By making computers more reliable, a company like Dell could dramatically reduce the amount of computers that require on-site servicing in the first place. Fo

By making computers more reliable, a company like Dell could dramatically reduce the amount of computers that require on-site servicing in the first place. For instance, what percentage of Dell XPS's have their keyboards fail within a year? What percentage of MBPs do? Right now a base warranty for an XPS includes on site repair during business hours after a remote diagnosis for one year. Getting three years of that is $160. One year of the more advanced "ProSupport" is $50 more than the base price, and three years of that is $280 more. The non-linearity between those two figures is perhaps indicative of the failure rates Dell is expecting. I couldn't say if Dell is losing their ass with these service contracts or not, but from what I've seen it works pretty well for the consumers. Edit: And beyond baseline reliability, the particular design of a computer can determine whether a particular failure is cheap or expensive to fix. If the Foo widget requires replacing the Bar board, that's going to be a more expensive design to fix than a computer in which the Foo widget and the Bar board aren't soldered together. This matter crops up in things like "flexgate" for Apple, where faulty cables necessitate replacing the entire screen. What could have been a very cheap repair suddenly becomes a very expensive repair. I can't claim to be familiar with the insides of a modern XPS, but I wager they tend to be cheaper to repair than modern MBPs.