A Tale of Two Companies

In the late 1960s I worked for Control Data in South Africa helping to install and run a triple mainframe system at Iscor, the large steel conglomerate. While there, I saw an ad in Datamation about the IBM System/360, which was then quite new. I wrote to IBM for more information, but none came. So, after several weeks, I wrote to Thomas J. Watson Jr., the CEO of IBM.

Very quickly a reply arrived on magnificent stationary signed by Mr. Watson himself, or so it seemed. The letter explained that, unfortunately, no additional information could be sent since I had not provided a return address. The package also contained the asked-for literature and a copy of my original letter. It was hand-written on a one-page aerogram common at the time and it, indeed, lacked a return address. My first reaction was one of deep embarrassment, but that was soon replaced by a feeling of immense admiration for a company that would store, somewhere in the world, what was essentially a worthless piece of paper and have the ability and will to retrieve it and to respond to my unjustified complaint. This was before the age of the Internet, large-scale databases, and even fax. The goodwill thus engendered stayed with me all my life, whether considering IBM products, buying IBM stock, or dealing with IBM people.

Some time ago I bought a PC from Dell. It was only the second PC I bought, the first had been the original IBM PC. In between I had built a number of PCs from scratch, buying parts in computer stores. But this had become uneconomical, even if I valued my time as nothing.

The Dell system worked well until I installed a second hard drive. Curiously, it would transfer data correctly, but take 5-7 times longer than it should. Thus copying a large picture folder would stretch from a few minutes to an hour.

I called Dell support and was told a number of times that this was a third party drive and "we do not troubleshoot third party equipment". I could quickly show that the original Dell drive, as well as my new "third party" drive (which was the same make as the Dell), and another drive I had salvaged all had the same problem of excessive tardiness when connected as a second drive. All three worked flawlessly as the primary drive. I also pointed out that there was no prohibition against adding third party equipment to a Dell system. There is even a section in the official manual on how to install a second hard drive.

Pursuing this turned into a morale-sapping nightmare. There were the endless waits on hold and the many disconnected calls. Once I was given a non-existing number, once I ended up in an endless loop. All the young Indian women - and they were mostly women - were charming and unfailingly polite, but they all insisted on starting with their script from the beginning. After a while I worked my way up to managers. None of them was interested in the problem, all wanted to get rid of me, one was downright rude.

After about three weeks of daily calls the verdict was that Dell does not support second hard drives, whether third party or their own. However, I could return the system, which I did, paying the freight both ways.

Incredibly, a few weeks later I bought another Dell computer. I had been told that they had never before seen my problem, so I figured the chance of ending up with the same problem was infinitesimal. Although I bought a different model, it came with the identical problem. This time I did not even bother to call Dell support. I solved the problem myself and it took only a minute to fix. The BIOS entry for the second hard drive was set up incorrectly. Perhaps I should have thought of this sooner. But none of the Dell "experts" had thought of it, the manual section on how to install a second hard drive did not mention it, and Dell cannot assume that all customers are conversant with the BIOS.

I then wrote a letter to Mr. Dell. It was returned to me unopened, by company policy I assume, and the thought occurred to me that Mr. Dell is not Mr. Watson and that Dell, the company, is not IBM.