XPS M1330: What's Going On?

FROM Direct2Dell

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XPS M1330: What's Going On? Since my last post, many of you made it clear that you want us to share more details about what's going on with the XPS M1330. I want to apologize for the frustration that these delays are causing you. I understand that no amount of explanation is a substitute for shipping the system, but hope this helps address some of your concerns.

Right now, we are focused on shipping as many systems as we can. Currently, we have worked through about 10% of our backlog and will focus on improving this going forward. Despite our best efforts, we may not be able to ship some orders before the original estimated ship date we gave you. In those cases, Dell will be contacting affected customers to let them know. Details will vary by region.

When you order a system, the estimated ship date factors in our best currently available information, including the number of orders in front of you and the availability of parts. It should not change unless something impacts one of these factors. If that happens, we will contact you.

As Lionel mentioned in an earlier post, we have found the production ramp more difficult than we expected—let me take a few minutes to explain the process. Before we begin shipping products to customers, we build a sizeable number of units to test our manufacturing process and to help flush out any issues that may impact our ability to build in volume. These test builds are a fraction of what we expect to build at full production. Once we start building a larger number of units, we may see issues that pop up in only one or two of them, but which require larger volumes to reveal themselves. Since it's hard to tell if the issue is an isolated one or if it will affect a large number of units down the road, we investigate each one thoroughly. When that happens, it slows our build process.

One example of this is the painting process. Right now, Tuxedo Black is the only color that is consistently meeting our quality standards. That's one reason why some customers are getting their orders before others. The finish on the XPS M1330 is similar to a custom paint job on a car, but with one additional complexity—on a car, typical viewing occurs from several feet away. With a notebook, the typical viewing range is much closer... sometimes a foot or less. This requires a different level of attention to detail. Why do I bring that up? There was no problem painting hundreds at a time. But as we increased the volume, otherwise manageable factors like dust contamination caused our successful yields to decrease. Adding to the complexity, the Crimson Red and the Pearl White colors require more coats of paint and more touches to create the finished product—that means there is more opportunity for dust contamination.

All this ultimately results in fewer finished parts from the paint line than we expected. You may have noticed on Dell.com yesterday we discontinued the Pearl White color. The reason is that we are just not able to produce the kind of volumes of high quality product that we need to support demand. It takes about 5 coats of paint to get the appearance we were looking for.
We are working to ship white units that meet our standards to all customers who ordered them, but those may be the last of the units using the current process, as we continue to pursue alternate methods of producing high-quality white units.

Unanticipated part shortages also hold up our ability to ship products. The most obvious issue is one mentioned in earlier posts-the LED backlit LCD display. First off, it's new technology, and that means there are fewer suppliers available. Bright white LEDs provide the backlight for the LCD instead of a fluorescent tube. It results in a brighter display that offers better color reproduction, is thinner and lighter, and draws less power. This relatively limited supply base combined with stronger than anticipated demand-the number of orders has simply exceeded our expectations-has contributed to the delays. Our vendors are ramping production as quickly as possible, but these displays continue to be in short supply.

We're committed to shipping these systems as quickly as we can. Once again, I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for your business and your continued patience.
Published Friday, August 03, 2007 2:30 PM
by Alex Gruzen, Sr. VP—Consumer Product Group
Filed under Products, Consumer, Customer Experience, Strategy, Dell 2.0, What You Need To Know