Dell to face lawsuit in China over false advertising

The world's leading personal computer maker, Dell Inc may face a possible lawsuit in China for alleged false advertising regarding chips in its laptop computers, state press has reported.

A Shanghai court is reviewing the lawsuit filed by 19 Chinese consumers who claim that some of Dell's laptops are installed with the lower quality chips (Inter T2300E CPUs) rather than the more expensive T2300, advertised by the US firm and identified on the company’s order forms, consequently preventing various software upgrades.

Whereas the latest chip, the T2300, enables users to access multiple operating systems at the same time in a process called "virtualization", the lower quality chip T2300E does not.

These claimants say Dell has “not provided them with acceptable products” and are asking the computer maker to refund twice the value of the goods and pay all legal costs. The angry consumers are also demanding the computer manufacturer to issue a formal apology.

An average Dell laptop costs around US$1,000.
On the other hand, Dell reportedly says there is no difference for consumers using CPU T2300 or T2300E.

However, Sharon Zhang, a spokeswoman for Dell at China headquarters in Beijing, confessed that the Texas-based company had made an error but had since done its best to make amends.

Apologizing for the mistake that occurred after the company started switching chips on certain laptop models but the sales brochures and order forms were not updated on time, Zhang said, "We have acknowledged that this is an error, that this error is unfortunate and unintended. We have apologized for the inconvenience and the misunderstanding and the confusion caused to customers."

"Most customers were satisfied with an apology but for those who were not satisfied we offered full refund, which many customers took," she informed.

But, on contrary, Zhang Min, who was first to file his case in Shanghai, said that negotiations with the Texas-based group had come out with fruitless results.

"I tried to negotiate with Dell and simply asked them to change the CPU, but they said there was no difference between the two and it was unnecessary to change (it)," Zhang Min was quoted by a newspaper as saying.

"My lawyer sent them a letter demanding compensation which Dell chose to ingore, so we decided to sue."

Guo Zhongfang, one of the lawyers linked with the cases, said, "Dell has defrauded Chinese consumers and should be fined according to the law."

An online bulletin board established by Dell consumers in China has enlisted up to 500 complainants so far, which could mean the number of lawsuits against the world's largest PC manufacturer will accelerate.