Buyers Compromise Performance For Price
Mark Camm
03/12/98
Sydney Morning Herald
Page 20
Copyright of John Fairfax Group Pty Ltd
THE PC industry is getting smarter, but it is still surprised sometimes at what people buy or want.
At last week's Sydney PC IT 98 show at Darling Harbour, for example, most public interest was centred on the cheaper home PCs and printers and not on the latest and fastest systems which were expected to get the most attention.
Gateway 2000's productmarketing manager for Australia, Ms Michelle Vanzella, said a growing trend was for buyers to be willing to sacrifice performance for a lower price.
"These are people who might choose a slower processor, but increase the amount of memory in the PC," she said.
Although home and small business buyers, shopping for their second PC or who had used PCs before, were more aware now of what was available and what they wanted, first-time buyers still needed considerable help and time in deciding what they wanted.
Ms Vanzella said Australia was only a tiny market when compared with world-wide sales, but Australians were very quick to take up new technology. This was important for larger markets, such as that in the United States, which could look to Australia as a small but significant testing ground for new products.
Gateway 2000, a world leader in the direct marketing of custom-designed PCs, was in a special position to pick up buyer trends quickly, especially in Australia.
She said price was still a major factor for most people when they bought a PC, but they were becoming smarter in judging value for money.
Other clear trends included:
* Ignoring smaller 14-in and 15-in monitors and having 17-in monitors as a minimum requirement.
* Ordering more memory with the PC (typically at least 32Mb) rather than choosing to buy more later.
* Treating cautiously or avoiding altogether the new DVD (enhanced digital video) technology.
* Buying the fastest modems available, even if Internet service providers can't match the speeds, and wanting Internet connections that are easy to set up.
* Power users upgrading their systems heading straight for the new 333MHz processors, bypassing the 300MHz processors completely.
Ms Vanzella said expectations of Microsoft's Windows 98 were high, with the hope it would allow the newer and faster systems to perform faster and more reliably than they do now with the aging and unreliable Windows 95. |
