Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Years of Dell Purchases by Super Technologies May End

Our company is a frequent buyer of Dell products. You'll find netbooks, XPSs, Inspirons, Vostros, and more all over our global offices. We've probably spent around $50,000 at least in the past ten years with Dell. Very disappointed today when I gave one of mine to my colleague who works mostly in Karachi and Dubai. I followed the correct protocol to transfer ownership to my colleague.

Dell replied the following, while we know that XPS can be serviced in Pakistan, so I think we will not purchase from Dell again in the future:

"Dear Valued Customer,

Good day to you.

With regret, this is to inform you that your request to transfer your
Dell system bearing service tag: (number deleted to protect the writer) to Pakistan was unsuccessful as
Pakistan does not support XPS 1530 models.

However, should you be traveling back to US or nearby countries such as
Hong Kong, Malaysia or Singapore and need any technical assistance,
please do not hesitate to call Dell Technical support in the respective
countries.

Hong Kong
Desktop Standard Tier Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer
Notebook Standard Tier Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer
PowerEdge & PowerVault Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer

MALAYSIA
Desktop Standard Tier Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer
Notebook Standard Tier Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer
PowerEdge & PowerVault Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer

SINGAPORE
Desktop Standard Tier Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer
Notebook Standard Tier Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer
PowerEdge & PowerVault Main Line Phone number deleted to protect the writer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience caused."



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2 comments:

Michael Bowen said...

Sounds like you are a victim of the government's computer export controls. There are certain computers which cannot be exported (even shipping one to a country when it was originally purchased somewhere else falls under the term "export") to nations which may be perceived as a national security or (nuclear, biological, chemical) proliferation risk.

I know the Apple Macintosh G3 computers were under that particular umbrella back in the 1998-2000 time frame.


The speed of the general purpose microprocessor used in standard personal computers and business applications today has increased by a factor of eight since the Administration's 1995 decision took effect.

Unfortunately, there is no definitive line that separates levels of computing power on the basis of their usefulness for military applications. The Administration determined (2000) that widespread commercial availability of computers with performance capabilities up to 12,500 million of operations per second (MTOPS) makes that a realistic and enforceable control level.

Four country groups were announced in 1995:

Tier I (Western Europe, Japan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Brazil)-exports without an individual license are permitted for all computers.

Tier II (South and Central America, South Korea, ASEAN, Slovenia, most of Africa)-exports without an individual license are permitted up to 20,000 MTOPS with record-keeping and reporting as directed; individual licenses are needed above 20,000 MTOPS.

Tier III (India, Pakistan, all Middle East/Maghreb, the former Soviet Union, China, Vietnam, Central Europe)-exports are permitted without an individual license up to 6,500 MTOPS, and require individual licenses for military end-uses and end-users above that figure. Exports without an individual license are permitted for civil end-users between 6,500 MTOPS and 12,300 MTOPS, with exporter record keeping and reporting as directed. Individual licenses are required for all end-users above 12,300 MTOPS.

The Commerce Department has ways to calculate how fast a computer processes (GHz-to-MTOPS); it might be that the Dell in question falls into that realm above 6,500...meaning there needs to be an individual license for that particular laptop.

cheap computers said...

I guess there is no definitive line that separates levels of computing power on the basis of their usefulness for military applications.