Watchdog

WARRANTIES NO GUARANTEE

ed specifically to protect your interests as a consumer. Over the page, we check out the latest PC prices on the high street and direct from manufacturers in Price watch. No matter who you buy a computer from, you'll get the chance to buy an extended warranty or pay extra to upgrade to onsite service. But is it worthwhile, or merely a chance for retailers to make a quick buck by selling overpriced bits of paper?

Last time the Office of Fair Trading looked at extended warranties - for consumer electronics goods rather than for PCs - it thought most of them were a rip-off. But how about computers?

Here, there's a huge variation. At one end of the spectrum, some retailers offer a five-year guarantee for the best part of #500, and some readers have complained about salesmen trying to push them into this deal. At the other, we've seen PCs that came with a five-year labour-only warranty for free, so all you pay for is parts - and they are getting cheaper all the time.

Watchdog's advice is to think very carefully indeed if you're tempted by extended warranties. As a rule of thumb, most electronic equipment will fail within three to six months if it is going to go wrong at all, well within the standard warranty period. What's more, buy a PC now and, though it will continue to run current software for years, packages two or three years hence will be slow - if they work at all. There's no point buying a five-year warranty if you'll get a new PC before the guarantee runs out.

Most important is the price. #400 is a lot of money - keep it in the bank, and you can afford to replace hard disk, motherboard and even the processor if anything does go wrong.

Make up your own mind, but if you think an extended warranty is too expensive or you're being pressured into buying it, walk away.

MAIL ORDER - KNOW YOUR RIGHTS

It may seem crazy, but when you buy a copy of Windows or Word for your PC, you don't actually buy the software itself. Instead, you buy a licence to use the program, which you have to agree to when you install or use the package for the first time.

The licence is an agreement which allows you to use the software as long as you obey certain conditions. One of these is that you must not make or use illegal copies of the program, so it's important to ensure that any software you install is legitimate.

As soon as you buy software, whether on its own or supplied with a new PC, you should check that the original licence agreement is included in the package. Most manufacturers make this look fancy - Microsoft includes a certificate of authenticity complete with textured green print and a hologram - to help you be sure it is the genuine article.

If it's not there, or you suspect that you've been supplied with dodgy software, you should immediately contact your dealer to find out what is going on. If you don't get a satisfactory answer, get in touch with your local Trading Standards Office.

If you've bought your software retail, you should also always have an installation CD-ROM.

Normally, you will get this with pre-installed packages too, but sometimes dealers charge extra for the disc. This is legitimate - check before you buy that you will get a full set of discs.

CASE FILE

If you look at Gateway's adverts, you'll see that the company claims its desktop systems are 'expandable to 768Mb' of RAM. This claim caught the eye of a What PC? reader who wanted a system for heavyweight photo-editing, and he gave Gateway a call.

To his surprise, the salesman told him that this massive memory could only be achieved by installing 256Mb DIMMs on the motherboard - and Gateway could not supply these. Puzzled, he rang other suppliers to source the chips he wanted and found that no-one stocks them.

We spoke to Gateway, whose spokesperson said the company is 'legally bound' to state the expandability of its systems, but does not carry 256Mb DIMMs because they are too expensive.

So if you buy a Gateway system now, you can't fit it with 768Mb of RAM.

Whatever Gateway's intentions, Watchdog believes that customers will infer that 768Mb systems are available now.

Interestingly, almost no other companies publicise the expandability of their systems. They don't seem concerned about breaching their 'legal obligations' in this respect - and where they do make the calculations, they almost all use the currently available 128Mb DIMMs.

WRITE TO WATCHDOG

If you have a case for us to solve or a story that needs investigating write to: Watchdog, What PC? Editorial, VNU Business Publications, 32-34 Broadwick Street, London W1A 2HG, or e-mail us on watchdog@whatpc.vnu.co.uk.

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