Dear Reader,

Nothing in this page could be treated as an advertisement or an appeal to buy or not to buy stuff from this or that company. This is just a real story that happened to me and could happen to anyone else, so I decided to share it with the world hoping that it could help someone. There are so many nice boxes in the shops... and the ads are promising so much... so when I was thinking about what computer is better to buy, I was especially grateful to the folks that placed their own opinions on what they would not buy, and why.

It reflects nothing but my personal impressions.

Another reason for this publication is that there going to be a 1-year anniversary of my unlucky purchase. And the episode with the fan was just the beginning... This year was filled with my computer's problems, so I would like to "celebrate" it in this way. If a year's experience might be considered enough to make at least a preliminary conclusion, I would say that I have never realized that a stupid box could make so much trouble, take so much time and efforts and literally spoil my life. Of course, the box itself would hardly able to do all that; my impression is that its manufacturer helped it a lot.

The beginning of my story is described in the following letter that has been e-mailed to Hewlett-Packard:

Dear Gentlemen,

The last week was very instructive to me.

I bought my HP Pavilion on August 8, 2000, and it died on December 21, 2000. Basing on some strange sounds it emitted, I
suggested that the CPU fan broke. Before that I also noticed some problems with the CD-ROM drive, so I called the warranty
service. You see, I was so inspired by the 24-hour, 7 days a week customer support that you declared.

The first unpleasant surprise was when they booked the technician's visit on December 27. It seemed to me that it is just
unacceptable, it is definitely NOT a 24-hr, 7 days a week customer support. Or ... is it? Let me think... 21th, 22th, 23th, 24th,
25th, 26th, 27th... Yes!!! It IS 7 days customer support!!! But this in also NOT what I need...

Well, of course, nobody came on 27th. On Dec 28, in the morning, I called the service again, and they promised that someone
would come at 3 p.m. Naturally, there were no excuses...

I was waiting the whole day. However, at 3 p.m. nobody came, too. At 4.30 I called again and they said they would connect me
with someone (or someone with me) as soon as possible. In only 20 minutes, someone called and said that the visit was scheduled
for tomorrow. Here I would like to repeat what I answered:

This is NOT 24-Hour, 7-days a week customer service and I will NEVER buy anything from HP again. Either the computer is
repaired today or I will repair it myself.

Nobody came. Of course, there were no "excuse me", "we are very sorry, but ..."...

Then I went to RadioShack, bought a fan for $30 and repaired my computer. It took only about an hour! And I am composing
this letter to you when the machine is working pretty well. And if you told me that because of that I have losen my warranty, I
would answer:

I DO NOT CARE.

If you are making crap and putting cheap fans to cool CPU, it is your problem. I am not going to buy anything from
Hewlett-Packard. NEVER. If this piece of junk dies (I mean you Pavilion), I will throw it away and buy something decent... or
assemble something decent myself. And I will NOT install a cheap fan "made in China" to cool the CPU.

Yesterday morning a guy who is running some "ICS" or like that called and told me amazing things. He said HP is not servicing
their products, but "ICS" is. Again, there were NO EXCUSES!!! If HP was a good company, I would say that the guys like "ICS"
are just ruining the HP's business; but after HP's scanner I bought a couple of months ago died in an hour, I could only say that
your warranty service perfectly fits the quality of your products.

I am very glad that I did not buy a HP TFT display. And yesterday I bought a nice scanner... guess the brandname? Yes, it is
NOT HP!

Now I am definitely not sure what your reputation is based on. Possibly, once it was not a bad company but now it seems to be
just a bunch of crooks. Of course, I would like to warn other people who are considering buying a computer. Therefore I am
going to place this story on the Web site I am currently creating.

You see, I am expanding my business. At this stage, I have to make some crucial decisions. And sometimes to learn what should
NOT be done is not less important than to know what should. Now I know that my business should NOT depend on
Hewlett-Packard products. Thank you very much.

With best wishes,

Thankful Customer

As I mentioned earlier, that fan story and HP "service" was just a beginning. Besides of that, I have found that my Hewlett-Packard Pavilion was:

- very noisy; it was definitely the most powerful computer howl I have ever heard. The sound was so loud and nasty that when the monster was working, it was not possible to sleep in the next room, even with the doors tightly closed. I was really impressed...

- quite slow for a 667 MHz Pentium III machine with 64 Mb of RAM

- poorly configured, so it hanged every hour or so;

- unsafe - the metal construction inside have the edges so sharp that I cut my fingers when repairing;

- badly designed with some ugly fan compartment that takes enormous space inside the machine;

- the software included was primitive and unproductive;

- the hardware inside was poor and cheap;

- the backup software was poorly arranged and did not allow to repair the system without reinstalling it from scratch. At least, when I really needed it...

And so on, and so on, and so on, etc., etc., etc. ...

http://www.thecomplaintstation.com/h/hewlettpackard_toc.htm

Read those stories. Obviously, my naive faith that Hewlett-Packard is a good brand name was just some illusion. Do not repeat my mistake.

Also, Better Business Bureau Web Site contains useful information, tips and a form to send your complaint(s).

Good luck!