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Dell's Misleading Graphics Card Buying Advice
Barence writes "Dell's website includes a guide to graphics cards for PC novices which contains a dangerous chunk of misinformation. The monitor on the left, labelled as a PC that uses a 'standard graphics card,' is displaying a Windows desktop that's washed out and blurry. The seemingly identical Dell TFT on the right, powered by a 'high-end graphics card,' is showing the same desktop – but this time it's much sharper and more vivid. They're both outputting at the same resolution."
Yeah, but that difference is about an order of magnitude more subtle than shown on Dell's site.
The big difference is that in the UK and EU there's an excellent chance that this is illegal. Strange as it may seem, unlike the US we actually require adverts to be somewhat true - and not just by tacking on a timestretched disclaimer sped up to a garble at the end. For example, the Budweiser "Fresh Beer Tastes Better" ad campaign was ultimately sunk because fresh beer does not, in fact, taste better. Although the ASA eventually cleared the advert on the basis that Bud tastes so bad it actually becomes worse as it ages, the damage was done.
I would urge as many of you that summon up the enthusiasm to send a polite email to the Advertising Standards Authority. Since this portion of the Dell website is aimed at UK customers, they must abide by UK laws.
The ASA are actually one of the most capable regulatory bodies within the UK. I've been continually impressed by them demanding peer reviewed evidence from manufacturers to support their claims, and by the decent balance their provide when people complain about adverts that go against their morals/religion.
A few years ago I read that the average number of complaints to the ASA that lead to the advert people pulled was 1.3 . In other words they take every complaint on their merit rather than from public pressure. So if you think an advert violates one of the standards, there is a good chance you can get it pulled.
The badscience forum provides an excellent Activisim section that can help when constructing these complaints.