A Visit To A "Dell Store"

Is it called a "Dell Store"? What I mean is a retail outlet selling Dell products. I visited one last night at the Digital Mall in Petaling Jaya. I went there to have a feel of the Inspiron 1420, a laptop on offer for the PC Fair period. The offer appears to be really good if you are looking for a laptop at this time. It ends Monday, 21 April 2008. You can visit Dell's website for this offer.

Anyway, this blog is about my visit to the Dell Store. The store offers cash and carry services, so unlike purchasing from the website (which takes up to a week), you get to pay and own one almost immediately. When I reached there, I noticed at least 3 different groups of people were in the process of getting a laptop. The focus of this particular store is mainly on laptops. I saw only one desktop and one printer on display. The rest are all laptops, with the majority the Inspiron 1420. There were a unit of XPS M1330 and a M1530. I did not notice other products as my main focus was the 1420. I wanted to have a look at the Inspiron 1525, too, but it was not on display.

A sales rep approached and handed me a brochure of Dell Store's PC Fair promotions. At first glance, they all seemed similar to the ones on the website but there are big differences. The rep told me that they were more or less the same, except that the retail offers Windows-less systems, which over here, they are called "Free DOS". Is this a common term across the globe?

The other major difference that the sales guy stressed on was the CPUs are of higher specifications. Free DOS and higher spec CPU will make the pricing similar to those on the website. So for those that want an operating system-less Dell here in Malaysia, a visit to the store is required because Dell's website does not offer such systems.

Another good point that the sales rep pointed out was that if you purchased from them and you went home with any defects within 3 days, you could still bring it back to the store for an exchange (well, I wouldn't know if this is sales talk or what).

The disadvantage in purchasing from the store is, the sales rep did point this out, too, you would not be able to customise on things like type of LCDs on the laptop, the CPU, and other more internal stuff. RAM upgrades are available, though. This is in-line with Dell's recent announcement to place more focus on pre-built systems.

Update 4:05pm: One thing that I forgot to mention was that the sales rep told me extra charges will apply if payment is made by credit card once the promotional period is over. This doesn't happen if purchase is made online.

My personal preference would be if I were to buy a Dell laptop, I would like to visit a Dell Store to have some hands-on BUT would return to the website to make my purchase. This is provided I am not in any urgent need of a laptop. I still prefer the Dell buy direct concept.

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