I want to buy more from them. I find that every model I consider has Office 2000 Small Business (Inspirons) or Office Pro or even Premium included, and I want to get it without the software because I am entitled to the upgrade price and can pay once for my new laptop and my new desktop. I want Norton SystemWorks, so getting Norton Antivirus is a waste, even getting it free (after the free period, you have to pay by subscription for LiveUpdate). I may want to do the installation of Norton SystemWorks later to delay the paid subscription start date. I may want to put it on the D: drive as I would if I did it on my own. Etc.
Dell, as far as I could see, doesn't let me omit MSOffice. For that matter, I might want to get W2000 on my own, at the upgrade price, and install it on both machines. I may want to get an 8100 with non-Rambus RAM so later upgrades of RAM are easier/cheaper. It looks like all 8100's come with RDRAM.
Even better, I'd like to order both an Inspiron and a desktop and pay for some software once, and have Dell load it into both machines, and it would be OK to charge me for the software installations.
I like the products, I like the company, I just think the stock is going lower, and they could make it easier to do business with them. They could also be more forthright in disclosing the online daily volume, which many of us paid a lot of attention to as it went from $3 m to $50 m per day. And watch the projections that are unbelievable out of the box, like the "30% revenue growth rate". |
