Dell or HP

[techie08]

What do people prefer on hardware, Dell or HP? never used Dell so dont know what they are like in terms of the machines and the warranty support.

 

Thanks

[danrhodes]

HP for me every time, the helpdesk is pretty good for warranty repairs, also consider looking at Fujitsu their kit is decent for both servers and desktop / laptops, and if you get the 3yr warranty the support is next business day.

 

d

[RichB]

HP all the way, gone from HP to Dell hate it!!! support is awful, and things break all the time...

[danrhodes]

Why on earth did you go from HP to "Hell" you trying to cut costs, create more work and lower your service level?

[flyinghaggis]

Really?, we're found that our 3-year support package, for desktop PCs at any rate, is pretty good IMO. Next day on site replacement for any hardware faults and UK based called centres for business/educational customers. That and the pricing is still on average £100-200 cheaper per unit than HP. Can't ever imaging being tempted to pay the extra for HP to be honest.

 

Admittedly Dells educational account managers seem to be a bit patcy and have a habit of not responding very quickly to your calls when you do have a larger fault/issue than the helpdesk can deal with. Since we've started going through other resellers, rather than Dell direct, the service has been a lot better.

[INeedAUsername]

HP all the way - server and most desktops (we have cutom builds here)

 

We are toying with the idea of having Dell for laptops as they seem to be cheaper than HP but you get what you pay for IMO

 

STariq

[glennda]

Hp servers, sans switches tape autoloaders anything "back end" then desktops from stone and monitors from whoever has cheapest 19" monitors

[MYK-IT]

HP for Servers, although our last 2 were Dell's.

 

Dell Optiplex for Desktops, as previously mentioned UK call centre 99% of faults have been resolved Next Working Day, and we get 5 year warranties as well.

[soveryapt]

HP everytime for me .. DELL just seem to awkward in a Business Setting unless you have identical setups for each machine ..

[flyinghaggis]

.... and we get 5 year warranties as well.

 

Do you have to specifically ask for the 5 year warranty as I've never seen the option of it for desktops on Dell's website? How much extra is the cost compared to 3 year warranty per PC if you don't mind me asking?

[MatthewL]

Personally HP, we use all Dell desktop and server hardware, support is good but HP quality is a little better I think. Never called HP for server support.

[MYK-IT]

Not usually listed online, sometimes shown as an option on the Dell Premier Best Price Schools website (have to ask your Dell Accounts Manager to create an account for you), so you usually have to stipulate 5 years from your Dell Manager / Reseller when obtaining quotations.

 

You're looking at approx £30 extra per computer to upgrade from 3 to 5 years, well worth the investment as there is no way we can upgrade ICT Suites every 3 years!

[richardp]

I use dell servers at the moment and hp switches. As far as dell is concerned so long as you are within warranty I have not had a problem but as soon as I was out of warranty they didn't want to know me unless I took out a further warranty contract. As for the hp 4100 switches I use they have a life time swap out warranty and I have been so impressed with them and the warranty that this is the second job I have used the hp switches in. Also usually tend to stick with hp for printers unless cost is a real issue and need to find a very cheap alternative.

[teejay]

Dell here, as long as you get premium support its mainly UK based and absolutely fantastic and the enterprise range PC/Laptops/Servers that we buy are fantastic. Yes if you venture into some of their 'value' range stuff it can be a case of get what you pay for.

I know everyones experience varies, but we found HP support pretty poor if you have to speak to anyone, the web based support is ok though.

[SYNACK]

HP for servers and desktops, I have had a bad run with Dells, they can't all be as bad as the ones that I have ended up dealing with.

[teejay]

HP for servers and desktops, I have had a bad run with Dells, they can't all be as bad as the ones that I have ended up dealing with.

 

Just quickly checked our helldesk, with 520 Dell desktops we've had 6 hardware faults in total in the last 5 years, out of 120 laptops 3 hardware faults in the same period excluding some batteries which had expired out of warranty (8 of them), no server faults at all. Every single one was repaired with 1 working day.

HP - out of 60 desktops, 17 hardware faults, quickest repaired next day, longest took 23 days. Laptops, out of 20, 7 faults, quickest repaired in 4 days, longest took 7 months. HP Switches, 4 switch hardware faults, 3 replaced within 2 days, one took 17 days as their support techs were being useless, also had 5 mini-gbic fibre modules fail.

[Tallwood_6]

I have no brand loyalty in terms of desktops or laptops but find i can never get Dell's pricing to match HP in terms of like for like kit, i.e recently the HP elite 8100 vs the OptiPlex 980 was about £80 per unit in favour of HP (same motherboards/ chipset, processor, RAM, warranty etc). In terms of reliability i brought 150 odd Lenovo M58's last year and have not had a single niggle and the build quality is excellent, that said i would not buy them again as they messed as around with delivery dates. Switches Procurve all the way, some of the Dells look good on paper but you must keep warranties up to scratch to get software updates & servers there isnt alot between Dell & HP although Dell's line up does seem to cater on the face of it more to virtualized environments.

[Ashers]

We're in the same position as teejay, 605 Dell Desktops we have had 2 Motherboards, both Ultra Small Form Factors and both refused to detect DVD drives, and one HDD. All were replaced next business day. Of the 50 Dell laptops we have had one motherboard failure, suspect water spill after seeing the state of the chassis, but Dell replaced no questions asked and one LCD inverter failed, again both next working day.

 

I inherited 56 HP desktops, without any extended warranty and they cost loads in replacement part before I swapped them out with Dells last summer.

We have a mix of Dell HP and IBM servers, in terms of reliability we have had no problems with either the Dells or HP units, but the IBMs have been really temperamental, and Parts take days to turn up. We have 4hr engineer on site response on the Dell servers and next day telephone support on the HP and IBM servers.

 

I have a great relationship with my Dell Account team, I get invites to all their technical seminars (luckily only 20 minute drive to their offices from home) and last week we went to their Executive Briefing Centre, to have a play with their new technology, including the Dell Streak, before it’s official release date. But it’s their support that I have found sells it for me, even with the issues of the Indian call centre, we have found that the email support, gets around the queuing and language problems.

 

Hope it doesn't sound too soap boxy....

[teejay]

I have no brand loyalty in terms of desktops or laptops but find i can never get Dell's pricing to match HP in terms of like for like kit, i.e recently the HP elite 8100 vs the OptiPlex 980 was about £80 per unit in favour of HP (same motherboards/ chipset, processor, RAM, warranty etc). In terms of reliability i brought 150 odd Lenovo M58's last year and have not had a single niggle and the build quality is excellent, that said i would not buy them again as they messed as around with delivery dates. Switches Procurve all the way, some of the Dells look good on paper but you must keep warranties up to scratch to get software updates & servers there isnt alot between Dell & HP although Dell's line up does seem to cater on the face of it more to virtualized environments.

 

Yes, agree on the switches, the HP Procurves are far superior to the Dell ones.

[AngryTechnician]

I would take Dell over HP any day on everything but switches, although I have my gripes over ProCurve as well (two warranty replacements in the last 6 months, the latest one took 3 WEEKS for them to ship the replacement due to stock issues).

 

I don't like HP's product design much - they seem to have a fetish for using as many different sizes of screws as possible, and in quantities that are about 3 times higher than the equivalent Dell computer would use. As someone who has to sometimes take apart said machines, that annoys me a lot.

 

On the support side, every single time I have called an HP support number that wasn't for ProCurve, I have had astronomically bad service. I understand from the above posts that this isn't typical, but it's been pretty consistent for me. Dell support has been so good to me that I cannot recall a single instance in more than 4 years that I have been dissatisfied with them.

 

On the flipside, Dell's schools account team are sometimes very hard to work with. Account manager quality seems to very greatly. If you go the Dell route, I would recommend either going through a reseller, or getting Premier Page access sorted for your account as a priority to make life a lot easier on yourself.

Edited June 7, 2010 by AngryTechnician
Dell support

[localzuk]

HP here. Good pricing, good support in my experience. I've never actually had to phone them for support - I always use their support website to submit tickets, and 90% of the time, they organise collection of faulty devices next day without question. The other 10% of the time required clarifications of my requests, followed by them sorting out the replacements etc...

[steve]

Server - moving to all HP (great support from the 1 call I've made)

Desktops - Stone (good after sales for years)

Laptops - Stone / HP (both had issues)

Switches - Cisco (under a support contract)

 

Never used Dell - yet.

[john]

HP any day

 

Currently moving to HP Desktops campus wide

Already have HP Laptops where we have them

All new Servers have been HP since I started

Switches are Netgear and Cisco mixed

Media Converters are Allied Tesyis

[Gonk]

I'm a Dell fan tbh....

 

We've got a mix of Dell Optiplex 755/760's and older G/SX240/260/280's. In fairness the older kit has its niggles but nothing that a well placed whack can't fix. I've only had two 755's fail in three years and they we're replaced next business day.

 

I've also got 70 HP DX5150's that give no end of problems. They were purchased prior to my starting and on had 12 months warranty . So far 10 have had motherboard failures and 3 hard drives. I'm finding that they like to overheat... a lot. even when they've been air dustered too.

 

Servers are a mix of HP Proliant and Dell Poweredge and our switches are all Cisco.

 

Ross

[Hightower]

Server - moving to all HP (great support from the 1 call I've made)

 

Wow - you're putting ALL your trust in one good support call?!

 

@OP: We have HP and Dell servers here. Both work fine, but Dell was better value for money. Wouldn't buy HP workstations again after a bad experience with a class load of them.