HP vs. Dell: Who Keeps Your System Updated Better?

[Jason Dunn]

<img border="0" src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/500/dht/auto/1209574953.usr1.jpg" alt="" /><br /><br />Historically, I've always had custom-picked PCs built for me, or I've assembled them myself using Shuttle XPCs as the basis for the build. When it came to laptops, I was a three-consecutive-model Fujitsu guy, so I didn't have a lot of experience when it came to long-term ownership of more mainstream brands such as Dell and HP. In the past year, I've switched gears a bit and now own two HP Pavilion Slimline desktop computers, a Dell XPS M1330 laptop, and am in the process of reviewing an HP tx2000 laptop. I've noticed something quite interesting regarding the software tools that HP and Dell use for keeping the computer running smooth: HP's tools are very sophisticated, and Dell's tools are quite crude.<br /><br />Let's talk about updates for a minute: while Windows Update does a great job at keeping the Windows operating system up to date with patches, it's much less useful when it comes to hardware drivers and software application updates. More often than not, I've found that if I listen to Windows Update and download an updated hardware driver, I end up screwing up my system in some fashion. So while Microsoft will eventually improve the tool to the point where I'll trust it again, for now if there are driver updates for the system, it's up to the system manufacturer to make that as easy and transparent as possible for the user. <MORE /><br /><br />On my Dell laptop, and a Dell desktop I owned previously, the only way to get updates was to go to the Dell Web site, find your particular system configuration, and then try to figure out which ones were never than the ones you had. Dell's support software made that a bit easier by taking you directly to the driver page for your particular machine, but it did nothing to help you ascertain which drivers you really needed. Dell is trying to improve though: just last week I noticed that after I manually downloaded a support update, the support tool will now add little messages that have direct links to the updated downloads. That's better than their old system, but it sill pales in comparison to HP's method.<br /><br />HP's software, called HP Update (pictured below) is damn near perfect - it runs once a week (by default), and if it finds an updated driver of piece of HP software, it will ask for permission to download and install the update. That's exactly what software like this should do, and anything less is a complete failure. I should point out that HP's software isn't quite perfect - the first month or so that I tried to run this on one of the Slimline PCs, it would find driver updates, then fail to download them - week after week. Eventually that problem magically fixed itself via an HP Update software update, and now it's working smoothly. HP has really set the bar here.<br /><br /><img border="1" src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com//dht/auto/1209574685.usr1.gif" alt="" /><br /><em>Figure 1: HP Update works great...for the most part.</em><br /><br />But wait...it gets even better for HP and worse for Dell! As I was working on one of the HP Slimline PCs, the HP Hardware Diagnostic Tools software started up - this was the first time I'd seen it. The diagnostic software is extremely detailed and does a very thorough testing of the hard drive, CPU, RAM, network ports, and even the CMOS on the motherboard. This type of preventative scanning is helpful in diagnosing problems, especially in the case of hard drives of RAM that are in a partially failed state. The HP diagnostic tools run automatically once per month, and I suspect that if a problem was found, the user would be alerted to it. Dell has their own diagnostic tools, but I've never seen an automatic scan happen, nor do they seem to be as thorough as the HP tools.<br /><br /><img border="1" src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com//dht/auto/1209574049.usr1.gif" alt="" /><br /><em>Figure 2: HP's Diagnostic Tool.<br /><br /></em>Lastly, HP has their Total Care Advisor - which, frankly, I'm not as impressed with. It's bloated, extremely slow, and seems to be more of a marketing tool pimping HP products and broadband providers than actually doing anything useful for the customer. On every HP system I come across (friends, family, etc.) I always disable this product from loading - HP needs to do some serious optimization of this software to make it worthwhile.<br /><br />So, all in all, I have to hand it to HP for having useful software in place on their customers computers for keeping things running smoothly - now if I could only get HP to stop pre-installing all that junk software...<br /><br /><em>Jason Dunn owns and operates <a href="http://www.thoughtsmedia.com/" target="_blank">Thoughts Media Inc.</a>, a company dedicated to creating the best in online communities. He enjoys mobile devices, digital media content creation/editing, and pretty much all technology. He lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada with his lovely wife, and his sometimes obedient dog. He's become a bit of an HP fan lately.</em>

[timmy]

I partly agree with you, Jason.

I have a three year old HP Pavilion ZD8000 at home and up til recently had a three year old Dell at work (got it replaced a while ago :))

HP has much better software tools for updates than Dell. But when it comes to keeping the support for an older model Dell is better in my case.

Example:

HP released updated video drivers for my ZD8000 for the last time in 2006 and the bluetooth stack was not upgraded beyond Widcomm's v3. The video drivers (ATI X600) are still updated by ATI but HP does not make a version for the ZD8000, and I can't download them from ATI. They just point at HP.

During the same time period Dell has continued to publish new driver versions on their website for my work laptop.

Even though I don't expect full support for everything for a three year old HP, still Dell shows that they provide that support. I might just be lucky having a work laptop with a big customer base and a home laptop with a small one, but this is my experience.

[Tim Williamson]

One of my roommates has a Dell PC, he had Vista, but was having a lot of trouble so he went back to XP. I helped him use his Dell XP disk to go back, it went smooth, except I was really surprised that it didn't install the drivers automatically. So I thought, hey we can just go to the web site and type in the PC serial number and it will give us the configuration that he has. WRONG. It brings up this huge list of possible hardware, so I told my roommate he'll pretty much have to go through and try each one until there's a match. I was really disappointed with this experience and was confused why Dell would make it this difficult.

[makicr]

I got a HP laptop for my son. It is one of the cheapo ones (I don't recall the model number). I have had nothing but problems with the HP update. It tries to load drivers, then just fails. each week it tries again, just to fail. I have to manually install the drivers to get them to stick.

Next, about 10 of the keys came off of the keyboard (and were impossible to get to snap back on). Warranted, my son and his friends are quite tough on the poor little laptop. Positive side was that I was able to buy a replacement keyboard on Ebay (direct from Hong Kong, actually) for $20 and install it myself. While it was pretty easy to install, I have to say that replacing keyboards on old IBM laptops is much easier (I cannot speak to the new Lenovos).

I have no direct experience with Dell's but my ex-father-in-law had a series of them and he seemed to be happy with them.

[Jason Dunn]

Even though I don't expect full support for everything for a three year old HP, still Dell shows that they provide that support. I might just be lucky having a work laptop with a big customer base and a home laptop with a small one, but this is my experience.

An interesting counter-point! I've gone through similar things with Fujitsu in terms of them not updating drivers....I really, really, really hate it how most laptop manufacturers don't have an open video driver model where we can just download the latest drivers from NVIDIA or ATI. :mad:

[Jason Dunn]

I have had nothing but problems with the HP update. It tries to load drivers, then just fails. each week it tries again, just to fail. I have to manually install the drivers to get them to stick.

Well that sucks! I had a bit of that as I mentioned in the article, but it didn't last very long and within a couple of weeks the updates were being installed smoothly. Although on my HP Slimline (I swear I always type "Slimeline" first) that I use for a testbed computer, it won't burn the restore DVDs...it keeps telling me that there's no compatible DVD burner installed. :rolleyes:

HP sure isn't perfect, but they impress me more than Dell in most ways.

[Bill_P]

I found this thread while looking for information comparing HP and Dell systems. I have purchased from Dell for a number of years and been reasonably happy with the systems. It is about time to relegate my current Dell system to backup duty and, for the first time, I am seriously considering the purchase of an HP system. Next month (August, 2008) Costco is offering an HP Pavilion a6567c desktop bundled with an HP w2408h 24" LCD wide-screen monitor for $1,149.99 US (after a coupon for $100.00 off). The desktop features the Intel Core 2 Quad (Q6600), 4GB RAM, a 640GB drive, a 16X double layer Lightscribe CD/DVD drive, an NVIDIA GeForce 9300 GE graphics card with 256MB, and Windows Vista Home Premium with Windows Media Center (64-bit). It seems like a deal too good to pass up, and Costco has a relatively liberal 90-day return policy.

I noted with interest that Jason has become "...a bit of an HP fan lately," and I would appreciate an opinion on the HP system from those of you who have experience with HP systems.

[Jason Dunn]

I noted with interest that Jason has become "...a bit of an HP fan lately," and I would appreciate an opinion on the HP system from those of you who have experience with HP systems.

I've owned two HP desktop systems, both Slimline systems, and they've been great - I think that's a lot of computer for the money, and I'm sure it would handle anything you throw at it. :)

[Bill_P]

I've owned two HP desktop systems, both Slimline systems, and they've been great - I think that's a lot of computer for the money, and I'm sure it would handle anything you throw at it. :)

Thanks, Jason. Once I have some experience with the HP system, I'll report back on what a long-time Dell user thinks of HP.