Quote:
Originally posted by nothingx
You're right about the recovery option being simpler and not everyone needing a CD, but here's where I take issue... He called and asked for CD copy of the software he purchased. They should, without question, honor his request. Seriously, it's just bad business to not give the customer what they want. How much does it cost to send out a CD? $5.00? Whatever it is, it's pennies compared to the hundreds of dollars he paid for the machine.
HP should give him the CDs or take their piece of shit machine back. End of story.
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HP sold him a machine for a relatively low price (which includes the price of the extra "crap" software, by the way). They have to buy their hardware *and* software from someone else. Microsoft offers them a discount for "recovery versions" of Windows, and this discount is represented in the price of the computer.
Therefore, technically, if Piston Honda wants an OEM version of Windows XP, he'll have to pay for an OEM version of Windows XP, minus the costs of this recovery version. Otherwise, HP would be forced to give him a discount just because he wants one. Why the hell would any company do that? He may have paid a lot for his machine, but it wasn't *expensive* at all - it was worth every penny. And now you want HP to make less of a profit (or even to lose money) just because?
Long story short: Piston Honda shouldn't have bought a HP. Not because they're crap (I won't go into that), but because they're simply not selling what he needs. He should have gone to a shop like mine (I assume they have medium-sized good-quality computer shops in the USA), where he could have selected the components that he wanted; they would have build his machine, and would have been able to supply him with an OEM CD version of Windows. All of that would probably have saved him some cash too.
Final note on brand-name PC's in general: They're not that bad. Sure, you may not be able to select each and every component, and some components might not be top-notch, but generally speaking, they're simply using standard components from standard manufacturers. For example, many brands buy their motherboards from MSI, and then put their name on them. They buy their videocards from Sapphire (which makes Ati's reference boards!), and put their name on them. Under all the HP logos, you still have a good kit.
(Note: this does not include Dell, by the way. After having seen two of their POS machines, I would never ever buy one. Imagine having bought a Dell, and wanting to install an AGP videocard... The machines would probably be some 6 months old now, but they didn't even have a friggin' AGP port! We had to replace the motherboards with ASUS P4P800-VM boards just so that the customers could play a computer game!)