The Mrs laptop gave up the ghost a couple of days ago, and so we made the decision to get her a new one. So yesterday we headed off down to the local Currys/PC World store and had a good look at what was on offer before selecting the one that best suited her indoors. There were a range of colours, and so she decided on a red one as opposed to the conventional black of silver. Anyway, got approached by the salesperson, told him what we wanted, and he said I would not recommend buying a coloured one as they overheat and blow up within a couple of months So dumfounded, we asked, does this apply to the conventional black or silver laptops of the same make and spec? Oh no he said, just the coloured ones. We then asked, if they are a brand name but the coloured ones are so unreliable or have a reputation of in affect "Blowing Up" after only a few months, why were they still selling them? The sales person had no answer other than he was only advising on personal experience and recommendation and then directed us to a cheaper lower spec machine. Suffice to say, we were not impressed, and so we said we would return with our son in law who was far more computer savvy then we are and get him to go through it (Bottom line was we thought the salesman was a ) and had no confidence buying from this guy. Went to another bigger branch just down the road, mentioned what had been said only a short while earlier and the salesperson fell about laughing as this was the first he had ever heard of laptop reliability being dependent on its colour. Anyway, found a machine which was a little bit more expensive than we had been looking at and the other store got our business. Annoying though that with windows 8, you either have to wait up to 8 hours for the computer to be backed up by the store at a cost of £50 because they no longer provide a back up or recovery disc, and so the price advertised is actually incorrect. What a con and what a way for these stores to make more money, because not only do they charge you for backing up (I don't have the knowledge or ability to do it myself) you also have to buy new anti virus because current anti virus does not work on windows 8. And I appreciate that someone will probably say that this is incorrect, but as a lay person, like people rely on good or sound advice from other professionals, we were none the wiser. Suffice to say, the Wife mentioned this on her facebook page and the number of people who have come back to her and say they cannot believe what we are told. Even PC World have made a comment that the information we were given about the coloured laptops is incorrect. Says a lot for the competence and knowledge of their sales staff. But the issue about a red laptop made us chuckle. Anyone else ever come across this sales pitch before?
T.C, hate to say this mate, but would you take your Blade to be serviced by chimney sweep? Just the same as you don't go to PC World if you want quality advice on PCs. Do your research matey, then buy at the cheapest reputable place you can find......oh and get Win 7 not 8....its pants. I do not allow 8 in the network, far too many issues and applications that just do not work with it. I reload every PC that comes with 8 with a fresh copy of 7.
I appreciate what you are saying, and we did look into models, makes, specs and the like before we set off. Te Mrs previous laptop was windows 7 which she was happy with, but it appears that you can no longer buy a machine with anything but 8 installed, and despite me having heard about peoples dissatisfaction with windows 7, she was quite happy with it. But as I said, we are lay people when it comes to computing.
I have a red laptop at home, I've just tried ringing to warn the wife and she's not answering, I'm worried now, should I call Royal Ordnance out as a precaution? Or maybe it's already too late?
Pete, the best option would be to get the wife when she answers, to put it in a bucket of water and pop it down to PC World, they will know how to dispose of it. Saying that, I have a blue one sitting in a comms cab next to me.....got me wondering
