fledged office suite, and access any website, communicate with anyone across the world, and so on. Only users with rather specialized needs (read: gaming or professional use) would want to shell out any more than that for a decent new workstation. Part of this price reduction is due to the improvement of technology and manufacturing processes, part of it is due to the economies of scale. There was a time where selling 1 million computers was a considered a massively improbable success. Now, a computer which doesn't sell a million units is considered a failure.
Unless you you have more than one or two hard drives, most desktop computers will consume under 100 watts. This has pretty much always been the case. The reason you see power supplies now with ratings of 450W and up is more due to marketing wonks trying to push the numbers on their features bullet-list. A desktop computer which actually consumes anywhere near that amount is more appropriately referred to as a "space heater".
These days, you still need to pay attention to what you buy and take/send it back to where you bought it if it doesn't work.
I love this. I read it so often on Slashdot: "My $preferred_corporation always makes perfect devices! Except for that one time I bought one and it wouldn't power on straight from the factory. But other than that, they're sooo reliable!"
And nobody would buy them because they cost too much. I'll tell you right now there wouldn't be much of an I.T. industry if an average desktop computer was still priced at $4000. (Today's equivalent of $2000 in 1985.)
Okay, okay, I'll get off your lawn now.
1. Buy a Dell machine with Ubuntu pre-installed
2. Love it.
3. Profit. (Well, not for Microsoft, anyway.)
... I'll not be buying machines with Intel processors.
Last thing in the world I need in my machine is a built-in hunk of big-brother remote-sniff-and-poke hardware between my processor and its network port and other I/O. Peek and poke UNDER the operating system and out of its control or view. "The Matrix Has My Laptop." Worse than the Blue Pill virtualization hack.
Look up "Intel AMT" and its subset "CIRA". (My tinfoil hat spun clear around when reading THOSE documents.)
And how do I know it's disabled? The proprietary BIOS TELLS me so? Yeah, right!
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Linux made me love computers; Windows made me hate Microsoft.
Windows 7 makes me like Windows. It's a good product.
(And it's always-on, too, even if the machine is "turned off". Great for battery life in a laptop.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
That people aren't comfortable with Linux isn't Linux's fault.
In less than one year the Win 7 Beta/RC went on from nothing to capture a 1.5% share of the global desktop.
OSX 10.5 with its impeccable UNIX roots took 3%.
Vista holds about 20% of the market.
Linux simply seems to have run out of gas. Top Operating System Share Trend, OS Platform Statistics
Linux's part of the bargain is complete.
The bargain is never complete until you make the sale.
I actually had no friends, since my interests were obscure and unsharable.
You don't say. Think it might somehow be connected with talking to yourself, too?
Just a few responses:
1. Most modern systems *do* draw a lot more than 100 watts because of a power-hungry 3D video card. Yeah, some systems are just going to have cheap, integrated Intel video or what-not ... but any of the PCIe or AGP cards out there are going to bump up the power requirements considerably. Furthermore, people want some "headroom" so the expansion slots can actually be filled with cards, without exceeding the limit of the power supply. (What about that TV tuner/PVR board someone had their eye on, for example?) And don't forget the firewire or USB devices that get their power from the system.
2. As for devices not living up to their stated ratings, it's not always a case where it's obvious enough that you can just "return it if it doesn't work". More often, the stuff works for a little while, before either burning out (outside the return window from the vendor who sold it to you!). Or it delivers power outside the normal, allowable ranges, shortening the life of the components until your motherboard has blown capacitors on it or you've had 2 premature drive failures you can't explain, all inside of 1-2 years.
3. I never said Apple made "perfect devices". But within the realm of reality (where ALL electronics components have a certain failure rate, no matter who assembles them), their products have been quite good. Receiving 1 "DOA" item, while frustrating, is far better than it dying after you've already started using it a little while and invested time putting all your software and data on it.
4. I think the I.T. industry would be doing just FINE if personal computers were priced in the $1000-2000 range today. That would still put them in at a price point as low as 50% lower than they cost in 1985 dollars. But more importantly, as people get more practical use out of a computer today, the up-front cost is more justifiable. Everyone I know has data on their PC that's worth FAR more than the system itself cost! So why "cheap out" on the hardware and put that at risk?