Vikingod

System Specs

Alright, here is one for ya. A guy I work with just purchased a Dell desktop ($800.00 or so). Well he got it, other then at few things they forgot to add (like a cdrw) everything was there. He comes in a asks me a few questions, through some conversation he tells me they didnt send him any disks. No drivers disks, not software disks, no WINDOWS DISKS. He was told by tech support they dont ship them with systems anymore because they software is already installed on the system, and you can "use windows restore to fix any problems you have with your system". Thats right, windows restore fixes everything!!!! Anyway, I told him to call them and demand they send the disks and to ask them what he is supposed to do if he needs to reformat... When he told them that, a long silence, then a "We'll ship them to you right away", click...

Let this be a message, if you are the resident computer geek at your place of work, and someone orders a Dell POS, make sure they got, or demand to get, their Windows installation CD's and drivers CD's, as well as any software bundles that they ordered. This is an unheard of level or shady dealing in my opinion, taking advantage of those that dont know better. I can only imagine the millions of dollars Dell is saving as profit by not sending these disks to people.

Good job Dell, thats the way!

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Zardon

They are doing it with their laptops as well - you will find there is a hidden partition on the hard drive (around 3 gig) with the system installed on that as a restore point. It is terribly poorly documented I know. but go to start/run/diskmgmt.msc and you will see a no named 3 gig fat32 partition in which to restore your system.

First thing a dell owner should do is take ALL the crap they install by default, and ghost an image to DVD.

Vikingod

System Specs

wow, that is awfully clever, but I think a bit more than average Joe can understand. Hell, its hard enough for most the people I know to install windows from a CD. The word partition can get you a few blank stares.

With this new method then, you cant take a "fresh" install of the OS? I mean, to restore the system, you get all the AOL Free Trial/ Dell Resource/PC Health/Crap CD Burning program stuff they install by default? Its amazing I havent heard of this before.

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H3X4D3C1M4L

System Specs

Didn't Microsoft just sue some people in Canada here for that? I know a few dealers (some of which I go to on occaision) are being sued for promoting piracy and preloading and etc.

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Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Zardon

Well Dell used to supply a reinstall disc and a driver disc which was actually a total cock up as you had to reinstall all the drivers from the driver CD, and some of the drivers werent actually made for your specific laptop as they mass produced a whole series disc with drivers for them all.

The hidden partition contains a restore OS which shows up in disk management as an unknown partition, primarily to stop people messing about with it, its useless in windows.

What dell are pimping right now is to use windows system restore for minor issues and if its a more serious issue then you can boot the machine and HIT a special key configuration like FN and F1 to do a restore from the hidden partition to the main NTFS partition.

What is even MORE amusing is the fact all this is contained in a PDF file inside a DELL folder on the main C drive, something the average user wont even find, nevermind the hidden partition ! Yes they dont even supply a manual now with a READ THIS FIRST!! so people are aware of it.

Dell also give you a DELL OS RECOVERY CD tool which you can handle from windows, but it is basically CRAP as it only works to CD media, not DVD. smart? yes lets back up a 3 gig OS install to multiple CDS when most of them come now with DVD burners. it wont even recognise a DVD burner if you have one.

Of course if you use the hidden partition to restore you lose everything and get back to the original state when it was shipped, meaning 40 free broadband options and substandard antivirus and other misc crap. This is of course from my viewpoint which probably wouldnt be the "average joe" viewpoint as they will make use of the 500 meg of bundled feces they supply im sure.

what I do with dell, is remove the crap I dont need which is basically 90% of the bundled software, then boot from a ghost CD, put in a blank DVD and back up the OS to DVD. This means you have the hidden partition option if you are selling it on so its factory default, and a DVD option for 1 year down the line when the system needs cleaned out, so you can get back to the state you created when you got it.

Dell REALLY need to get in a team to shake up the IT guys, the whole thing is a mess, you would actualy think they DONT WANT people to know about the restore options. It is also cheap, but to not supply media with the OS or even the drivers, then to not give people easy means to find all this is inexcusable.

Great laptops though, I just received delivery of my 630m last week, its lovely, but I certainly didnt like the state the OS was shipped in, took me a few hours to fine tune it to my liking.

pr0digal jenius

That's been common practice for a while now..this isn't new.

HP/Compaq do it, Sony does it, Toshiba does it, why not Dell?

Sony writes their own recovery software for it, whereas HP seems to use an unattended image of windows with a custom interface, and Toshiba doesn't hide anything and uses Ghost discs, standard interface and all. All of them are bottable options on the system as well, usually by hitting F1 or F11 during startup(when you would normally hit F8 if you wanted safemode)

and it's a perfectly fine way of doing it.....unless your hard disk dies...then your up the creek

Zardon

Nope dont agree. Dell pay MS for the operating systems. the customer should at least get a restore DVD/CD. Granted it isnt hard to make your own, but then again we are talking about "not hard for a DH member" .......

pr0digal jenius

in a legal sense, the only thing you pay for is the content on the disc, and that sticker, which they give you.

but yes, is ee your point..its very udnerhanded(or perhaps quite simply a backhand?)

Vikingod

System Specs

Thanks for the enlightenment Allan. I can't believe someone ever thought this was a good idea. I just talked to the guy again, and it gets better. Yes, they are sending him the CD's, which is fine. When he asked for an explaination as to how to use the restore feature, they (the forth person he was directed to, btw) told him... "I can't tell you how to use it as it would qualify as software support, and your warranty only covers hardware, I'm sorry, click".
It would definetly seem as though they dont want people to know about this.

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pr0digal jenius

and his account has now beenf lagged int he system, and he will never get anything but phone redirects and runarounds. ever.

Zardon

Dell customer support here sucks. you get redirected to india for everything.

pr0digal jenius

everything is in india now. Last tech support call i made was a credit card company, actually. I went from oklahoma, to bangladesh, to michigan, to singapore...lol


I wonder if dell's "top tier" XPS support, which is supposedly fancier, is actually natively english and can DRIVE to your house rather then swim?

H3X4D3C1M4L

System Specs

Dell... ah...glad I never buy directly from them.

I'd buy one of their machines refurb, if I needed it just for one specific purpose (internet machine etc) because those don't need fixing much and I can just wipe it and install XP fresh. Other than that... don't much care for Dell

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Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Drakon

Stunt like these are one main reasons I wouldn't buy a Dell machine nor recommend them

mkk

System Specs

Wasn't there a big lawsuit concerning this practice a few years ago? At least some company was forced to reintroduce discs if my memory serves me right. Anyway, when a relative bought a Toshiba laptop half a year ago she got two WinXP discs in different languages with it. A friend who recently got a Fujitsu/Siemens system recienved not only a restore disc with the machine, but actually a quite well made one. Dell are just too cheap to care, I'm sure.