This is Round 24 in our Worst Company in America contest, Toshiba vs Microsoft. Vote which sucks more, inside…
Toshiba: When commenter Buran nominated Toshiba she said it was for, “inhibiting the end of the hi-def DVD war. They can’t see when they lost and keep fighting, and are therefore inhibiting customer choice (there are movies I want that are on a dead format only).”
Microsoft: flooded the market with $400+ defective XBOX consoles, then made it very hard for customers to get the warranty repairs they deserved. Their latest operating system, Vista, comes in two flavors: one that only works if you have a super fancy computer, and one that has none of the cool advertised features.
This is a post in our Worst Company In America 2008 series. The companies nominated for this honor were chosen by you, the readers. Keep track of all the goings on at consumerist.com/tag/worst-company-in-america/
STILL OPEN FOR VOTING:
US Airways vs Washington Mutual, American Airlines vs Blockbuster, Time Warner Cable vs Radioshack, Wellpoint vs Charter Cable, Dell vs Home Depot,
Sears vs Citibank, Wal-Mart vs TJMaxx, Mattel vs ATT, Capital One vs Video Professor, eBay/Paypal vs COX, Apple vs SallieMae, Diebold Vs Pfizer, MTV vs TransUnion, CompUSA vs DirecTV
Target vs Best Buy
Allstate vs Verizon,
DeBeers vs 1800 flowers, Starbucks vs United Airlines,
Exxon vs Crocs, Google Vs Sony, Ticketmaster vs Wachovia, Facebook vs The American Arbitration Association, Comcast vs Menu Foods
More From Consumerist
-
Here Are Your Contestants For The 2013 Worst Company In America Tournament!
-
Worst Company In America Round 1: Apple Vs. Microsoft
-
Microsoft Store Can’t Exchange A Defective Computer Properly, Sends Me Wrong Refund
-
Microsoft Updates Service Agreement To Make It Easier To Read The New Mandatory Binding Arbitration Clause
-
China Smacks Samsung & LG With $35 Million Fine For Fixing Prices Of LCD Panels
I voted for Toshiba since they gave Hillary the idea about prolonging the pain.
Toshiba. Hands down. I write this and I am on a Toshiba with Vista on it.
It sucks. Seriously. The volume control is a reason alone not to buy this damn thing (remember old cd players, with the little black knob? It has this at the most inconvenient place. Seriously) Mind you this wouldn’t be the only reason, but also take into account that other comparable laptops are much higher quality.
I have this laptop (Vista) my beast of a desktop (HP, Vista), and a x360.
The fact that yes, my 360 did flop not too long ago, the only thing I lost was time on it, since it was an extremely painless process (mind you time=money), but Xbox Live being as robust as it is, it more than makes up for it. If you want to play games, the 360 and windows are the only ways to do it, short of flash games online.
Gaming aside, since I understand not everyone uses their computers for it, I have had no problems with compatibility,and I’ve had Vista a few months short of a year on my laptop. I’m actually impressed with it.
Mind you, I’m also a student, so I have to use the various word processing programs (Word07, atm). It does seem like it lacks polish, on occasion, but its not nearly enough to make me want a Mac. :/
The HD-DVD issue wasn’t Toshiba’s fault. The studios decided to go with Blu-Ray, so Blu-Ray one. At least Toshiba had the decency to bow rather than try and prolong the war with the few studios that still supported HD-DVD.
As for Microsoft: Broken XBoxes; prolonging/supporting the HD disc war so they could get more time to let their digital download service mature; releasing Vista prematurely; multiple/confusing and overpriced Vista SKUs; removing XP from the market because people weren’t buying Vista; Zune not supporting Microsoft’s own Plays for Sure standard; DRM and Activation schemes that treat paying customers like criminals. I could go on, but I think thats enough to make my case.