Everything had gone well, but Microsoft Office kept saying it requires an Office365 subscription – this shouldn’t be the default as the PC was shipping (she had paid extra money for the same) with a perpetual license for Office 2019 Home. She opened the package and proceeded to set up. A relative of mine, a recent graduate on my recommendation had bought an HP laptop for personal usage for Rs.45,000 (USD 607): AMD Ryzen 5 3500U, 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD, 1 TB HDD with Windows 10 and Microsoft Office 2019 Home & Student Edition. The latest frustration for me happened today. I have experienced them to be upfront on what they charge you for – you may not like the premium price but that’s ok. Though I am not a fanboy of Apple products, I admire Apple for remaining clean in this regard. The excuse they provide is that there are wafer-thin margins in the business, unlike Apple, who operate on the higher end of the market. Unfortunately, this stealth mode operations are a common theme in the world of Windows PCs and Android Smartphones for decades. There is nothing wrong in upselling, but they need to be transparent on what is already provided and what’s the upgrade for.
I am annoyed when companies design products to get the paying customer into doing things that are good for the manufacturer’s top-line and expensive for the customer.
