Posted on 07/22/2006 11:12:56 PM PDT by Zakeet
The growth engine that Dell once was is sputtering. The degree of its troubles was made plain—yet again—on July 21, when the company said this quarter's earnings would fall far short of analysts' forecasts. Sales won't meet expectations either.
It was the fourth time Dell (DELL) said it wouldn't meet quarterly earnings or sales forecasts since the beginning of last year, and investors were incensed. Some registered dismay at the company's annual shareholder meeting in Austin the same day (see BusinessWeek.com, 7/21/06, "Dell's Dull Meeting"). Dell shares dropped nearly 10% to $19.91, the lowest level in almost five years, and dragged shares of other computer makers, including Hewlett-Packard. The rout left the Nasdaq at a 14-month low.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessweek.com ...
I am interested if any of my fellow geek colleagues have any more or better suggestions
The only thing Dell has going for them to compete against their clone competitors is their brand name. Their strategy of selling low-cost computers as a loss cannot be sustained.
When is the last time Dell got a patent?
Has to be one of the least innovative large tech companies around. They are a commodity box pusher with a brand name.
The best computer you can buy is from Systemax from Tigerdirect.com.
I never purchased a Dell because I didn't want to buy something like a PC online and there were no Dell stores where I lived.
People are going laptop, and Apple seems to have a better product.
Dell needs to focus on laptop - - QUALITY, higher-end laptop.
I like their work stations. It's a lot of work to keep up with what hardware is hot this week. I'd much rather let them figure out what components work well together and which don't rather than build my own system.
""What would I do? I'd shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders."
-- Michael Dell discussing Apple Computer, October 1997
My, how the worm turns. If I were Steve Jobs, I think I'd have to send him a card and a fruit basket of some kind. I'm petty like that.
And now it can run Windows. Not that I want to if I have the option, but Mac on Intel has eliminated the little inclination I had to keep a Windows box around.
Opening stores is probably a waste of money - but they could put out a series of models available at retailers.
I have to agree. HP has some good machines out right now and over the last 2 years. Apple has done well understanding niche marketing - the graphics/video/music niche, and the email/internet/entertainment user. They do well focussing on these niches - they make it appear easy for those who don't want complexity.
Windows doesn't help the PC market, IMHO. They make it more difficult by jamming too much stuff on one piece of software.
Dell is just an assembler of other people's parts - I can, and have done, and will continue to build my own machines to my specs without paying their assembly fees. And my Ipod works just fine with my Logitech THX surround sound stereo system.
I have an HP too! HP Pavilion. I recently overhauled it, added more harddrive space, memory, and an LCD monitor with new speakers. Pimp my PC!
We've always had Gateway and Dell computers, and they have been very good, worked well for us. But recently my daughter decided to get her own computer for college and settled on an Apple laptop because she could record her original songs on it, among other features. I mean, she just opens the thing up and plays guitar and sings and voila! there's her song on the computer.
Yeah but I am kicking myself for not keeping up with the times and waiting for the Dual Processors to come on line. I do a LOT of 3d graphics work and video editing and I should have been more aware of what was in the works. Oh Well.
I usually buy high end computers, and the ones in the stores never have all the options I need especially the Professional version of Windows instead of the Home (amateur) version. I once made the mistake of recomending buying an HP desktop. It had no driver disk so when I had to reinstall an upgrade to Windows Professional using the option to delete the boot partition and completely reformat it, I lost all the drivers that came with the computer on the utility partion. Every Dell computer I've ever ordered had CD's with all the drivers needed for the equipment installed at the factory so that if I needed to reinstall anything I could. I really hate the computers sold in stores that have no Windows installation disk. They only have a system image that completely destroys everything on your system hard disk including all the non system partitions if you run the image restore. I much prefer getting the real Windows installation disks shipped with my Dells.
And I really hate it that hardly any computers available in stores have Windows XP Professional installed. Just because you may be using a computer at home doesn't mean you don't need the features of Professional. It has much better security and encryption,provision for VPN tunneling, multiple processors, hyperthreading, and multimonitor support. I'd much rather order a Dell online with all the features I want rather than some half-assed generic model in a local computer store.
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