Consumer

• Have a Question? Our Community May Have an Answer!

  Mon. Apr. 28, 2008
  by Natalie Davis, Manager—Global Ops Community Team

  Next time you are over at the Dell Forums searching for answers, look for the image like the check mark on the left. It's telling you that there is an solution for that issue. It's part of something we launched in February called Accepted Solution.

  The concept is based on a simple premise... that customers who create a forum thread about a specific issue are the best ones to tell the community which post fixed their problem. Said another way, an original poster of a thread can now select the specific post within their thread that answered their question.

  Here's how it works:

  • Login to the Dell Forum (if you don't register, you can still browse)
  • Click on a thread that contains the kinds of details you're looking for (like Desktops and General Hardware)
  • Look for the threads with a green check mark labeled Solved!

  

  Note: Clicking on the picture above will take you to a larger version of it.

  If you click on one of those threads, you will see the comment that started the thread.  When a customer identifies a post as a solution, the thread gets a special logo in the top right corner that looks like the logo below. Clicking on it will take you right to the solution post.

  

  It also marks the specific comment that fixes the issue with an Accepted Solution icon and turns that comment green like this one below:

  

  This provides a visual way to search through the millions of threads on our forums for an answer to a question, by allowing users with the same question to quickly identify answers already provided by other users. If you spend time on forums like we do, you know that threads can get quite long and quickly! From the usual conversation back and forth to the many steps it often takes to arrive at a good solution, this feature helps users help each other ‘cut to the chase’!

  It's taken off faster than we expected: we recently reached over 5,000 accepted solutions, and are averaging about 60 new accepted solutions added each day. Over half a million views of accepted solutions, our database of questions and answers is growing! We are excited and pleased to see so many members of our community using this feature and helping not just the first user with the question they have, but potentially millions of other users who have the same question in the future.

  So next time you have a question, whether it’s technical or you’re not sure what to buy, check out the forum. There may already be an accepted solution waiting for you. Starting there will probably save you some time and effort.

  For more details on how the Accepted Solution functionality works, take a look at the FAQ.

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• Recent Opinion on SSD Failure Rates Fails to Include the Facts

  Wed. Mar. 19, 2008
  by Lionel Menchaca, Chief Blogger

  Sometimes we have to react to information that has no basis in reality. That's what we're dealing with here.

  A recent analyst document from Avian Securities incorrectly stated that Dell is seeing high return rates (20 - 30%) due to performance issues and failures on solid state disk drives (SSDs). It has been the basis of conversations in the blogosphere like Crave, Gizmodo, Techcrunch and BloggingStocks.

  Here's the real story: the 20 - 30% failure and return rates cited by Avian Securities don't even vaguely resemble what's happening in our business. It's also true that Avian did not contact us while doing their research. Said another way, it's just not true.

  Our global reliability data shows that SSD drives are equal to or better than traditional hard disk drives we've shipped. Beyond that, return rates for SSDs are in line with our expectations for new technology and an order of magnitude better than rates reported in the press.

  The vast majority of our customers who purchased these drives appreciate the benefits that SSD drives offer: increased durability, fast start up, better reliability and improved access times.

  In her earlier blog post, Sarah Williams from our product group mentioned that first-generation SSD drives performed on par with 5400RPM laptop hard drives overall. She also said that we're now offering second-generation Samsung's SATA II drives (we call them Dell Flash Ultra Performance SSD) that outperform existing laptop (and even some fast desktop) hard drives. 

  Whether we're talking about a new technology or an established one, Dell is extremely strict on quality variations. Hard drive quality in particular is closely monitored by virtue of its job: to store customer data. Computers can be easily replaced—customer data cannot.

  We remain committed to SSD technology and see it as a key technology that will advance mobile computing overall. Because of this, we will continue our efforts to offer them across a variety of consumer and business laptops and mobile workstations.

  Update: EqualLogic blogger Marc Farley weighed in on the topic here. Very soon, he will be joining the Direct2Dell family to contribute to a new group blog we'll be launching soon called Inside IT. More details coming.

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• Microsoft Releases Vista SP1

  Mon. Feb. 11, 2008
  by Mark Anderson, Client OS Development Mgr.

  Last week, Microsoft released Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) to manufacturing. Mike Nash from the Windows Vista Blog team shared the news last week, and followed up with a second post that explains a bit more how Microsoft plans to make it available to customers.

  SP1 introduces several improvements that customers will see, especially to battery life, performance, reliability and applications compatibility. In order to provide the best customer experience for our customers, Dell has already incorporated many of the most important fixes in our current OS load. Dell customers will begin seeing the entire service pack 1 on new systems ordered from Dell later in May this year. Additionally, customers should soon be able to download it from the Microsoft Windows Update. More information from Microsoft on testing and deploying Service Pack 1 is available here.

  Dell recommends that users of Vista migrate to SP1 as quickly as possible. More details on this topic to come in the future.

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• Notebook AC Adapter Survey

  Thu. Nov. 29, 2007
  by John Blain, Consumer & Gaming Liaison

  If I've learned anything from surfing customers' blogs over the last year and a half, I've learned one thing: customers do have a voice at Dell.

  When you meet people for the first time, usually the conversation drifts towards what each of you "do for a living". When it does for me, I am never surprised to see a "knowing look" when I tell people I work at Dell. Being the kind of guy I am, I hit that look head-on more often than not. I explain that rather than working at a "big, faceless corporation" as a "drone", my job is proof that the customer has a voice. When people find out I surf and respond to blogs for a living, that "knowing look" usually melts right off of their faces. "Dell actually pays people to do that?"

  In my day to day experience, I am constantly getting feedback from customers, and forwarding that feedback along to the appropriate groups. Customers are always telling me "wouldn't it be great if Dell would do <yoursuggestionhere>". I usually refer people to IdeaStorm, unless their suggestion is break/fix related. IdeaStorm is a great place to share your ideas, but sometimes our product engineers could use some specific feedback while putting together a new product design. Now is one of those times.

  We have used the same AC adapters for all Dell notebook lines since 2003. In that time, notebooks have undergone some fairly significant changes, and also during this time, virtually no changes were made to the AC adapters being shipped with our notebooks. Four years is a lifetime in the computer industry, so it's safe to say these adapters are quickly becoming yesterday's technology. They have worked well, but there's always room for improvements.

  There is at least one AC adapter in circulation for every notebook we sell, so not only is it the most common piece of Dell equipment, it is also probably one of the products we receive the most feedback about. Given these facts, our engineers have decided to focus on the AC adapter to try and determine the best ways to improve its design. This gives us a golden opportunity to give feedback at a critical time in a product's life:

  AC Adapter Survey

  Our engineers want to know how you use the AC adapters with your notebooks so they can take these scenarios into consideration during design. Being that this is one of the most ubiquitous pieces of Dell equipment, this is a chance for us as customers to tell the designers themselves how we collectively use their product, so that they can improve the design and make an AC adapter designed to meet our needs. The survey is yet another way the customer has a voice at Dell.

  I've already filled it out, and I hope you'll join me.

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• No New Home Page This Year

  Thu. Nov. 08, 2007
  by Laura P. Thomas, Global eCommerce

  Well, the numbers are in from our most recent beta test of a new dell.com home page design, and they're not as I'd hoped. While one researcher recently found our web site to be "quite easy to navigate only after several visits," our beta metrics indicated that changing the home page actually made it harder for returning visitors to find what they were seeking.   

  So, we theorized that if we ran the beta test for a longer period, the return visitors would have time to become more comfortable with the new navigation. Thus, a longer beta run would show return visitor results beginning to level out with new visitor results in both the beta and control groups. However, after re-running the beta for twice as long, control continued to outperform the beta group. 

  We want to make sure that our customers know how to find what they are looking for on dell.com as we head into the holiday shopping season, and these results seem to indicate that the new page does not improve findability. Something  Peter Morville dubbed "one of the most thorny problems in web design." So, we will not launch a new home page until after the end of this year. 

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• Electronics Recycling Update

  Wed. Oct. 24, 2007
  by Joe Strathmann, Sr. Mgr.—Asset Recovery Services

  The Dell Asset Recovery Services team is in Atlanta today and tomorrow for E-Scrap 2007, an international conference highlighting the latest e-recycling trends and policies.

  Earlier today, I had the opportunity to moderate a panel that explored market conditions and factors across the globe, with a specific focus on how emerging trends will impact end-of-life management of electronics in the United States and elsewhere. Among the key themes discussed was the need for manufacturers to offer convenient recycling programs, something Dell has embraced for several years.

  Today, we are the only manufacturer to offer free recycling services for our own branded computer equipment worldwide without requiring new product purchases. You may remember that Michael has been publicly challenging others in the industry to join us in this effort.

  Environmental benchmarks and goals are a longstanding cornerstone of our business. We reported the recovery of more than 78 million pounds (nearly 40,000 tons) of unwanted information-technology equipment from customers in 2006, a 93 percent increase over 2005 and 12.4 percent of the equipment we sold seven years earlier (more than any other manufacturer that reports recovery progress by past sales weight). This puts us ahead of schedule to achieve our goal of recovering 275 million pounds of equipment by 2009.

  Last month, we simplified recycling for small businesses with an online service that enables customers with fewer than 10 pieces of computer equipment to easily manage, return and track unwanted assets. If you haven't done so already, I encourage you to check out the video overview at StudioDell.

  Our customers are our most important partner in our efforts to protect the environment. From energy efficiency, to climate stewardship to reuse and recycling, we'll be sure to keep you posted on our commitment to become the "greenest" technology company on Earth.

  In the meantime, feel free to share your thoughts and environmentally-focused ideas on ways we can continue to enhance our partnership for a cleaner environment.

  

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• Staples to Offer Dell Systems, Ink & Toner

  Mon. Oct. 22, 2007
  by Lionel Menchaca, Chief Blogger

  Today we announced a retail agreement with Staples, the world's largest office supply retail chain. Beginning on November 11, we will begin selling some Dell systems, displays, printers and ink and toner throughout 1,400 Staples stores across the United States. 

  Since we entered the printer market with Dell-branded printers in 2003, customers purchased replacement ink and toner via Dell.com. While that process has worked well for many of our customers, some like guardianxps shared an idea called "Sell ink cartridges at local retail" in the early days of IdeaStorm. We will still offer continue to offer ink and toner online—the only thing that this changes is that customers will have more options to get replacements when they need them.

  As far as systems and other hardware, we will offer unique configurations of our Inspiron 1521 and 1721 notebooks, our Inspiron 530 desktop, the 19-inch SE198WFP or the 22-inch E228WFP widescreen LCD displays. As far as printers, we will offer Dell's 926 and 948 all-in-one inkjets and the 1320c color laser printer. Staples will offer ink and toner for most models of our printers. Customers can recycle by returning used Dell cartridges to the store for a $3.00 coupon that is good toward a future ink purchase.

  With this agreement, Dell products are now available in over 10,000 stores worldwide. It's all part of our evolving retail strategy. If you're interested in seeing all retail-related blog content, please take a look at the Retail category. Otherwise, you can also get an RSS feed to the retail-specific blog content here.

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• Ratings & Reviews in More Languages

  Mon. Oct. 15, 2007
  by Lionel Menchaca, Chief Blogger

  Late last week, we rolled out ratings and reviews functionality in France, Germany and Spain for Consumer and Business systems.

  

  Since we began offering the ability to share ratings and reviews on October 4, we've now expanded the functionality to the following countries:

  • Canada
  • France
  • Germany
  • Ireland
  • Spain
  • United Kingdom
  • United States

  We plan to offer in more languages moving forward.

  Update 10/20—Direct2Dell reader MButler was correct to point out that I could have been more clear explaining how customers could get to ratings and reviews from the main home page. There are a couple of different ways you can get there, but essentially, you need to get to the product level to get to the ratings. If I can use Canada as an example, from the main home page, click Home & Home Office from the Notebook section.

  On the next page, if you scroll down a bit, you will see the Inspiron 1501 and the 1420. If you look just below the image of either, you will see a star rating graphic like this one:

  

  Clicking on that will bring you to the reviews page for the Inspiron 1420:

  

  Clicking on the red Product Details button will bring you to the Inspiron 1420 product page, where you can see thee review average, read all the reviews, or write one yourself.

  

  Otherwise, you can also get to ratings and reviews by going directly to the product page itself.

  

  I've hyperlinked the above images, so you can click on them to get to the corresponding page. Hope

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• Dell Retail Expansion in China

  Mon. Sep. 24, 2007
  by Michael Tatelman, VP—Consumer Sales & Mktg.

  Today in Beijing, we announced a partnership with Gome, the largest consumer electronics retailer in China, to sell Dell products in local Gome stores. This marks the first time Dell has sold systems in retail in China since we entered this market in 1998.

  Starting in October, customers will be able to buy notebooks like the the XPS M1330 and the Inspiron 1420, and desktops like the XPS 720, Dimension 9200 and the Inspiron 530, at more than 50 major metropolitan Gome stores. Additional Gome stores will carry Dell products in the coming months. Dell employees will be on site in Gome stores to help customers with their purchases and provide tech support.

  Many of you may not be aware, but I lived in this area of the world for almost 3 years and appreciate the increasing sophistication of Chinese customers in how they buy and use technology. Since Dell opened its first Customer Experience Center (CEC) in China last year, customers have shown us how much they value seeing our products in person. That success has led us to establish nine CECs throughout China within one year. These experience centers continue to provide insights into the affinity of Chinese customers for a convenient shopping experience, and helped pave the way for us to enter into retail in China.

  Because of the size of Gome's presence in cities of all sizes, most Chinese customers are probably familiar with Gome. This partnership will help us extend beyond our online and phone direct business model to connect with a broader set of customers.

  Does this mean the end of traditional direct in China? No, it does not. All of our recent retail activities are meant to augment direct sales. Dell has built our business on the foundation of direct customer interaction, and that will not change. This is about reaching more customers in China. 

  Not long ago, we announced retail agreements in the U.K., U.S. and Japan. The partnership with Gome in China is an important extension of Dell's global retail strategy. We will continue to grow and develop this strategy based on needs of customers around the world.

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• Dell to Open Retail Store in Russia

  Wed. Sep. 19, 2007
  by Lionel Menchaca, Chief Blogger

  Michael Dell took part in a media briefing in Moscow today to discuss Dell's plans to open a retail store in the new Gorbuskin Dvor retail center. The store will open next month and will offer notebooks, desktops, servers, printers and more. This is part of additional investments that we'll be making in Russia, which is one of the fastest-growing computer markets in the world.

  Customers will be able to see demonstrations of products and talk to experts about what products make sense for home use or what's required to run a small business. Besides hardware, the store will also offer a service outlet to provide hardware warranty repairs for Dell equipment. While we already sell our systems alongside competitors' products in other Moscow retail locations, this is the first store in Moscow that will sell Dell products exclusively.

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