It’s been 3 years since I bought my Dell XPS 8300 desktop. During that time, I’ve had a lot of time to fiddle with the system and form a strong opinion about what I love and hate about it. This includes one very important secret, that anyone who is interested in buying one of Dell’s XPS series of computers, needs to know.
Before we get to that, let’s examine why I purchased this system.
Value
There’s no way to get around this – I got a great deal for the Dell XPS 8300. After some aggressive bargaining at a PC show, I managed to get a further 15% discount on a system that was already very competitively-priced. Eventually I paid SGD$1,870 and here is what I received –
System Specs
Intel Core i7-2600
8GB DDR3 SDRAM
2X1TB HDD
Blu-ray Writer/Reader
1GB AMD Radeon HD 6670
Hauppauge Analog/Digital TV Tuner
Dell ST 2420L 24’W HD LED Monitor
Wireless 802.11 B/G/N
Multimedia Card Reader
3 year on-site next business day service extended warranty
2.1 Dell Speaker System
3 year McAffee Anti Virus
Wireless keyboard and mouse
As I was writing these specs, I was once again struck by what a good deal I received. Even by 2014 standards, this system is a very good deal. A ‘comparable’ DIY system cost about $2100 today, and that is sans Dell’s excellent 3-year on-site service. When I did a comparison in 2011, a comparable system would have cost me about $2300-2400.
Great Service
Speaking of service, nothing beats Dell’s great customer service. I had a good experience with Dell when I purchased the system and the two times I needed them to replace defective parts – once for the graphics card and once for a faulty PCIE USB 3.0 expansion port. For a power user like myself, having next-day on-site service is a life saver. I do not need to do any troubleshooting or lug any parts, or the entire tower(!), to a service centre for repair.
Getting the system delivered directly to my home was also a great convenience.
Dell’s Dirty Secret and Why I am never buying a Dell Again
The Dell XPS 8300, and its successors the Dell XPS 8500 and XPS 8700, are marketed as systems that offers expandability and upgradability.
Those were the main reasons why I chose to purchase a desktop instead of a laptop. In addition to using more powerful desktop-class components that offers greater durability and heat management, desktops are much easier to upgrade than laptops.
But here’s the problem – the XPS’s promise of upgradability is a half-lie.
To be fair, I had no problem installing a 1TB Samsung Evo SSD as my main system drive or increasing my RAM from 8GB to 16GB. But when my father recently bought an ASUS Gaming system for my younger brother, he upgraded the graphics card and gave me the stock card, a nVidia GTX 680 but it did not work with my system.
I did everything I could to troubleshoot the problem. I uninstalled the drivers for the old card, installed the latest drivers for the new card and updated my motherboard’s BIOS but my system couldn’t even recognize the card’s existence. I did a bit more digging and I discovered that several other users were having problems upgrading their system to the latest graphics cards.
The reason? Dell intentionally cripples its motherboard hoping they can force you to upgrade to an entirely new system sooner rather than later. In reality, Dell could simply issue a motherboard BIOs update that would make their systems compatible with the latest graphics cards, but they choose not to. From my research, it appears that Dell only provides motherboard updates for about a year before they release a newer version of that system and cease motherboard support for previous systems.
To make matters worse, Dell uses custom motherboards, so you have to rely on them for software support. Good luck with that. The problem isn’t limited to graphics cards either. Even though Dell’s motherboard uses the LGA1155 socket, the motherboard’s BIOS intentionally locks out the otherwise compatible and newer Ivy Bridge CPUs – another component users cannot upgrade.
Goodbye Dell
When I bought my Dell XPS 8300, I intended to use it ‘stock’ for about 3 years before upgrading some of its parts and using it for another 3-4 years. When I discovered Dell’s horrible motherboard support, I entered panic mode. By this time my system was already 3 years old, so I could only ‘upgrade’ my graphics card to an older, but more powerful graphics card that had been certified by Dell to work with my system.
The problem was trying to find a graphics card that is so old.
When I called a local AMD graphics card distributor to ask if they had a 3-year old graphics card in stock. His reply was understandably incredulous.
“Why are you looking for a 3-year old graphics card?”
I felt quite silly as I explained the situation to him, but he understood and tried to help me source for the card. Unfortunately, his retailers were out of stock so I had to resort to ebay.
Today, my Dell XPS 8300 is running a Gigabyte HD 6950 (1GB) graphic card. It runs well, but I am quite miffed that I am unable to install the latest and greatest graphics cards.
Even though my overall experience with Dell has been positive, and I feel like I got a great deal, the poor motherboard support is a deal-breaker. Why should I have to spend $2000 to replace my entire system every 3 years when I only need to change one part that costs $500?
I feel like I have been completely misled by Dell’s promise of upgradability and expandability.
After another year or two of usage, I will probably replace my Dell XPS 8300. At the moment, I am leaning towards purchasing a custom-built PC. But one thing is for certain, the next desktop I buy will not be a Dell.
