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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."
... using words like "misleading" and "unfair." It's fraud, plain and simple.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
There is no such thing as a "standard" graphics card
I can barely read this article, I better get a new video card! Shameless comes to mind.
Maybe Dell is comparing the VGA port of onboard graphics vs. DVI/HDMI of a discrete card. I do notice a difference between VGA and DVI on a 17" monitor.
Why don't they put two naked chicks fondling the expensive card monitor behind it . . .?
And Roseanne Barr behind the cheapo one . . . ?
Then I would know which one to buy!
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
I can't remember what software it was, but it included samples labeled "8-bit" and "16-bit" to demonstrate the difference between 8 and 16 bits/sample audio.
I assumed the 8-bit audio file was deliberately made noisy and grainy, because it sounded much worse than the 16 bit file downsampled to 8.
It's still funny how in some product descriptions and user reviews some flat display is described to have "sharp picture" even though that's equal for all of them. (Of course the VGA input might weaken it, but that's not the main point here.)
Dell’s page says that its picture is for “demonstrative purposes only”
Dell should rephrase it and clearly state that this is for "promotional purposes only" instead.
Most people understand the black bars as being due to the shape of the image
Not exactly as accurate as knowing the difference between aspect ratios, but close enough
This video is in this shape, but the screen is in another shape so if I make it fill the entire screen it will get distorted. Easy enough to explain
So complain to the FTC, or to competitors who sell lower-end graphics chips. This is what truth in advertising is for.
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
the images look the same on my low end graphics card. I guess I should upgrade.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
This is an OptiPlex, intended primarily for business-type customers and not available on Dell's "Home" section. The likelihood of a novice user stumbling to this is low.
Not saying it's fair of them, but still--and their "help me choose" pages are rarely representative of the actual choices, anyway (this being an exception, except it's misleading).
R.Mo
Images shown are for demonstrative purposes only.
My theory is that both displays are actually showing a bird's-eye view of a Windows desktop, as rendered by a redstone emulation of an X86 processor. The visual difference is because the worse card needed the "Fancy Graphics" and "Smooth Lighting" options turned off.
A company is using deceitful tactics to attract unsuspecting customers! News at eleven.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
Are we sure this isn't an overreaction? Maybe they're simply trying to show the difference between VGA and DVI/HDMI to laymans in a way layman can understand?
Large corporation uses FUD and misinformation in an attempt to generate more revenue. Film at 11.
They took it down shortly before the reporters got to it, this was what it looked like before: http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/8082/dellimage2.jpg
Anonymous Coward
From the look of the two monitors on the 'example' page, it looks like they're showing 27 or 30 inch monitors. If that's true, then the comparison of the 'low end' Radeon 3450 at a max of 1920x1200 to a 3470 or higher with a max resolution of 2560x1600 (the native resolution of a 30 inch monitor) will look something close to the example photos.
Not labeling the examples with the types of cards used, resolutions, sizes, etc is close to unconscionable for a business computer comparison / assist site.
The funny thing is that even if that's true, then the lowest end baseline integrated intel graphics chip would match the high end in display resolution, and therefore, sharpness on any monitor Dell sells.
Is this really worth any kind of discussion?
The people who would be fooled by this, would not have the capacity to adjust their monitor settings in Windows, let alone possess the skill necessary to Photoshop an image's brightness and contrast.
So you're saying it's okay to defraud people if they're ignorant?
Here's a tip: everyone's ignorant about something. In fact, everyone's ignorant about most things. You know enough to spot the fraud in the Dell ad, great, good for you. But I guarantee you that there are people working very hard to part you from your money who will do their best to find the gaps in your knowledge -- and they will find those gaps, because you have just as many of them as everyone else does.
Normally, when (not if, when) that happens, people will be sympathetic. In your case, they'll point and laugh.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
It's advertising, and because we know better about monitors, it's clearly not for us. But think of, say, laundry detergent commercials. The latest always makes your clothes whiter and removes more stains than the "leading brand". Well, the commercial has been the same for 50 years. And so have the detergents, more or less...
All that matters is the warning at the bottom. Think of cigarettes. They kill you, but as long as they told you so.
Dell super video is much good. Much much gooder than standard picture. Definition is very high! Don't buy cheap standard video!
Buy Dell video, I rating A++++++++++! Very happy very sharp picture!
Maybe Dell is comparing the VGA port of onboard graphics vs. DVI/HDMI of a discrete card. I do notice a difference between VGA and DVI on a 17" monitor.
If the monitor is a flat panel and its native resolution is not VGA, or an exact multiple of VGA, then the image can appear blurry. Every play an old fixed resolution 640x480 game on a modern flat panel?
Most people care about the results, not the specifications. Indeed, most people don't understand the background information required to understand specifications. So the marketeers have to simplify things. Which is awfully hard to do when you're talking about a static image on a website, which would make low end video appear on par with high end video. So they simplify things.
Do I agree with that simplification? Not really. Do I understand that simplification? Absolutely. After all, even though it is fraudulent in the purest sense of the word it is relatively realistic when you are talking about real time rendering of 3-D graphics.
And the sad part is, I remember when Dell didn't have to resort to cheap tricks to sell PCs. Speccing in non-standard and substandard parts, plus rolling over for every sad business brain-fart has destroyed that company. Such a pity, at one time their Just-In-Time business model was seen as a something of a wonder.
Try a new tactic. Go back to doing what made you successful in the first place. Put on a black turtleneck (if you must), and inform your customers that while their money means a lot to you, you simply cannot sell them machines that run like dogs anymore. If that laptop doesn't have at least 8 GBs of RAM and a 1 TB 7200 RPM HD or 256 GB SSD, with a separate video card, it cannot be sold. Your company depends on repeat business, correct?
I am John Hurt.
It even blurs the stickers on the screen!
xD
Showing chicks fondling a monitor isn't an illegal or misleading marketing practice. Misinformation is.
``OK, so ten out of ten for style, but minus several million for good thinking, yeah?''
I know that in Europe we have fairly strong advertising standards regulation and in theory every ad is supposed to be "legal, decent honest and truthful". I see the odd case of outrageous ads being challenged but for the most part we get exactly the same litany of gullible customers being sold products they don't need: €100 hdmi cables, ultimate broadband for Facebook browsing etc.
I am not sure that any amount of regulation can stop it. I have become quite resigned to the whole business and I accept it as a kind of ignorance tax. While I can be smug about the fact that I am knowledgeable enough about tech products to avoid paying this ignorance tax I am quite sure that in other areas where I am less knowledgeable I am probably duped into paying more than I should.
Did you ever actually try to explain this to people?
I have, so many times to the same people that I've given up and suffer misshapen TV in silence.
The answer is always, "I don't care about that, I want the picture to fill the screen."
Why don't they put two naked chicks fondling the expensive card monitor behind it . . .?
You're getting it all wrong.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
I'd have more sympathy for them and your comment if their monitors didn't come with Display Port and every model of Optiplex bar one seems to come with displayport as well for their integrated graphics adapters.
Money does not need to be spent for some mythical increase in contrast ratio (which is what they are showing on the website, and contrast ratio is one thing which does not improve going from VGA to DVI/HDMI/DP). There's only a barely noticeable increase in sharpness in many cases.
Misinformation yes, but "dangerous"?? Is someone going to die or get seriously hurt from this?
Jumbo Shrimp
Military Intelligence
and Friendly Fire
Words that have no business being said next to one another for 800 Alex!
Watch any TV advert about a 'no surgery' facelift... Please note the differences on the 'actual patients' before and after photos and videos. They are selling a medical procedure, but showing the results of a make-over including hair style, make-up and jewellery.
What will bring you more 'satisfaction?' The few hundred bucks of the make-over? Or the few thousand dollars of the 'medical procedure?'
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 answer is always, "I don't care about that, I want the picture to fill the screen."
So it sounds like they understood but have different priorities to you.
I have tried explaining it
Most people atleast realise that they are watching distorted TV (helps that my home setup consists of a 25inch CRT 4:3 and a 32 inch LCD 16:9 side by side, fed from the same source so its very easy to show the distortion side by side)
Some will still insist on distorting the image since they "paid for a 32 inch TV, so will use all 32 inches"
No, just overly ignorant of your own ignorance.
You are still placing the blame here on the person who is buying rather than the person who is telling the lies.
I put my books on Amazon, Smashwords, Demonoid, ISOHunt and Pirate Bay. Search for 'Michael Cargill'
Film at 11!
Seriously, companies have been lying to sell overpriced crap to gullible people who don't need it forever.
strikes again...im having a hard time caring. and for those who say dell is resorting to cheap tricks, its a fact for the big two that anything they sell from ram to monitors is a cheap trick. CPU's get whitewashed as helping twitter run faster, and memory gets the usual 'more tabs' treatment. customers dont notice, but nerds do. The only travesty here is the number of people outraged without realizing they arent the target demographic.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Of course it's hard to truthfully advertise how "good" or "bad" a screen would look, since they are both being displayed on whatever screen you are currently using... And there is a visible difference between VGA and DVI in many cases, albeit subtle.
Monitor advertisements have a long history of deception, though: back in the early days of LCD monitors, I remember being annoyed at how pretty much every company all of a sudden started advertising their CRTs as "flat screen monitor" -- which is merely a trinitron-type CRT with a flat piece of glass in front, instead of the more old-fashioned curved tubes. But the vast majority of less educated customers would see the "flat screen!" bullet point in their local computer ad and immediately interprete it as flatpanel. Especially since they invariably used photos showing the monitor in question straight from the front, completely obscuring the depth of the CRT tube. (Actual LCD's were typically shown at an angle showing off their thinness of course)
While technically truthful, the combination of the "flat screen" phrase combined with a picture obscuring the depth was definitely deceptive, and undoubtedly a not insignificant number of customers didn't end up getting what they were expecting.
Dell has done this on and off for a long time. (We've used Dell for 12+ years) It was laughable then, it's old news now. I see stuff like this all the time. At one time, the FTC was charged with stopping this stuff, but now they are as effective as the TSA: they only create jobs, they don't actually do much except piss people off.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
Quiet, you! Do you want to alert all workplaces/schools that less powerful machines unsuitable for gaming could still do the job?
Maybe I'm just cynical, but I ALWAYS expect advertisements to lie. Every claim that is not quantified and expressed in numbers is definitely a lie. Claims that are expressed in numbers are probably a lie. Only specs that are very easy to verify and actually define fitness for purpose can be relied on- like RAM size or dimensions. Claims that are hard to verify like quality or reliability or performance or health benefits will be lies. Salesmen who have vested interest will ALWAYS lie to you. You'll never get honest advice from people who stand to profit from your decision. Even independent sources are often biased one way or the other and often won't give advice that is best for you and your situation.
This doesn't just hold true for tech. This is true for everything you purchase from washing machines and pencils to computers and cars. I still don't understand how some people don't realize this and just walk into a shop and ask someone there to help with their purchase.
--Coder
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.
So if a drugs company was allowed to place an advert that said their drug cured cancer with little to no side effects, you would be fine with that and it would be the consumers fault for believing it?
Although the ASA eventually cleared the advert on the basis that Bud tastes so bad it actually becomes worse as it ages.
That implies that Bud tastes of something... Clearly false! NB: I've actually had some rather nice beers in the US (although they do tend to be from their mother's womb untimely ripp'd).
Back on topic, before USAians start talking about freedom of speech and censorship (personally, I couldn't care less if the adverts are censored as long as the bits in between them aren't) its worth noting that the ASA is an independent body, not an arm of Government, and the sanctions are usually limited to forcing the offending ad to be withdrawn.
Dell, however, should maybe study UK/EU adverts for expensive wrinkle creams to get some tips on how to sell snake oil without actually making any falsifiable claims (in surveys, 8 out of 10 people who's contact lenses we'd flushed down the loo thought the SuperTuboGraphics option reduced the seven signs of pixellation).
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
I'm not sure if that would fall under the ASA's remit, they only cover marketing communications. As it's part of the sales process it's more analogous to a sign posted in a computer store, which would make it a trading standards issue, and I'm not sure how that works online. (Normally trading standards are handled by a plethora of independent offices in each part of the country, and it's up to an affected customer to contact their local one.)
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Yeah, it's like AMD's new Bulldoer family of CPUs. They have all of a sudden doubled the core count of the CPUs so that their line of quad cores is now "octocores" and their octocore Opteron 6200 family of CPUs now have a whooping 16 cores.
What they did was implementing a form of hyperthreading by throwing in an extra integer ALU into each core. They changed the name "core" to "module" and now falsely claim that each "module" now has two cores. If that were true then the old Sun UltraSPARC T1 would be 32 core, the Pentum D would actually be quad core (as it is also specified to have two ALUs per core), and all Intel processors that support hyperthreading can double their core count.
Tests done by Anandtech and other people indicate an underwhelming performance on these CPUs so I was a little confused as to why they would resort to such a cheap and fraudulent marketing trick, but I have now figured out what this is all about. As many people state, the Bulldozer is mainly targeted at the server market with their Opterons (that also has shown abysmal results in server benchmarks) and when it comes to servers, not only the workload is different but also the software licensing. A lot of server grade software is actually licensed on a per-core basis, i.e. the license you pay for a certain piece of software is based upon the number of cores you intend to run it on and not the number of systems as is the case with PC grade software. Microsoft used to charge their server software on a per-CPU basis or per-chip basis but they are already transitioning into a per-core license model starting with their SQL Server Enterprise 2012.
So, by doubling the core count instead of just calling it hyperthreading, they can generate twice the license income for software producers.
Mostly people are getting upsold into computer systems that they perceive to be "better" for features that they barely understand and hardly need. Every purchase commits you to future purchases. Why would you get a single core processor when you can get a DUAL core processor. Why would you get 2 GB of RAM when you can get 4 GB of RAM? Who wants a 1.73 GHz processor when you can get a 2.5 GHz processor? I would say the average person shopping at Best Buy or on the Dell website has no idea what they are really buying when they are choosing between computers. The way computers and computer parts are sold is designed to be confusing if not misleading. Personally speaking, whenever I am shopping for Graphics Cards I try to pick the package that has the highest numerical value in the name of the card AND has the picture of either a very scantily clad warrior cartoon lady on it OR the package that has the most ferocious looking monster graphic on it because I believe that they put those pictures on the graphics card boxes to give me a general idea of the various performance related features I can expect. I never buy graphics cards that have pictures of fast cars racing on their packages. For example, recently I bought a Radeon HD 5470 instead of an nVidia GTS430 because 5470 is clearly a higher number than 430.
if your life is such a big joke then why should I care?
I mean, how else would you quickly and efficiently explain 3D acceleration to someone who has no idea what it is? Let's same I have a game and I want to run it at 30 frames per second. On a low-end card, I have to turn the details down and decrease the resolution to get the same speed - in other words, make it "blurrier." On the high-end card, I crank everything up and it looks nicer. Dell didn't want to get into the whole give and take of speed / detail / resolution, that's not who this guide is for. Blurrier is a good enough representation of those technicalities.
If there's anything wrong with this, it's that they used a desktop instead of a game screenshot. I supposed that potentially could cause someone to upgrade who had no legitimate need for a nicer graphics card. But with Aero and whatever desktop nonsense there is now, it's not that misleading.
And there you go. The first time, and probably the last time, that I've stood up for Dell.
I cannot switch dual graphics card in Ubuntu, because ATI card always freezes. So I wanted to set it from bios. As dell's driver update page(http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/19/DriverDetails/DriverFileFormats?DriverId=R314952) has update drivers for bios. With fear of screwing my computer, I upgraded the bios software, to enable their number 1 feature (1.enable Discrete AMD VGA fixed mode Support, listed under Fixes And Enhancement). After upgrading, I did not see any change. There is no option to enable or disable single graphics card. So what's the point of letting user download that software.
A 2GB 520M?
lolnothx
Tests done by Anandtech and other people indicate an underwhelming performance on these CPUs so I was a little confused as to why they would resort to such a cheap and fraudulent marketing trick, but I have now figured out what this is all about. (...) Microsoft used to charge their server software on a per-CPU basis or per-chip basis but they are already transitioning into a per-core license model starting with their SQL Server Enterprise 2012. So, by doubling the core count instead of just calling it hyperthreading, they can generate twice the license income for software producers.
So your conclusion is that AMD did this to increase the total cost of their platform, making their chips less attractive to buy? You're rambling without making any sense.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I submitted the following to Consumerist. I looked for somewhere to tell Dell, "thought you'd like to know, I've submitted the following to Consumerist" but couldn't find any place to submit it. Whatever happened to old-fashioned contact pages? It looks like all the many ways to contact them involve signing in to Dell, Facebook, Twitter, or Google+. Bah.
=== submitted to Consumerist ===
Dell is engaging in faulty advertising. The image in the link is misleading. The different graphics cards would show a Windows desktop the same. There would be other differences between the cards, but that's not one of them. Here are links to Dell, Reddit, and Slashdot.
Dell:
http://content.dell.com/uk/en/business/d/help-me-choose/hmc-video-card-vostro-dt.aspx?ref=CFG
Reddit:
http://www.reddit.com/r/hardware/comments/mle4f/is_this_image_on_the_dell_website_complete_bcks/
PC Pro:
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/blogs/2011/11/23/dells-unhelpful-graphics-card-buying-advice/
Slashdot:
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/11/11/24/022247/dells-misleading-graphics-card-buying-advice
1) Isn't this plain and simple fraud? We all know it is, but I'm asking if it is this under US law?
2) If so, isn't this something for which a company (or an individual) in the US can be sued into next Wednesday for a bazillion dollars or something like that? ... In Germany they'd get a stern look from the judge, a 'No, no! Bad company!' and some laughable sum (like 100 000 Euros or so) as a fine.
I'm just asking out of general curiousity of how USians expect this to play out if someone took this case of fraud to court.
Anyone care to indulge in speculation on this?
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Why don't they put two naked chicks fondling the expensive card monitor behind it . . .?
And Roseanne Barr behind the cheapo one . . . ?
Then I would know which one to buy!
I wouldn't, Roseanne has the most seductive laugh...
~Syberz
> So, by doubling the core count instead of just calling it hyperthreading, they can generate twice the license income for software producers.
Or, by not actually doubling the core count and just calling hyperthreaded cores "modules", AMD can provide a (low) middle ground between n- and 2n-core processors without doubling the license cost for server operators.
I'll be your candy shop of infinite deliciousity if you'll be my discotheque of endless rump-shaking.
I see people trying to guess how/why the images are different. You clearly have missed the comment under the image, or don't understand what it means. The images on those monitors were not produced by the monitors. The monitors were photographed while powered off. Then a graphic artist produces a picture for each monitor, and pastes it inside to look like a monitor producing the image. Thus "demonstrative purposes".
It is a standard marketing technique. Every TV advertised in a flyer is shown with artwork pasted in, not a picture of the TV showing the image. It is so common that if you believed that image is real, you would have to be Mr. Bean.
Dell cannot be nailed for this, because they have included the caveat phrase under the image. It means, in a fancy way, "don't take this as real evidence of the difference". It is just like a package of cookies. Big picture of the cookie on the outside, and underneath, it says "product enhanced in size for illustrative purposes".
If you don't get it, then adjust your set. It will be like this until capitalism and lies are replaced with something else.
I don't suppose this applies to politicians when they advertise what they will do once they get into office?
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
"Caveat Emptor"
It's existed since the first caveman traded for something with another caveman.
There are always going to be people who recognize that cheating in a system based on trust will gain them short-term advantage.
We've tasked government to pass laws that can be applied against these people, but the sheer volume of commercial transactions going on means that the huge bulk of cases will never be prosecuted formally. Ever.
Therefore it's incumbent on a buyer to be as knowledgeable as possible about the things they are spending their money on, to the degree of financial risk they care to assume. Otherwise, one method is to shop at companies that earn your trust (either directly, or by trusted word-of-mouth).
It's really not terribly complicated, people just have to stop expecting that the nanny state will or can protect them from all bad things, and accept that they are largely on their own.
-Styopa
So your conclusion is that AMD did this to increase the total cost of their platform, making their chips less attractive to buy?
I totally agree with you, their strategy don't make any sense at all. They probably didn't realize that this would be the consequences.
Most TVs have a mode that expands AND crops, so it minimizes the distortion. This might be an acceptable compromise for you.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Or, by not actually doubling the core count and just calling hyperthreaded cores "modules", AMD can provide a (low) middle ground between n- and 2n-core processors without doubling the license cost for server operators.
Yes, this is what I think they should have done.
Yes there is. "Standard graphics card" means no graphics card at all, and the PC will fall back to your integrated graphics. if your PC has an Intel chipset, this will be the Intel GMA known for its underperformance. AMD CPUs, on the other hand, mean you get an NVIDIA or AMD chipset, which means at least an integrated GeForce or an integrated Radeon.
Every play an old fixed resolution 640x480 game on a modern flat panel?
Yeah. It's called Wii.
Try a new tactic. Go back to doing what made you successful in the first place. Put on a black turtleneck (if you must), and inform your customers that while their money means a lot to you, you simply cannot sell them machines that run like dogs anymore.
Don't compare low-end PCs loaded with bloatware to dogs, or you'll offend the mushers.
I have a new PC, using the second gen intel i7, and the sandy bridge chipset. I can connect my monitor's HDMI-cable to either the builtin graphical connector (the one powered by the CPU, one of the chipset features), or a cheap Nvidia card which I happen to have. The picture quality is very different: the builtin graphics gives me very crisp and clear picture with bright colours, and the Nvidia card gives me a bit blurrier, darker picture. Same monitor, same cable, different HDMI providers.
That or the 8-bit file was made grainy and the 16-bit file was made using state-of-the-art noise shaping dither techniques to get near 10-bit effective performance. If you think such dithering is impossible, consider that SACD is 1-bit; it just pushes quantization noise out to frequencies where the ear is less sensitive.
First amendment rights have been ruled to cover deliberate lies designed to mislead customers. I don't think false advertising laws would hold up in court anymore.
ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI
People prefer the mode that expands and distorts instead of the mode that expands and crops because the mode that expands and distorts doesn't cut off the score bar on broadcasts of sporting matches. CBS in Fort Wayne, Indiana, for example, is still in 4:3.
before that they were selected by those very same corporations.
Is there any corporation holding you from running for office? How do they do that?
...marketing people frequently shoot from the hip without having a fscking clue about what they're selling, and sometimes even tell outright lies. Film at 11.
the batteries that last "up to 5 hours" (which is basically a guarantee that they will not last over 5 hours, and is consistent with lasting 5 minutes). All companies are committing fraud.
Yes, well, the US version of the website in question is doing the exact same thing. No, really! Take the link from the story in question, and change the UK to US.
So yes, First Amendment does actually apply here.
Yay America, where we have the right to lie, but no right to expose it without getting sued or arrested.
[End Of Line]
A lot of early DVD players had this too, and it still mean the studios putting out shitty 4:3 versions of films with no possibility of getting proper original aspect ratio versions later.
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Click on the link from TFA, then change the UK to US.
http://content.dell.com/us/en/business/d/help-me-choose/hmc-graphics-optiplex
Tah-daaaah! US now has jurisdiction, though not sure what good it'll do folks in the US. Play around with it a bit, see what other countries they're playing with.
[End Of Line]
Basically, they did say: Water doesn't prevent dehydration. They said: You can't claim bottled water is better at preventing dehydration than tap water, and you're claim implies that.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
The graphics geniuses in Dell's ad department blurred the entire monitor on the left. Zoom in if you don't believe me-- the edges of the monitor casing, the aluminum stand they copied from Apple... everything is ever so slightly blurrier. Genius.
That's a little odd, but maybe it's a service call thing - i.e. they know most cards, even ones that do DVI, also support VGA but the reverse is true, and by pre-plugging the VGA cables in they save $X amount each year from customers who lack DVI-out and have just picked the wrong cable out of the box.
I had no idea cavemen spoke Latin!
Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
If we had much stiffer penalties for fraud (Like jail time for execs) and prosecuted them vigorously, this wouldn't be nearly as widespread.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
We've all known that corporations (and even sole proprietors) engage in deceit to sell more product or sell at higher prices. They manipulate, misframe, mislead, and generally miseducate at every opportunity within the bounds of the law... and those bounds leave a lot of wiggle room.
We know they do it, and do it constantly. Why act indignant and butt-hurt when one gets caught a bit outside the bounds? It's a foul, they went over the line, so call it and let's get on with the Black Friday game.
If we really want to make a difference in how much of this manipulation takes place, how about we enact some laws that drastically tighten those bounds and serve the goals of the 99% for a change? The Occupy movement may not be the precise remedy, but a revolution is definitely overdue.
"Graphics Card?" Are you fucking kidding me? The year 1990 called and they want their obsolete parts back.
What kind of loser dweeb uses a "graphics card" any more for common business applications - or even web development, programming, and so forth? The Intel integrated graphics is more than adequate for such tasks. High end gaming and 3D CAD might be another story.
It's much more reasonable to assume that the parent poster is right. Although the "drive and ambition" bullshit is the usual spiel used to try to blame everyone else for the greed and avarice of these people, so I'm not surprised you fell for it.
What they did was implementing a form of hyperthreading by throwing in an extra integer ALU into each core. They changed the name "core" to "module" and now falsely claim that each "module" now has two cores. If that were true then the old Sun UltraSPARC T1 would be 32 core, the Pentum D would actually be quad core (as it is also specified to have two ALUs per core), and all Intel processors that support hyperthreading can double their core count.
Actually, each of the two cores in a Bulldozer module has two ALUs all to itself just like a Pentium D core (plus two AGUs which IIRC can calculate some integer operations too). If they were actually counting cores in the ridiculous way you're claiming - which they're not, in case you didn't get the hint - they could claim four cores per module. In theory Bulldozer actually has the same amount of FPU power per core as the previous generation, too.
Well then, there are four ALUs in each core and not two cores. Just because the said performance is higher per core in the next generation CPU doesn't make it right to double the core count the way AMD has done. Hyperthreading or SMT as other CPU manufacturers than Intel call it can allow for more than just two threads per core. The implementation AMD has done is merely an enhanced version of SMT, no more no less.
Sure everything is nice and dandy in theory whereas in practice things are not so shiny and the Bulldozer family has failed miserably to impress even with their line of Opteron 6200 CPUs on server benchmarks. As the per-core licensing scheme is becoming the standard licensing scheme among servers, the Bulldozer family of CPUs looks very unattractive right now.
AMD's attempt to mislead the non-techical, a la 'Get The Facts'.
Check out this marketing asshole.
An old version of the Wikipedia article points out the bullshit of their older 'Vision' nonsense:
Some of the divisions made in the classifications seem dubious. For example, the basic "Vision" should be capable of watching DVDs, while "Vision Premium" can "Convert CD to MP3s". But any general-purpose personal computer capable of playing a DVD is also perfectly capable of converting CD to MP3s. So adding "Convert CD to MP3s" to "Vision Premium" instead of "Vision" is purely for marketing, without basis in technical reality.[citation needed]
They're still full of shit - their "Help Me Choose" page would have me buy a mid-range machine to rip CDs, apparently more demanding than watching DVDs. To "be a productivity powerhouse", though, I'd really better shell out for the best.
It's a pity. I really want to like AMD - they're a much-needed underdog.
Is nobody else seeing the words 'images shown are for demonstrative purposes only'? It's the same as putting two cars side by side and putting a wind-up toy handle on one. Obviously it's not really a toy car (and obviously a 'low end' graphics card will not display a desktop in any washed out way), but it illustrates the point of marketing that one has more power/better quality than the other.
It looks to me like the display on the left was just blurred; even the monitor bezel and stand look blurry.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
It's entirely possible their image is perfectly legitimate. If their "standard" card uses an analog SVGA connector and a, say, 100ft cable, and the "high end" card is connected with a digital transport of some kind, then I can see how the images might look a bit different...
It's still misleading as hell, though..
"Please take a little longer to read what you're replying to before spewing the same answer in every thread next time."
Actually, I should be take a little longer to parse my reply.
I was trying to say that because they're doing it in the US as well as UK, it means that the US regulatory agencies can go after them for false advertising. Also, the US is rather friendly with the UK, and we have reciprocal treaties and agreements here and there. If US regulatory agencies are made aware that Dell is doing this in many countries, it's possible they could file joint action against Dell.
So. Not so much trying to say that US law would apply to what initially seemed a UK issue, I was trying-and no succeeding-to say that the US now has an interest it can follow up on.
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Perhaps I should've been clearer: those two ALUs and two AGUs are dedicated to a particular core and that core alone, even with AMD's definition of a core. The only shared hardware is the instruction decoder and cache on the front and the floating-point unit. In theory each core still has as much floating-point hardware available to it as in the previous generation, it's just that the other core can borrow that FPU hardware in addition to its own if the first core isn't using it.