[crazycylon]

edmontonsun.com - Edmonton News- Dell's heading for the hills

excerpt
Computer retailer Dell is closing a call centre in Edmonton this spring less than four years after it opened, affecting 900 employees.

The Texas-based company, which is the world’s No. 2 personal computer maker, said Thursday the Edmonton closing is part of a global plan to increase its efficiency and performance.

It comes on the heels of cuts at its Ottawa call centre, which is cancelling plans for a 1,200-employee expansion and reducing its current workforce of 1,500 by an unspecified number....

[ghporter]

Actually it looks like they're heading for the Texas Hill Country. They seem to have pulled back on a lot of call centers lately-maybe because of all the really bad press they received over handling corporate customers' tech support through an outsource deal to India or Pakistan. Big customers don't like that sort of treatment, and told Mike Dell himself that he was losing customers that way.

Frankly, a U.S. customer that can't understand a Pakistani accent is not uncommon, while one who can't understand an educated Central Texan is very rare. (We don't all sound like someone who never saw running water before. ) It's a Good Thing® to handle domestic customers with domestic customer service employees, and it took a while for Mike to get that message.

[Chuckit]

Apple came across the sea
He brought us pain and misery
He killed our stores, he killed our cred
He took our customers for his own need

[OldManMac]

Dell is sort of grasping at straws. They have been surpassed by HP as the largest PC vendor, and they just closed all their mall kiosks, rather quickly, and are making another attempt at retail. They were the company that started the price war in PCs, and made it a commodity, and now they don't seem to know how to respond.

[- - e r i k - -]

This one seems to be appropriate again:

Originally Posted by TUAW

Remember Michael Dell's legendary snub of Apple's prospects? Back in 1997, Dell was publicly asked what he'd do with the recently re-Steve'd Apple if given the opportunity. "I'd shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders," said Dell, earning the people's denigration and infamy forever. Of course, how could he possibly know?

Fast forward 10 years, and Dell's $62B market capitalization is dwarfed by Apple's $144B valuation. AAPL is trading at all-time highs, possibly portending a split, and the July prediction of AAPL passing IBM's $160B cap (!) is starting to look more rational every day -- but first it'll likely pass Intel's $149B. That's a lot of value that, shamefully, Apple has created for shareholders instead of taking Michael Dell's sage advice and throwing in the towel back in '97. Don't feel bad for MD, though; as Apple 2.0 notes, he's personally worth about 15 billion dollars. Seems like there's money to be made at both ends of the computer quality spectrum.

[Big Mac]

Originally Posted by OldManMac 

Dell is sort of grasping at straws. They have been surpassed by HP as the largest PC vendor, and they just closed all their mall kiosks, rather quickly, and are making another attempt at retail. They were the company that started the price war in PCs, and made it a commodity, and now they don't seem to know how to respond.

I guess, but HP's quality has degraded since swallowing Compaq. I'm actually quite satisfied with the Inspiron I'm typing on right now (which I have only because I need Win for one part of my business and Apple refused to put a real GPU in the MacBook line). And quite honestly, their new AIO looks very nice, aside from being a PC.

[Mastrap]

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

which I have only because I need Win for one part of my business and Apple refused to put a real GPU in the MacBook line

You've gotta explain that to me. I run Windows on my MacBook no problem.

[RAILhead]

Hey, I admit it: I love Dell. Their monitors are simply gorgeous, and I'm currently waiting for a 24-inch widescreen LCD to arrive and replace my original 23-inch Cinema.

[Eug]

Dell is closing all of its kiosks too, as someone has already mentioned. It's getting tougher and tougher for them to generate new customers. Dell, is the king of internet delivery... except that it's gotten pretty easy for anyone to do this, and there isn't that much about a Dell machine that's a good differentiator vs. competing products for people to choose Dell over something else.

Originally Posted by RAILhead 

Hey, I admit it: I love Dell. Their monitors are simply gorgeous, and I'm currently waiting for a 24-inch widescreen LCD to arrive and replace my original 23-inch Cinema.

I have a 24" inch widescreen Dell LCD.

It's a good screen and it's not fugly, but I wouldn't exactly call its design gorgeous. I bought it because it was cheap, not because it's gorgeous. (2407WFP)



Gorgeous are the Apple Cinema Displays... but they're a total ripoff, and don't even support HDCP.

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

I guess, but HP's quality has degraded since swallowing Compaq. I'm actually quite satisfied with the Inspiron I'm typing on right now (which I have only because I need Win for one part of my business and Apple refused to put a real GPU in the MacBook line). And quite honestly, their new AIO looks very nice, aside from being a PC.

What are you doing that requires such a GPU?

For example, Vista's Aero Glass runs just fine on the MacBook.
Video showing Aero Glass on my MacBook, with Flip 3D.

[RAILhead]

Originally Posted by Eug 

I have a 24" inch widescreen Dell LCD.

It's a good screen and it's not fugly, but I wouldn't exactly call its design gorgeous. I bought it because it was cheap, not because it's gorgeous. (2407WFP)

Yep, that's the one I just bought. I bought the 20-inch for work and liked it so much (I LOOOOVE the wide screen ratio) I bought the 24-inch for home (my old G5's vid card doesn't support 30-inch screens).

DHL is supposed to deliver it to my office today, but of course, it's Friday and we close early...

[ghporter]

I don't get how HP, which LOWERED its standards in buying Compaq and continues to put out absolute crap products has gotten a bigger market share than Dell, which puts out (generally) decent products. Ever open the case on an HP and a Dell desktop? Night and day-scary, nasty night compared to bright sunny day! While I can't say I'm happy about Dell's move toward their own motherboard form factors and the like, at least you can get at all the connections and human hands can work them. HPs seem designed to injure anyone with the temerity to assay to enter their innards. It's crazy.

[Eug]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

I don't get how HP, which LOWERED its standards in buying Compaq and continues to put out absolute crap products has gotten a bigger market share than Dell, which puts out (generally) decent products. Ever open the case on an HP and a Dell desktop? Night and day-scary, nasty night compared to bright sunny day! While I can't say I'm happy about Dell's move toward their own motherboard form factors and the like, at least you can get at all the connections and human hands can work them. HPs seem designed to injure anyone with the temerity to assay to enter their innards. It's crazy.

Well, at our workplace, Dell constantly screwed up orders... but curiously, it was always in Dell's favour. I don't think it was them specifically trying to rip us off, but just that when you make component upgrades on your order it fscks them up.

A friend had the same experience at his workplace. In his case they'd also send him machines with the wrong parts... saying that his requested upgrades were unavailable if he asked. Then they'd ship him the part 3 months later and make him do the install.

P.S. Apple does the same thing, but at least they'd tell you that up front.

Most here don't order from Dell anymore. We use Lenovo and other companies. (I think Lenovo costs more too.)