I'm convinced that when someone asks for advice on a computer they're looking at buying no matter what I say they hear "Yes, buy that $399 computer! It'll run great forever!" It doesn't matter if its family, friends or coworkers, a "no buy" is universally ignored. It's to the point where I'm just about ready to stop giving advice. Does this happen to anyone else?
They seem to think that the salespeople they talk to are more knowledgeable, not just company hacks whose main goal is to get you to buy something.
Generally, the sales people are supposed to me more knowledgeable. However, a lot of the time, they don't know shit. This is why I use the interwebs!
Just some thoughts from somebody who's been in the trenches as a retails salesperson. Part of the problem is that computers have become commodity pieces. 10 years ago when I was selling electronics with the occasional foray into computers, there were some very big differences. E*Machines and Acer were loss leader garbage, Sony rocked. Nowadays, unless someone wants to get into heavy duty gaming or video editing, machines at the bottom end are not all that different. I got a $399 E-Machine on clearance from Best Buy that works just fine for my purposes. If they're already convinced the low end machine will do the job and don't want to go through the qualifying process, there's not much you can do except hope it doesn't come flying back in as fast as it went out. (At Circuit City, we used to call that a boomerange). If you're just making a friendly recommendation you can hope they won't blame you if it doesn't work.
I told my grandmother not to get an eMachine. They're generally shoddy and at the time you got sucked into ISP contracts. She got it anyway. The motherboard gave up the ghost about 15 months later. There was probably less than 200 hours use on it.
The vast majority of the time, when someone asks you for your opinion, what they really want is for you to confirm what they were already thinking. Computers, relationships, travel. Doesn't matter - it's all the same.
Which is why when I want a new computer I go to the guy that ends up fixing the machine. Hasn't steered me wrong yet - because he knows he has to fix whatever is wrong with it.
I always get second opinions if I'm about to buy an electronic device after the 100 dollar DVD recorder I bought at Wal Mart last year turned out to be complete shit that recorded maybe one full pre-programmed show out of five. And being on WF, I learned that a good computer =/= the one with the largest harddrive at the cheapest price.
Yeah, but the real problem with assuming that all low end machines are garbage is that the issue is more complex. Working at CC I saw plenty of low end burners in every department come back defective. Every product has a failure rate and the lower the cost, usually the higher the failure rate. In computers it used to be because companies would buy their components from whichever vendor was selling them the cheapest on that particular day. One computer with the same name on the case and the same minimum specs could have a completely different set of guts in it. One consolation for you: computers are cheap enough nowadays that a buying mistake for most people is not a life or death issue and getting more than a couple of years out of one, while a good thing, is not something I think most consumers lose sleep over, since we're getting to the point where very few people are buying their first computer. Hell, my mother's on her third! Make a mistake buying a car and that will haunt you for a long ass time. Buying a computer that craps out in a year and a half may be a pisser, but it's not that big of a deal. Keep in mind too, that older people have a different outlook. When my favorite Aunt was in her 80's she used to joke that she didn't buy green bananas. An extra long product life may not be as important to her as it would be to you.
