Dell Products

Joel Spolsky seems to be smitten by Dell. That is probably why his website is called “Joel on Software” rather than “Joel on Hardware“…Joel doesn’t know hardware very well…for hardware see Tom 😉

He mentions in a recent post that an HP/Compaq server runs 2x -3x an equivalent Dell. There must be a Dell marketing type feeding him that comparison! Definately not doing an oranges to oranges…

The idea of a server is a box that you can depend on. My experience with Dell servers (quite a bit) is they are seriously lacking in quality no matter the price. We had stupid hardware problems with $20k Dell servers six months after they were purchased. And the same problems showed up again and again…the Dell fixes were only patches.

Joel’s take on PC Connection is right on for most of these vendors. The salesmen are pretty much clueless and tend to make a pest of themselves. My recent experience with Dell sales folks and HP for that matter is they are not much better than PC Connection. NewEgg stands out because they do not even pretend to offer all the value added services.

There is a huge opportunity in the market for smaller, local vendors.