Hardware - HP v Dell

[MicrosoftTechy]

Hi Guys,

 

Who prefers HP and who prefers Dell?

 

Servers + Desktops

 

Support, Hardware, maintenance etc......

Edited December 20, 2012 by MicrosoftTechy

[Steve21]

Dell personally. You pay more, but you get a lot more. Quicker reponses to issues, (less issues in the first place too it seems), standard longer warranties etc etc

 

(Unless you mean switches etc?)

 

Steve

[FN-GM]

Dell personally. You pay more, but you get a lot more. Quicker reponses to issues, (less issues in the first place too it seems), standard longer warranties etc etc

 

(Unless you mean switches etc?)

 

Steve

 

Same here. Plus you get all the extra tools for example managing the BIOS of the machines centerally.

[denon101]

Dell personally. You pay more, but you get a lot more. Quicker reponses to issues, (less issues in the first place too it seems), standard longer warranties etc etc

 

(Unless you mean switches etc?)

 

Steve

 

Could not agree more... same here. But HP Procurve for switches!

[pcstru]

Dell. Good solid kit, unbelievably reliable, good service on the few occasions minor issues have cropped up.

HP - flaky, overpriced. Service can be good but won't touch their servers or PC's ever again (or for a long long time, whichever is sooner). Their switches are a different kettle of fish though...

[ict_support]

This is a bit like the iOs and Android debate I have good and bad experiences with both HP and Dell, My last few server purchase for VM hosts have been HP G7's which have been great.

[teejay]

Dell on servers, not so bothered by brand of desktop/laptop these days, I just pick whatever does the job at the best price but with a bit of haggling then Dell usually come out well on price anyway.

Why do I dislike HP servers, well:

Inability to retain extended warranty information that you've registered with them, also taking the start date of any warranty as the manufacturing date rather than the purchase date means virtually every warranty request means digging out invoices etc.

Their servers are LOUD, one HP is louder than a rack full of Dells and yes HP have been out and say there is no problem.

They love to use the 'it's a software not a hardware problem', even though the software works fine on other hardware.

[Earthling]

Dells for servers and workstations.

 

Takes me less than 15 seconds to get the hard drive out of one our new Dells for re-imaging.

 

Servers: Had the DVD drive go in one of our domain controllers (years ago) and a NIC in our Smoothwall (years ago too), but both replaced same day, no problems. Since then, they've been boringly solid.

 

Procurve switches for the lifetime guarantee.

 

Wouldn't touch HP laptops or workstations with the proverbial barge-pole. Just a preference.

[6Foot2]

Not much experience of HP workstations/servers: Except one bad experience with a Compaq PC [ages ago!] So Dell for servers, desktops and laptops.

 

Switches: We have an HP Procurve at the centre of our network and 3Com edge switches. 3Com stuff is really old and we look like switching to HP soon.

 

Printers: 100% HP.

 

Copiers: Kyocera.

[Sirbendy]

Dell throughout here for workstations, HP for servers, cisco for switches.

 

Only beef with Dell is poor peripherals.

 

Lost countless mice - they go unresponsive or fail internally.

 

E178 monitors are gash. Tap them on the bottom right corner too hard, and pop goes the internal fuse, plug fuse and room breaker. Or they die randomly, or lock up and need a hard power off and back on.

 

Keyboards seem good, but I have at least 3 minor revisions here in the same batch, and my keyboard (newer style) is just hateful..imprecise keys.

 

WD Caviar Blue standard drives are at best merely OK..having a fair turnover of those too..thank god for MDT. The "base" T3400/T3500s though, not bad.

[Jimmer3568]

Personally, I've been let down by the service from both.

In an ideal world, I'd go for Dell but HP is a decent compromise if you are on a restricted budget.

[Davit2005]

Many frustrations with inadequate, foreign help centers with HP servers, no such problems with Dell. I allways shudder when need to call HP, feel like pulling my hair out and head butting the nearest wall before dialing the number. Edited December 20, 2012 by Davit2005

[localzuk]

Weird, I love our HP servers - we're onto our third generation of them now, using some of their Gen8 models. Support is excellent - we've had to replace a couple of drives over the years and they've always arrived next day as expected. With more complex issues, an engineer is also out the next day with the parts.

 

HP workstations and laptops are a little more variable - the engineers are always here quickly and do their job well, but they do seem to struggle with supply chain sometimes - wrong parts being sent for example.

 

However, that said, Dell were the same in my last school - every time we reported a dead LCD in a laptop, they'd send us the wrong panel, then the wrong lead, etc... So it'd take a while.

 

The only thing I will say that differs pretty greatly is boot times. The BIOS/EFI boot time on HP servers is looooong. A similar Dell will get past that stage in a third the time.

 

Also, Dell don't appear to sell a 2U server in their latest generation range which runs the E5-2690.

Edited December 20, 2012 by localzuk

[SYNACK]

HP, had nothing but trouble with shoddy dell gear, had dodgy hp stuff but dell has had more issues for me.

[teejay]

I've noticed a few posts above about Dell being dearer than HP, if you go direct to Dell through their Edu team or work with a Dell Reseller who has access to their Edu team you'll find the pricing is very favourable to HP and others.

[localzuk]

I've noticed a few posts above about Dell being dearer than HP, if you go direct to Dell through their Edu team or work with a Dell Reseller who has access to their Edu team you'll find the pricing is very favourable to HP and others.

 

See, there's another issue -I've had nothing but trouble *buying* from Dell. My account manager at the last place was, to be blunt, useless. I was lucky to get a reply many times! Then if we needed to order a spare part (an LCD panel for a laptop for example), they couldn't handle it, instead making us call another line which wanted payment there and then via the phone using a card. No amount of wrangling got past that one, so we had to go elsewhere for it. When we did manage to order some spare batteries, they sent us the wrong ones too.

 

HP's reseller network is a lot more robust I would say. Nearly all of my common suppliers don't sell Dell stuff.

[achedgy]

Agree, Dell Support is good but buying it is the problem, given up dealing with a Dell Account manager, taking forever to respond to quote requests, better be right first time, if not, wouldn't bother trying to get it adjusted. Buying through resellers, just means they have the hassle and it's still just as slow (and expensive) Dell kit seems hideously expensive now (servers not so) Always, always used to buy Dell all in ones, just can't justify the cost anymore. Always bough HP ML350's which have been fab. A few hdd's pop and a motherboard die, but they've always sorted very promptly! Did buy a dell server recently against my will, wish we hadn't, it's okay now, but the fight get Windows 08r2 on it, urrgh. Don't really many desktops these days, currently like the HP all in ones, but they've discontinued the model I had been buying, haven't had to look since. Always buy Samsung laptops for the moment. Give it a year to 18 months and no doubt things will have changed again.

[SYNACK]

I've noticed a few posts above about Dell being dearer than HP, if you go direct to Dell through their Edu team or work with a Dell Reseller who has access to their Edu team you'll find the pricing is very favourable to HP and others.

 

Weird, the hp stuff is more expencive here but worth it for the quality. One school I was working with tried to buy Dell gear, after a week of trying to get even a account manager to talk about quotes with we gave up.

 

The other school already had some contact with Dell but have switched to HP for quality and reliability reasons.

[clareq]

We use mainly Dell for servers and workstations - had a harddrive go on a server recently, we were offered the part, with or without an engineer to fit it. We opted to fit it ourselves, it was here within 4 hours, and I even got a phone call two days later to check everything was up and running OK. I was very impressed with the service.

[teejay]

See, there's another issue -I've had nothing but trouble *buying* from Dell. My account manager at the last place was, to be blunt, useless. I was lucky to get a reply many times! Then if we needed to order a spare part (an LCD panel for a laptop for example), they couldn't handle it, instead making us call another line which wanted payment there and then via the phone using a card. No amount of wrangling got past that one, so we had to go elsewhere for it. When we did manage to order some spare batteries, they sent us the wrong ones too.

 

HP's reseller network is a lot more robust I would say. Nearly all of my common suppliers don't sell Dell stuff.

 

Really weird, we've had 3 account managers in the 10 years I've been here, all have been great and they tend to beat HP for equivalent kit. We also have no problems ordering spare parts by purchase order, yes it is a different department but we just email them the PO. Really strange how they vary so much.

 

The worst manufacturer I've dealt with are Oracle when they bought out Sun, we had some Sun Unified Storage boxes, they were decommissioned in summer.

[gshaw]

HP for me, Dell's business and support processes lose them more custom than any other major manufacturer I reckon. Procurve network kit is solid and servers also been good for me with the exception of our DL180. That thing has shocking firmware that runs fans at full pelt (10000rpm!) as soon as you install an expansion card, despite having temperature sensors all round the motherboard. Only got it as I needed a server with plenty of drive bays but it's clear the quality of management features drops very sharply on the lower end servers i.e. anything below the 380 series.

 

Dell desktops made me laugh a few years back, sent the same spec to 3 or 4 suppliers (Stone, HP etc) and whereas most came out around the £400 mark for a base unit Dell were giving £750 as their base price, regardless of what channel you get the kit from it the price shouldn't vary by £300!

Edited December 20, 2012 by gshaw

[localzuk]

Really weird, we've had 3 account managers in the 10 years I've been here, all have been great and they tend to beat HP for equivalent kit. We also have no problems ordering spare parts by purchase order, yes it is a different department but we just email them the PO. Really strange how they vary so much.

 

The worst manufacturer I've dealt with are Oracle when they bought out Sun, we had some Sun Unified Storage boxes, they were decommissioned in summer.

 

Worst I dealt with was Fujitsu-Siemens. Awful. Just plain awful. We were an entirely F-S school before they made us wait over a week for support on our Active Directory server which had packed up.

[john]

HP for me, I have got about 100 Dell as well through a school merger and I am finding my stress levels through the roof on them, stupid faults we've swapped a number of mainboards now due to faulty fan controllers, the call centre is poor and generally the kit is poor build quality and the design is poor the Optiplex SFF's we've got are pants design and overheat easily as it hasn't really got any decent fans or airflow where as the HP SFFs we have do.

 

The HP kit I have is simple, parts turn up next day (not that we need many and we probably have heading for 200 of them now), they are well built and feel strong, use off the shelf parts in most cases which I am finding the dells are not using they are slightly custom/not easy to sort out

 

HP Servers have much smarter tools than Dell's in my experience as I have 2 Dell Servers and they just don't have that finishing touch that the HPs do, the iLO on the HP is better than Dell's system, the install tools simpler and the BIOS on a HP wipes the floor with Dell for simplicity, took me 10 minutes to suss out the RAID card on one of the Dells we have where as HP it is just logical and simple.

 

Price wise, I didn't buy these Dells but when I have priced them before HP can always beat the Dell pricing which I am glad about as they are just not worth it, and we certainly have said we won't be considering buying any Dell kit still and will go elsewhere for PCs if the HPs are too costly, Lenovo kit maybe cheap and thus not as well built as the HP but its still better than Dell in my investigations so far