Dell complaints

[Commendatore]

How can you tell the difference between a new Dell computer and a refurbished Dell computer?

Does Dell actually sell refurbished computers out of the box and label them new?

Call me paranoid but.......

[FallenAngel]

It's against the law to sell a refurb as "new". It has to be labelled or clearly indicated that the system is refurb or not. I'd suspect that this wouldn't stop Dell from doing it, but through resellers they'd be a little more hesitant to break the law.

The only real way to tell is if you just bought your system, or had a system exchange. Exchanges are 99.99% of the time refurbs.

[Rocke_T_Sinetist]

The legal definition of refurb is 'previously sold as new'. If the box leaves the building headed to a customer, that's 'sold as new'. Even if the customer refuses delivery and sends it back unopened, that system would require the red sticker to be sold again.

Internally however, Dell can and does recycle parts, and is not legally required to label them. Failed systems are dismantled into their components, the components tested superficially and put back into stock to be reassembled into other 'new' systems.

If Dell were thorough, they would track the serial numbers of recycled parts, so that the same part couldn't go through the system more than twice before being returned to the vendor as defective. That would weed out troublesome, potentially intermittent parts. And as the vendors credit Dell for defects, the cost to Dell would be negligible, just the cost of running the serial number database. But it's not going to happen, as Dell has negligible concern for product integrity.
_________________
Rocke T Sinetist
as in, 'it doesn't take a...'

[Commendatore]

FallenAngel wrote:

[DELL-Jimmy_P]

[Rocke_T_Sinetist]

If Dell could be assured of getting away with it, they would. But there are things that could trip them up, date codes, serial numbers. Particularly in terms of systems, which if they are returned from original sale and test good, they're resold or reshipped with the original service tag.

If I remember correctly, in the failure lab, I ran across one system that had been sold to 3 customers and returned for the same failure each time. On the other hand, the computer I'm using right now is a refurb, bought from Dell's storefront in 1998, and hasn't had a moment's trouble despite Texas thunderstorms and operating it well above the 'office' temperature of 75F--as high as 93F. 'Course, that's a 1998 Dell. Such longevity in a 2008 Dell would qualify for the Guinness Book.
_________________
Rocke T Sinetist
as in, 'it doesn't take a...'

[DELL-Jimmy_P]

[Rocke_T_Sinetist]

The tests are cursory, and cannot be counted upon to find intermittents.

Worse, Dell's HDD and CDD tests will pass a known-failing drive, I know this firsthand. I can hold it up to my ear and tell you it's failing, but Dell diagnostics will pass it.

I'm not sure your assertion about 'same components' is correct though. Are HP motherboards Foxconn? Each vendor cuts different corners.

Indeed, plasma and LCD TVs mostly become doorstops or ant farms if they break out of warranty, as the manufacturers don't support them at all. No parts, no documentation, no nothing.
_________________
Rocke T Sinetist
as in, 'it doesn't take a...'

[DELL-Jimmy_P]

[Rocke_T_Sinetist]

Surge schmurge. I'm writing on a 1998 Dell, with a US-made motherboard, that has been through countless central-Texas thunderstorms and never failed.

OK, you don't know HP's motherboard vendor. Neither do I. But I know Dell's, and Foxconn is a hosebag Chinese corporation that will get away with anything and everything they think they can.

When Foxconn became Dell's exclusive vendor is precisely when the reliability problem started. I was working in reliability engineering when it happened. A co-laid-off co-worker went to work for Foxconn briefly, and had nothing but bad things to say about them.

Read Dell's own site, about enduser problems with Foxconn motherboard/BIOS unable to control fan speed in current Inspiron 530, Vostro 400, after 4 revisions to specifically address that.

I know what good engineering is, and it is NOT Dell/Foxconn. If Dell manages to sell a product of integrity today, it is strictly by accident.
_________________
Rocke T Sinetist
as in, 'it doesn't take a...'

[Commendatore]

DELL-Jimmy_P wrote:

[Rocke_T_Sinetist]

If your Chevy or Maytag waterpump fails in warranty, you do not get a refurbished pump to replace it, you get a new one. Only the computer industry dodges business ethics to this extent.

But as far as anyone straightening out Dell's shit, I heartily recommend not holding one's breath. Right now, the closest anyone's coming to straightening out Dell's shit is Hewlett Packard, and not by a whole lot.
_________________
Rocke T Sinetist
as in, 'it doesn't take a...'

[FallenAngel]

[Rocke_T_Sinetist]

You misunderstand. Internally recycled parts were never 'on the market'. They were part of a failed system that never left the factory floor. No law about that.

The only thing bad about the practice is that the recycled parts may have been the reason the system failed, the tests before restocking them are inadequate, and the parts are not tracked to keep them from cycling through the system indefinitely, or until they happen to work long enough to get shipped.

Besides the slipshod Chinese engineering, this is how Dell manages to make so many lemons.
_________________
Rocke T Sinetist
as in, 'it doesn't take a...'

[FallenAngel]