Spam Or Not? You Decide:

[Atrocities]

THIS IS A LEGAL NOTICE THAT MAY PERTAIN TO YOU REGARDING THE SETTLEMENT OF A CLASS ACTION INVOLVING CERTAIN HEWLETT-PACKARD ("HP") COMPUTERS.

THIS COURT-ORDERED NOTICE MAY AFFECT YOUR RIGHTS. PLEASE READ IT CAREFULLY. IT WAS SENT FROM AN AUTOMATED SYSTEM AND REPLIES WILL NOT BE ANSWERED.

CLASS ACTION SETTLEMENT NOTICE

Melissa Dukes and Thomas J. Dolan v. Hewlett-Packard Company

Case No. CV-2002-270

(Circuit Court of Phillips County, Arkansas)

If you are the original purchaser or recipient of a particular model of HP brand computer after September 1, 2001, you may be entitled to relief under a proposed class action settlement.


YOUR RIGHTS MAY BE AFFECTED. THIS NOTICE IS ONLY A BRIEF SUMMARY. YOU SHOULD OBTAIN THE FULL NOTICE OF CLASS ACTION SETTLEMENT ("CLASS NOTICE") AS SPECIFIED BELOW.


What is this lawsuit about?

The lawsuit the Court preliminarily approved for settlement as a nationwide class action and this notice is titled Melissa Dukes and Thomas J. Dolan, individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, v. Hewlett-Packard Company, Case No. CV-2002-270. Plaintiffs allege that HP committed deceptive and unfair trade practices because HP allegedly did not disclose to Plaintiffs and Class Members that HP: (a) placed recovery software on certain PC hard disk drives, which reduced the storage space on their computer hard drives; (b) did not provide them CD-ROMs containing recovery software; and, (c) loaded a version of the Windows XP operating system that did not include the "ValueAdd" and "Support" folders, which were included in stand-alone versions of Windows XP available for purchase separately. Plaintiffs claim that the foregoing practices caused damages to them and the Class. However, HP believes and contends that the current configuration of the Class PC Models is preferred, and that hard drive recovery is superior to recovery with CDs. HP denies any and all liability for the claims alleged in Plaintiffs_ lawsuit. By preliminarily approving the Settlement of this lawsuit, the Court has not decided in favor of the Plaintiffs or HP.

Who Is The "Class" Of Consumers Covered By This Settlement?

If you are the original purchaser or recipient of one of the Class PC Models listed in Exhibit A to the Class Notice, then your HP computer is a model included in the Settlement and you are a member of the Class. Excluded from the Class are: employees of HP and persons closely associated with HP, persons or entities involved in the manufacturing of the Class PC Models, resellers or distributors of the Class PC Models, and any persons or entities that have previously obtained from HP the specific relief provided for in the Settlement.

What are My Options if I am a Class Member?

You May File a Claim to Receive the Settlement Benefits. Class Members must submit a properly completed Requested Relief Form by September 9, 2005. Class Members may complete a Requested Relief Form, or request a copy of the form, online at http://www.computersettlement.com/.

You May do Nothing, Remain in the Settlement Class, but Receive no Benefits. By doing nothing you consent to remain a member of the settlement class. You will not receive the available benefits and you will be unable to assert a claim against HP and other released parties in the future on the basis of the allegations in this settlement.

You May Remain in the Class and Object to any of the Terms of the Settlement. As fully described in the Class Notice, to do this you must file a written objection with the Court and mail a copy to the attorneys for the parties. To be valid, any objection must fully comply with the requirements set forth in the Class Notice and be received by July 6, 2005.

You May Exclude Yourself from the Settlement and not Participate in the Benefits of the Settlement and not be Bound. Your signed exclusion request, clearly stating your wish to be excluded from the Class and including the information listed in the Class Notice, must be mailed to the address specified in the Class Notice and must be received by July 6, 2005 or it will not be valid.

To get information including an explanation of who is affected by this settlement, a list of available benefits, and a complete explanation of all important deadlines you must read the Notice of Class Action Settlement, which may be accessed at the website below.

http://www.computersettlement.com/

DO NOT TELEPHONE THE COURT OR THE COURT CLERK

For more information, visit http://www.computersettlement.com/ or call 1-866-778-1148.

The Tracking Number and Passcode for submitting your Relief Form online are as follows:

1406314

V819R51

This Notice is being sent to potential Class Members as required by the Stipulation of Settlement. The Stipulation of Settlement requires the Settlement Administrator to provide legal notice to all email addresses provided by Plaintiffs_ counsel or HP pursuant to the Stipulation of Settlement. This is not a recurring email.

Recipients can unsubscribe by emailing your request to the address below:

unsubscribe@computersettlement.com

Poorman-Douglas Corp.

10300 SW Allen Blvd.

Beaverton, OR 97005




I have no idea to be honest with you.

[Leslie]

I am sure this falls under the heading of spam.

I have nothing to base that on, other than walks like a duck, quacks like a duck.... you know what I mean eh.

[capnq]

The obvious question is, have you ever bought an HP computer with XP installed? If you haven't, it's definitely spam.

I'm not sure e-mail is a valid way to distribute a legal notice. ISTM such things would be distributed by snail mail. OTOH, one occaisionally sees these things advertised in magazines.

If it's spam, someone went to a lot of effort to make it look legit.

[Atrocities]

It could be based off of HP's email lists, but more likely than not, it is just scam sight trying to get my personal info as it was also emailed to my new email account. One that I know HP does not have unless they have hacked into my computer, downloaded all of my hidden and encrpyted files, brain washed me, and had me abducted by aliens, and force fed ground up liver worms through a grapefuite.

COme to think of it, I did wake up with a really bad taste in my mouth this morning, kinda like dirty grapefruit.... I live alone.

[Atrocities]

Well it is not spam. I just got the offical letter today in the mail. Ouch. I guess I shall go to the web site and sign up for my free download.

[Suicide Junkie]

Why in hell would HP put the reinstall / "recovery" software on the harddrive?!?

That has got to be one of the lamest ideas EVER.
If the user needs to reinstall windows, there is a good probability that they've lost control of the machine to viruses and crapware.
Assuming they still have the ability to run programs at will, there is no guarantee that the recovery software hasn't been eaten by viruses.

Heck, I've encouraged common people to partition their harddrive and keep a backup of their clean install for easy restoration.
They say "Meh, if my disk dies, everything is gone, and its pointless!" Which is quite true.
The backup on harddrive only helps if windows keels over and dies peacefully. Or if you decide to put it out of its misery before it goes completely.

[Richard]

Compaq used to do this crap. The used to not only do that but also put most of the backup media on a second partition. Problem is it absolutely dropped your disk space in half.

I don't know if this is where HP is picking this up from, but I hope this is not a trend. I love HP laptops after years of using comcrap http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

[Atrocities]

I was quite shocked to find that I did not have a disk or copy of WinXP. Then when I found out that my 80 gig HD was actually only a 55 gig HD, I was a bit PO'ed. Then when the HD died, on the first HP POS, I knew it was a bad call.

The thing about most PC companies now is that they have you send them your pc and then they send you a refurbished PC that in most cases is inferior to the one you bought and was originally sent in because it was broken and more often than not, was sent out to you prior to being repaired.

Even this "NEW" PC that HP sent me two years ago, was used. WTF! I found out that most HP PC's are now refurbished older computers that they have just placed into a new tower. This is uber bull**** and is one of the reasons why I hate HP so.

There is nothing more alarming then call in a PC repair, provide the serial number for your NEW PC, and be asked if you are Mr. Smith from Vancouver. "Ahh no."

What tops it off is the fact that when you do call customer support you are connected with some guy in Bangladesh who can barely speak english and he is asking for all of your most personal information. Ever wonder why your credit card was billed $2,000.00 for over sea's sent merchandise? Well now ya know.

And the funny thing is, people give out their info to these people in other countries, some of whom hate us very much, without question while having histeria fits about some cookie that recorded what porno web site they just visted. Go figure the logice behind that one?

[Psitticine]

Eesh, that sucks! I've heard of people having problems with HP, but no more than with anybody else. I hope this doesn't mark a downhill slide for them.

Maybe the legal action will wake them up.

I have a Dell laptop myself, and I'm pleased. It has been pushed to the limit for about 2 years now, driving the great monolith that is 3d max around and generally being my portable auxillery brain. So far, so good.

[Leslie]

The response to lousy service though, is clearly the service game.

Hands up all those that actually buy their printer ink cartridges?

Gee that's too bad. I don't.

No I don't steal them. But I do make them give them to me for free. It's simple, you ***** and complain.

I have a friend that has worked for HP. He's manned the phones, and as such knows all the code words key phrases and triggers.
So you have an empty cartridge. What do you do?
Well you don't go to the store and buy new ones necessarily. Considering printer cartridges make up 80% of the cost of the printer.
The smart savvy person phones up the service line, and explains in a most disgusted tone, my cartridge doesn't print (well of course it doesn't, its empty). But, it's not a crime to just not say that eh. Saying it doesn't work from fraudulent reasons might be, but failing to disclose you actually know why it doesn't print is not.

Sound like a stupid idea?
Well I suppose some people enjoy forking out 50-70 bucks for printer cartridges, but I don't.
I usually get 2 maybe 3 "free" sets of ink cartridges, then I buy a new printer (which comes with ink cartridges). The company does make some money selling me hardware, but I don't have any interest in paying idiotic sums for some lousy ink.

Service operations usually would rather just give you something, rather than deal with tricky issues. The guy on the phone is being monitored, and he likely has X minutes to fix your problem, or it makes him look bad (great job to get if you enjoy a lot of stress for lousy pay).

Latest option friend has been exploring has been online video rentals. You pay X dollars for a month's service. The services are all set up on the assumption you will rent X movies per month. If you routinely rent X plus X movies, they start to lose money on you. But, you as joe consumer, naturally want more movies for your X dollars, not less.
Squeeky wheels get greased eh. His first month, he didn't get the atypical 10-12 movies, he got 37 movies. He *****ed.
"Hey you sent me number 2 before number 1 in this series, you expect me to enjoy the series all out of sequence? Additional films shipped out.

The truth is, the companies make their best money off the people that just bend over and take it. And they usually want the complainers happy. And lets face it, a printer cartridge set does NOT cost HP 75 bucks. It's just ink.
The online dvd rental service really doesn't suffer greatly, by adding 2 extra rentals out to the one person that complained. Likely makes money if the complainer tells just one other person that they like company X.

It's not always gimme gimme gimme though.
When I go to a restaraunt I usually don't tip. Sorry not made out of money here. But, if I enjoyed my meal, if the waiter and or waitress gave good service if the food was good, I call over the manager and I tell him right then and there so that it is heard by others, the meal was great and the staff are to be commended. Not the same as leaving an extra couple of bucks, but maybe it impacts favourable a chance of getting a raise or promotion. I can only hope.

I also never spare the negative publicity with those that make crummy products. Which explains why some have heard me really rip into some wargames in the past. If I think something sucks, I'm not keeping it to myself http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Wolfman77]

I was quite shocked to find that I did not have a disk or copy of WinXP. Then when I found out that my 80 gig HD was actually only a 55 gig HD, I was a bit PO'ed.

I had the same thing when I bought my computer. 40 gig HD had only 32 gigs of space. I only lost 8 gigs though, I have no idea why but it seems like the larger HD's need more room for the backup. I've heard other people say they are missing different amounts. Not that XP's recovery system is worth a hill of beans anyway, as SJ pointed out, but I guess it matches the rest of XP.

[Leslie]

What people sometimes do, and it's definitely unwise, is to just assume all big companies, by virtue of being large visible companies, are incapable of the same underhanded behaviour of small shady fly by night operations.

Companies and or corporations are just as capable of screwing you over as anyone else.

Does the name Enron ring a bell?
Want more examples?

When you are buying something, make sure you know what you are buying. The phrase buyer beware applies to more than just dealing with strangers on eBay eh.