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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to be really irritated by that Windows 7 advert?

26 replies

Bramshott · 27/09/2011 21:37

"Mrs X thought her 4-year old PC didn't need updating" - shock horror, how could she possibly own anything so old and dated?! Drives me insane - surely a computer, which costs several hundred pounds, should not be considered obsolete after only 4 years?! Grrr.

OP posts:

Tomorrowslookingfine · 27/09/2011 21:56

YANBU they should be advertising their products as longlasting and durable, not something which needs replacing as soon as a newer model comes out!

ButWhyIsTheGinGone · 27/09/2011 22:04

Even worse is the PC world one where they "do out" the woman's living room to look like a PC shop. The MAN shows the helpless WOMAN round while she twitters around the big, complicated machinery and makes asinine comments such as "ooooh I like the orange one"....

Bah!

Original poster

Bramshott · 27/09/2011 22:35

I think that's the same one ButWhy - they certainly appear in her house, do it out, and then show her shiny things while simultaneously mocking anyone who might think a 4 year old computer is still fit for purpose. Lovely - I can be irritated from a feminist perspective as well!

Fuckers. And then they wonder why people are looting to get new stuff . . .

(And yes, I am over-egging it there, but I am insanely irritated!)

OP posts:

WillowFae · 27/09/2011 22:37

It's like, if we show you this snazzy new computer the money will suddenly appear and you'll be able to afford to buy it!

Firawla · 27/09/2011 22:40

yanbu i hate that advert, for the reasons you mentioned also i always think like what a cheek for them to just go and make over her living room! i know it's not real.. but presuming we are supposed to go along with their senario then how presumptuous of the computer shop people to take over her house. crap advert.

DadIsSad · 28/09/2011 02:34

I'm a bloke and I hate it too - it's not a feminist thing, it's a condescension thing.

RottenRow · 28/09/2011 07:01

Can you imagine hoping your front door to fund a pc shop?'Oh my gosh' would not be my first words.

RottenRow · 28/09/2011 07:02

Opening to find!

Andrewofgg · 28/09/2011 07:30

Of course planned obsolescence keeps a lot of people in work . . .

halfnhalf · 28/09/2011 07:48

YANBU - thanks for posting this, I thought it was just me. It's wrong and stupid, what a great combination.

befuzzled · 28/09/2011 07:58

In fairness, Microsoft don't sell pcs, just the operating system that goes on top. The problem is there latest one windows 7 is much improved and fixes a lot of issues that people complained about. But it needs a beefy machine to run on. So I guess that is why they are pushing people to upgrade. They also run avprogram to recondition old pcs, get them up to scratch and sell them at very low cost to low income families with school age children. They give their products to schools.

Our desktop was 10y old and we have only just stopped using it recently as the hardware capabilities have changed so much (intel, IBM etc, not ms) it was just unusable and I wanted to take advantage of the new capabilities of a newer os.

I don't work for ms and I see your point, 4y seems too soon, unfortunately the reality of the it Market is that that machine probably isn't beefy enough. Cloud computing is supposed to fix all this one day.

CherylWillBounceBack · 28/09/2011 08:57

YANBU and I was considering writing to the standards agency about that advert. We have a 10 year old PC that's more than adequately running Windows 7 with just a few minor upgrades. We've also got an extremely high spec brand new machine and to be frank the only thing it can do that the other can't is play very new games.

The key thing here is they want people to chuck stuff out when a simple reformat and keeping things clean sorts a hell of a lot of problems.

It's a shameful advert.

discobeaver · 28/09/2011 10:34

Capitalism at its finest.

musicposy · 28/09/2011 10:38

I can't stand it either! I'm not sure which is worse, that one or the one they showed where the bloke's been watching illegal porn and messaging Nubile Nora for sex buying a present for his wife and they tell you how easy it is to hide it.

jenfraggle · 28/09/2011 10:39

One of the reasons why we don't have Windows in this house. We run Linux, it's legally free and will run on old and new alike

EsmeWeatherwax · 28/09/2011 10:55

YANBU, it is the worst advert in the history of patronising, sexist shite I have ever seen. And if I walked into my front room and it had been changed into a computer showroom, I would not be giggling and simpering like a moron, the ad would be x-rated!

lassylass · 28/09/2011 11:06

Just be thankful that you dont own an Apple Mac (or whatever they are called now).

At least Win7 runs on old technology. Apple just stop supporting anything older than a few years.

ViviPru · 28/09/2011 11:08

YANBU. Its beneath contempt.

But YABU for watching tv adverts in the first place :)

DooinMeCleanin · 28/09/2011 11:10

The thing is the woman was right. Her four year old PC would have done just fine. Once you have the tower you should very rarely need to upgrade the whole lot. Just add bits/upgrade certain parts. It's very simple to do and if you're really clueless even going to a PC repair shop would be cheaper than shelling out for the whole lot.

Crosshair · 28/09/2011 11:16

I upgrade about every 3 years would probably do 2 if I wasnt poor. She cant play bf3 on a 4 year old pc!!

DooinMeCleanin · 28/09/2011 11:20

I just add bits. Much cheaper. You end up with a better, faster PC for much less money.

Original poster

Bramshott · 28/09/2011 11:27

Seriously though, what sort of world are we living in where something that costs £400+ is considered obsolete after only 4 years . And then we wonder why the planet is buggered, and why we have such a consumer-obsessed society.

I must be getting old .

OP posts:

Crosshair · 28/09/2011 11:42

Adding bits hasnt been viable for me.

First pc was a dell refurb which was cheaper then buying the parts and putting it together myself. Current pc the gfx card its almost the size of the dell case, bought the tower as it was only about £30 difference then buying the parts separate.

RoseC · 28/09/2011 11:47

YANBU, both on the old front and on the condescending front. Every time that advert comes on DP and I sit there spluttering - one of our best friends is a programmer with a PhD in computer science and she certainly doesn't choose her computer based on the colour [fume]

Even my DM (who as a middle-aged woman is presumably their target, based on the actors in the adverts) didn't choose her PC based on whether it matched her handbag, she managed to do a bit of research first. [extra fuming]

Snorbs · 28/09/2011 12:36

Adding bits works for tower PCs provided it's not a big-name such as Dell as they use non-standard parts. Adding bits doesn't really work for laptops apart from increasing memory and installing a bigger hard disk.

But the advert is intensely annoying. It seems that Microsoft has given up trying to persuade us that Win7 is worth upgrading to because of what it can do and, instead, has fallen back to "Look at the shiny new laptop!!!" without adding the necessary "...from Sony so it'll be chockablock with unnecessary and annoying crapware and the after-sales service will be so bad you'll wish you had your old tower!"

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