Opuscula My last HP ?

I MAY HAVE JUST BOUGHT MY LAST HP computer.

I once owned an HP Compaq – my original HP Compaq was defective (it happens) and HP’s Customer Service made sure I had a replacement in short order. HP, “back in the day,” was known to stand for High Price and High Performance. Carly Fiorina was CEO of HP when I got my replacement Compaq.

WHEN I WAS A YOUNG reporter for the Titusville (FL) Star Advocate I decided I needed my own camera rather than borrowing the company’s TLR Yashicas and Rolleis (both good cameras, but bulky.) The newspaper loaned me $125 – reporters didn’t make a lot then – and I ordered a Honeywell Pentax SLR.

Japan’s Pentax had a pretty good reputation, but Honeywell, before it let any cameras with the Honeywell name get into customers’ hands, did its own QC in the States. When my new camera (an H3v) arrived, the package included a note that the camera had been inspected by Honeywell. Comforting.

I used the camera for many years before giving it to a friend who, after using it for many years, gave it to his son-in-law.

My latest – and likely last – HP product is made in China. Had I known that BEFORE I ordered the notebook I would have bought a different brand.

Being made in China, with that country’s well-deserved reputation for shoddy workmanship and zero QA/QC, is bad enough if there is at least QA/QC in the States a la Honeywell.

Because the notebook is being delivered by FedEx, I am able to track its movements from China to my door.

It came into the U.S. at Anchorage Alaska where it sat for 2 hours and 20 minutes; hardly time to inspect the product.

It then traveled to Memphis TN where it spent all of 17 minutes. Memphis is a FedEx hub. No QA/QC in Memphis.

HP – not the customer – instructed FedEx “Per shipper instructions, package will not be delivered until the scheduled delivery date. The “delivery date” is 12/12 before 4:30 p.m.

TO BE FAIR, the computer was delivered by FedEx one day early, on 11 December 2017. (Added 12-11-17)

Since the product left Memphis at 4:19 a.m. 12/10 (Sunday) I wonder if

(a) FedEx is trucking it to the local FedEx facility or (b) flying down where it will sit until HP allows it to be delivered.

My family geek will be arriving on the morning of 12/12, preparing for his Mother’s sufganiot and latkes and the lighting of a hanukiah (Hanukah menorah). Had the notebook arrived on 12/11, he could have helped me dual-boot Linux on the Win 10 machine.

According to a ZDnet article, ​How to install Linux Mint on your Windows PC”¹, installing Linux Mint next to Win 10 should be easy enough that (with apologies to GEICO) “even a caveman (this scrivener) could do it.” Still, having a computer-literate son standing by provides a “warm fuzzy” feeling.)

Bottom line

I know that being a private individual – vs. a Big Business – and ordering one device – rather than 100s – means I am a low priority for HP.

Low priority or not, given China’s reputation for sending garbage to the U.S. – even their food products are tainted², – HP should have instituted some level of QA/QC on all (100% sampling)³ Chinese-made computers coming into the U.S. Granted, this would delay delivery (a small price for the consumer to pay) and would cost HP to develop an automated inspection process so manpower would be less of an expense, but it would give curmudgeons a level of confidence currently lacking.

HP will take the computer back for repairs or replacement and even pay shipping costs for the first year, but while the computer is (a) in transit to HP, (b) at HP’s repair facility, and (c) in transit back to me, I have no computer. No email. No messages to print and snail mail. No blogging.

If the failed computer or its hard drive is replaced, that means reinstalling Linux (‘course by then I’ll be an “experienced” installer) and restoring all the files I carefully saved to external media, and again purging everything that came with Win 10 (all I want is the OS – “just in case” I can’t find a needed driver on a Linux or Ubuntu site. I’m pretty confident I’ll find what I want for Linux, but . . . )

• Chinese product.

• No domestic QA/QC

• Possibly delaying delivery for no good reason other than seller’s whim.

Pity I am a risk management practitioner who always looks at “what it” and not a Pollyanna who would never recognize a risk.

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1. ZDnet: http://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-install-linux-mint-on-your-windows-pc/

2. Chinese products:

http://tinyurl.com/y866r3nu http://tinyurl.com/ya8tsv9k http://tinyurl.com/y99n2pt6

3. Sampling: If China ever earns a reputation for safe, quality products sampling can be on a decreasing percentage of incoming products.

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

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