HP: Vista "Junk PC" scheme was "totally unacceptable"

Consumers weren't the only ones upset by Microsoft's Vista marketing scheme that sold "Vista Capable" PCs that couldn't run the most important features of Vista. HP was possibly even angrier, telling Microsoft that the move was "totally unacceptable."

That's the latest revelation in a class-action lawsuit against Microsoft for a marketing scheme in which people claim that Microsoft misled consumers into buying "Windows Vista Capable" PCs, even though the PCs couldn't run many of Vista's most important features. The new information about HP came out in a new round of recently released documents.

HP was upset because Microsoft bowed to Intel pressure, and put "Vista Capable" stickers on PCs with Intel 915 chipsets, even though those PCs couldn't run Aero or other parts of Vista. Intel said that it could face billions of dollars in revenue losses because it had many unsold 915 chipsets, and wouldn't be able to sell them unless they were called "Vista Capable."

Microsoft had previously told hardware makers that PCs with those chipsets wouldn't qualify for a Vista sticker. So HP spent millions of dollars building PCs with more powerful chipsets. When the company found out about Microsoft's decision, it hit the roof. Here, for example, is what one unnamed HP exec wrote to Intel after the exec found out about the decision:

"This just doesn't make any sense to us and for you to do this without talking to us is totally unacceptable...It's not very often you get pulled out a meeting by a group of engineers who feel that they have had the rug pulled out from underneath them so that any competitive advantage we may have had in the marketplace is taken away, enabling any Tom, Dick or Harry with a PC containing a noncompliant processor/chip set to play at the same table. It begs the question when is a PC really Vista-capable.

And Richard Walker, senior vice president at HP's consumer PC unit, had this to say to Kevin Johnson, Microsoft's chief operating office, and Windows honcho Jim Allchin in a February 1, 2006 email:

The decision you have made has taken away an investment we made consciously for competitive advantage knowing that some players would choose not to make the same level of investment as we did in supporting your program requirements...I hope this incident isn't a foretaste of the relationship I will have with Microsoft going forward, but I can tell you that it's left a very bad taste with me and my team.

If Microsoft was smart, it would settle this suit with consumers right away. Every time new documents are released, there's more dirt. Whatever Microsoft pays to settle will be far less than the good will it loses with each new revelation.

Preston Gralla is a contributing editor for Computerworld, and the author of more than 35 books.