Today's technology rant...

is more of a resigned sigh than a rant, I guess. My formerly reliable and trustworthy Dell 700m laptop has of late become a shitty little piece of shit laptop. First, the 71WH, 4800 mAH, Type C6017 extended life battery is dying. It basically only holds a little over an hour charge when fully charged with the DVD/CDROM drive running. For the last couple of years, it would regularly give me three plus hours with DVDs, a lifesaver on long flights. Researching it some, I've come to find out that almost everyone hates these batteries, which are close kin to the infamous firestarter Dell batteries which have resulted in at least three recalls in the last several years.

In addition, ont he ferry ride up here, the DVD/CDROM drive has started to malfunction, and doesn't like to correctly play DVDs for much more than an hour or two.

Mere coincidence that this all starts to go down after my 2 year extended warranty period ended in April? Truth be told, though, the extended warranty wasn't worth a shit anyway. When I had problems within a year, I spent endless and worthless hours on the phone with "technical support" who ran be through a series of stupid checklists, and ultimately I resolved the problem through some advice I found online.

Moral of the story? That Dell laptops suck, and I won't buy one again? Not really. I actually think it's a sad statement about built-in obsolescence, which manufacturers shamelessly apply to pretty much all consumer products these days. I still have a Mac Powerbook 5300c from 1996! that works fine, and offers better battery life than my Dell 700m from 2005. Okay, then, is the moral of the story that Macs are better than Dells for this purpose? Nope, not that, either: I know plenty of people with newer Max laptops that have jad just as shitty of lifespans.

No, I think the moral of the story is that computer (and consumer electronics) manufacturers have figured out that we, the purchasing public, have an endless capacity for ignorant spending and replacing and consumerism. In short: we're fools, and they know it. Pretty irritating, isn't it?

On a related note of irritation: sometime recently, Costco changed the only decent refund policy in the industry, and now only offers 60 or 90 days on electronics. I forget which, but it's not important, since it's a damn sight less than the lifetime satisfaction guarantee that they used to offer on everything they sold. That eliminates what was usually the primary reason, beyond decent (but usually not extraordinary) prices, to purchase from Costco. I used to almost always buy from them even when it wasn't precisely what I wanted. Now? Depends on where the price is right. And no, Costco, the "technical support" you offer as part of your Concierge services isn't a good substitute.