I am looking to buy a new desktop (again). When in the local store yesterday, was looking at an HP with 6 gigs of RAM, 1 Tb of hard-drive, quad intel chip(s?). Said to the sales person I was a little nervous about HP ever since they got into bed with Compaq.

He told me that though it was pitched as a merger, it was actually an acquisition by HP of the Compaq brand name. He said that the day after the deal was done, HP closed the entire Compaq operation, terminated the Compaq staff, and now just uses the HP brand for their own best product line, and Compaq brand for their own (HP) "economy" line.

My memory is not clear, but that isn't the way I recall it going down.

Is he correct?

2nd Question - He tells me that a lot of the manufacturer's (or assembler's) canned advertising which one used to be able to uninstall easily is now imbedded in the operating system and it takes specialists to get it out of there. He says his company (Office Depot) has a contract where that is done on-line and that when they get the hardware actually in hand (and it has been paid for by the customer) they hook it up and spend about two hours having that crap removed, free of charge to the customer. Does that sound like "smoke" to you?

Thanks for the help/opinions/advice any of you can give. Homebrewer, I hope you respond too.

The sales guy is wrong on both points.

Order your PC directly from HP.com.

I have been using HP PCs and laptops for years (both for professional and personal use) and I am VERY happy with them. (I do not work for HP or another hardware/software maker.)

The little crapware HP includes can easily be removed and is NOT embedded in the OS. If you buy from a retailer (Best Buy, Staples, BJ's, Costoco, et al.), you are guaranteed to a) get a lot more crapware, and b) a kluged-up OS that behaves unpredictably.

Go direct to HP.com .

George

Hmmmmmmmmmmmm...

I also get a complete three year warranty on HP computers, etc when I buy them at Costco and use their free AMEX card.

Rich
DRSS

Rich,

Check your warranty to see who is going to perform the warranty service and where you would have to ship it.

George

All manufcaturer's inc;ude crapware on their computers, whether desktop or laptops.

The first thing I do when I get a new laptop I get rid of all the freeware they include.

My experience with HP desktop has been great as long as they are using Intel CPUs.

The one server I tried with dual AMD processors I had compatibility issues with with certain software.

The other day I met a gentleman in the computer store, and he seems to have exactly the same problems I had with AMD CPUs.

I have one "token" AMD system (an HP) that refuses to quit other than that all the computers I have responsibility for are Intel CPU.

All the other AMD computers I've had or had responsibility for have one thing in common, one day they simply refused to start.

Don't know why don't know what was wrong with them.
All I know is they won't even POST.
They are simply stone dead.

Though I have an idea about it. AMD computers frequently use an AMI "Bios" and I've never had anything but trouble from computers using an AMI Bios. They never seem to vbbe as stable or as reliable as those using a Pheonix or another Bios.

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