Dell Reflects on 25 Years of PCs 198
An anonymous reader writes "Michael Dell, founder of the world's largest computer company, took a few minutes with CNet News.com to reflect on the past 25 years and offer a few personal notes. While Dell certainly has an impressive business history, he still thinks the best is yet to come. From the article: 'Michael Dell started off using PCs to create homework shortcuts, the way many young people at the time discovered the new devices. Few people, including Dell's parents, realized exactly how large the potential was for the personal computer. More than 20 years after he founded PC's Limited, he admits his parents never quite embraced his decision to leave the University of Texas at Austin to start the company that would eventually bear his name and record $56 billion in revenue during its last fiscal year.'"
Have you hugged your inheritence today? (Score:3, Funny)
Did they "embrace" the money?
Re:Have you hugged your inheritence today? (Score:2)
Re:Have you hugged your inheritence today? (Score:2)
A few million would be enough to convince me to admit I was wrong....
Re:Have you hugged your inheritence today? (Score:2)
If she's like MY mom... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:If she's like MY mom... (Score:2, Funny)
Paying off $100k in student loans with your tips from Denny's?
KFG
Re:If she's like MY mom... (Score:3, Interesting)
Business, Not Computer, Skills (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Business, Not Computer, Skills (Score:2)
I disagree (Score:3, Insightful)
While Mr. Dell might not have been personally in the design process of every machine I bet he did have some influence over
Re:I disagree (Score:3, Interesting)
Oh, is this why Dell computers all have proprietary cases, motherboards, and power supplies? Dell has not done anything to improve standardization in terms of physical components. Dell has simply continued the tradition set by HP, Compaq, and others of creating and using propretary components whenever possible in order to keep the consumer coming back to them and them only when components fail.
Re:I disagree (Score:2)
Re:Business, Not Computer, Skills (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, I may have taken too much cold medicine...
Re:Business, Not Computer, Skills (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Business, Not Computer, Skills (Score:2)
The rules change when your name is Ferrari, your company builds the Ferrari, and you sponsor the Ferrari racing team.
Other dropouts... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:2)
Indeed. As a friend of mine puts it "Gates couldn't start his business in his parent's garage - until he convinced them to move the Sunday Rolls and the Monday Lincoln out of his way".
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:3, Informative)
When he went to UT in 1983 (he was pre-med, IIRC, because being a doctor is "an honorable profession"), there were exactly two licensed IBM dealers in the Austin area. Since IBM allocated machines per store rath
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:2)
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:2, Insightful)
This isn't a difference in the times, it's the difference between being the master or the slave. There's nothing to stop someone from dropping out of High School, founding a company and refusing to hire Phds because they haven't done any post doc work.
As a caveat in support of your thesis, however, I'll note that's its becoming increasing
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:2)
The times haven't changed. If you go into a job interview without much experience, then or now, someone might want to know about your education. Do you think Gates, Jobs or Dell got started in a job interview? As the interview-ee?
If you start your own company, who cares what's expected?
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:2)
Of course they weren't multi-billionaires; but I'd imagine it takes some of the worry away when you know there's that big financial cushion to fall back on if you fail.
Re:Other dropouts... (Score:2)
Even 20-30 years ago, it was the exception and not the rule for a college dropout to be as successful in the business world as guys like Gates, Jobs, and Dell did.
The thousands of other entrepreneurs who did not and could not have been as successful as they were without their college degrees do not get talked about quite as much.
My Work Productivity (Score:2)
I need to convince the place I work at that if they get me setup with a 30 inch monitor, my productivity would skyrocket thru the roof!
Heh (Score:2)
looking back... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:looking back... (Score:2)
Re:looking back... (Score:2)
Dell vs. HP (Score:2, Funny)
I remember early PCs in high school... (Score:5, Interesting)
My high school also had early internet access, thanks to a donation of a 'mini-supercomputer' from a local supercomputer company (Sequent,) and dial-up access provided by a local college during my senior year. This computer had a whopping 32 386 processors, (which makes it marginally slower than my current cell phone,) and our connection used a quad-linked 9600 baud (effective ~38kbps) SLIP connection. It even ran X. Too bad the web browser wasn't invented until after I graduated... I had to wait another two years before the internet became 'public', and a friend and I convinced the local ISP to install SLIP software so we could try out this 'Mosaic' thingy... (On OS/2 of course. We wouldn't be caught dead running Windows.)
Then there was when (this same) friend would spend every night dialed up at 14.4kbps to a BBS in Finland so he could download install disks for this 'Linux' thing... One disk a night. Man, he had a big phone bill that month.
Re:I remember early PCs in high school... (Score:2)
I'll second that.
Even those of us who were around well before the GP was love the nostalgia.
SB
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
Reflect on This (Score:2)
and the future looks HOT (Score:2, Funny)
IBM is chopped liver? (Score:2)
In what alternate universe?
Re:IBM is chopped liver? (Score:2)
The... uh... 21st century one?
Re:IBM is chopped liver? (Score:2)
Re:IBM is chopped liver? (Score:2)
Has to be said (Score:5, Insightful)
The true lesson learned (Score:5, Insightful)
The PC industry is the way it is because IBM just assumed they could patent the interfaces - when they couldn't. When people started to copy them, billions and billions of dollars worth of lawsuits started to fly all over the place. IBM against Compaq, Intel aganst AMD - inspite of great effort and costs, they were given no rights to impose patents over the interface. Maybe this was a failure for IBM and Intel, but it created a nuclear explosion of business, commerce, opportunity, and R&D for the rest of us.
The moral of the story is that patnets do not help R&D and do not help finance R&D, they help lock out competition, and force the industry to fragment and center around a licensing model (which is good for lawyers and bad for engineers) instead of a service model (which is good for engineers, but bad for monopolies).
Re:Dell IS Proprietary (Score:2)
Did you ever try to use a case from Dell? Proprietary too.
Enough with the starry-eyed optimism. It was plain old economics.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_PC_compatible [wikipedia.org]
Re:Dell IS Proprietary (Score:2, Interesting)
IBM anyone? (Score:2)
IBM 114.64B market cap
Dell 56.74B revenue
IBM 88.50B revenue
It would be nice if even some basic facts could be checked. Of course - maybe some ppl think IBM is not a computer company.
ARRRRRRRGH (Score:4, Interesting)
I figured, eh the hospital will always have money, and this kid is likely to go through ups and downs and have cash flow issues, I want the security.
Figure out just how I feel about that.
Dell rocks, or sucks, depending on service tag (Score:2)
Their home support is evil.
There's a clear difference in machine quality, as well. Take two Dell machines, with nearly identical specs, one from the home line and one from the business line.
Same specs = same computer, right? Nope. In addition to the home machine being preloaded with every piece of crap software under the sun, the business machines seem to be better quality. Larger capacitors on the motherboard, perhaps, or j
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:5, Funny)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:4, Interesting)
guessing not a single web app is served out of his compouter, from IIS and .NET technology (one of the main reasons for having PRO)
Actually, I assume the main reason he would choose Pro is because it lets you join domains. Home doesn't have that ability.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Home also doesn't let you change ownership of files either as well as a few other absolutely critical things that home doesn't do. Try it sometime: delete a user in Home then try to recover their files. Home is only usefull if you run everything as administrator wich is exactly what I wish people wouldn't do.
The only thing worse than XP Home is XP Family Edition.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2, Insightful)
Actually, the most likely reason that he's using Pro is that the $50 difference between Home and Pro means nothing to him. He probably doesn't use his computer for some insanely specialized purpose like everyone here seem
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:5, Funny)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:4, Funny)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:3, Funny)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:3, Funny)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:5, Insightful)
Two things.
First, people like to overcompensate for things they could never use but for status. Why buy a car that can go 150mph when its illegal and unfeasible to drive it at that speed?
Secondly, computers age quite fast. If you buy a computer, it is reasonable to overcompensate because in 2-3 years an average computer will be out of date and underpowered. The top of the line computer today will be the below average in 5 years but you still can get some life out of it.
Remember 640K ought to be enough for anyone.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, it makes more sense to buy a middle of the road system today and upgrade it in 1.5 - 2 years. You probably break even on the money since you avoid the premium for the best hw, but you will have more power than t
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
So, over the entire 5 year period you have spent equal (or less) money, and you end up with two systems.
There is only one reason for not doing this: saving the environment.
Otherwise, spending on top of the line computers is always a bad investment.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Otherwise, spending on top of the line computers is always a bad investment.
Or heavy duty photo and video editing, or animation, or developing extremely large and complex systems, or anything else that takes a lot of processing power or memory....
Some people actually need the power of high end systems.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2, Insightful)
Illegal? Sure, on public roads. Doesn't stop people from doing it. I've been to 150 MPH plenty of times on the interstate and on long, straight, clear highways. And there are plenty of race courses where you can take your car to stretch its legs, legally.
Furthermore, a car that can do 150 MPH generally has a lot more power than one th
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Illegal? Yeah.
Unfeasible? After owning a Toyota Corolla for 13 years, I recently bought a car which is electronically limited to 130 mph, and which I have no doubt would otherwise be capable of 150 mph. And here's the funny thing about it: the handling on this car (an Audi A3) is sooooo much better than on my old car that
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
We can go further with this... (Score:4, Insightful)
If I were to guess, he probably hasn't spent more than $100 million of that.
Yeah, I bet he only uses one of them at a time! And he probably doesn't even go over 70mph!
He totally doesn't use any more than 10,000 square feet, I bet!
Point: welcome to the gratuitous world of the absurdly wealthy.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
From the article, Dell says he has their top of the line Dell Precision.
He had a Dell notebook, but it got consumed in an office fire...
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's -SETI? (Score:2)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2, Interesting)
Of course, management came down heavy on him. "Why is your department only using 15% of their machines capabilities! Every other department has 100% utilization of their resources". The other managers had just filled out 100% in the weekly reports.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not really sure I see your point.
First, Mr. Dell did not pay retail for this machine-- in fact in all likelihood the company owns it, not him. I would also say it doesn't look good for
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Re:I doubt it is standard XP Pro... (Score:3, Interesting)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Ext
True, it's not the same as full 64-bit support, as any individual process has to jump through hoops to use more than a 32-bit address space. XP Pro can certainly make use of it, though.
Re:I doubt it is standard XP Pro... (Score:2)
Re:I doubt it is standard XP Pro... (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, XP should be able to make perfectly good use of that RAM for disk cache, which could provide a substantial benefit to all processes.
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
Re:hmmm, some generic info about CEO Dell's home P (Score:2)
IBM? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:IBM? (Score:2)
Re:IBM? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:IBM? (Score:2)
Re:IBM? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:IBM? (Score:2)
I take issue with the word invented in this context. The concept of a personal computer was well established long before the IBM PC was released. Their design wound up being popular and is the predecessor to the current x86 based designs, but that doesn't mean they "invented" it.
Lots of folks also think that Thomas Edison invented the incandescent light bulb, or that Ford invented either the car or the assembly line, but those notions are just as wrong.
Re:IBM? (Score:4, Funny)
I bet you read eula's too
Re:IBM? (Score:2)
Re:IBM? (Score:2)
Re:Express Service Code (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Express Service Code - Dell Secret Blogger (Score:2)
Ah, the Dell secret blogger emerges. And so much better than the over-moderated, homogenized pap on One2One.dell.com.
Re:Express Service Code (Score:2)
US support for Dell (for those who bought the premium warranty) is decent if not wonderful. The Indian tech support for the rest of the peons is plagued by bad connections and difficulty understanding the reps' Engrish. If you're gonna hire someone to interface with customers, you'd best make sure that they run software perfectly for the pro
Re:Express Service Code-Between What??? (Score:2)
If you're "between calls", I take it that the next person who calls for assistance will be connected immediately with no wait time at all.
Boy have I slipped into another dimension lately.
Re:Express Service Code (Score:2)
And wonderful apostrophe skill's, apparently.
Re:Express Service Code (Score:2, Interesting)
So if they realise you have the smarts, you can be elevated to a similarly rated tech.
Imagine the efficiencies it would create for both sides!
Re:Business Support (Score:4, Interesting)
That's because you have the good warranty plan. The poor schmucks who get the "home use" Dells like the Dimension with the regular warranty are the ones who get sent to Apu and Pradeep. (No offense intended to Indians, but people who don't speak English shouldn't be doing tech support for Americans!)
-b.
Re:Business Support (Score:2)
Re:Business Support (Score:3, Funny)
While I appricate the fact that it's often easier to understand someone from your own region, America is a big enough place that regional dialects really get in the way of understanding. I would rather get tech
Re:Business Support (Score:2)
Actually, I've had experience with a few small software companies based in Texas who did their own support. Competent, polite, helpful, and knowledgable for the most part. And it's not so much a problem with understanding *them*, it's a problem with *them* understanding you, whereas even the language divide between Take-san and Noo-Yawhki
Re:Business Support (Score:2)