Deceptive Marketing Practices are everywhere these days, especially in the “tech” world.

I mentioned that I bought a new Toshiba laptop. I have been very happy with it thus far. So, when I received an e-mail from Toshiba Direct, one of the Toshiba family of websites, offering me savings on accessories, RAM upgrades and other things, I bought a 4-gig RAM upgrade, with the intent of having eight gigs of RAM in this new laptop, and I had it shipped to me “second-day air” with the goal of getting a lot of work done this coming weekend.

Yesterday, the RAM arrived and I opened the computer’s RAM access panel (on the bottom-side of the laptop) only to find that the laptop had two 2-gig memory modules installed and, of course, there are just two slots for RAM, meaning rather than having eight gigs of RAM installed, my new 4-gig upgrade would only give me six gigs.

I drove to the north end of town to our local Micro Center and bought another 4-gig memory module and came home and installed it. NOW, I have eight gigs of RAM in the laptop.

I paid almost $13 to have Toshiba ship me that 4-gig memory module. The cost of the RAM itself was $32 and change. What I bought from Micro Center was only $27 and no shipping charge, but, they only had one memory module of the right spec on the shelf.

I sent an e-mail to Toshiba telling them that their marketing of RAM upgrades is deceptive. Nowhere on the Toshiba Direct website does it indicate that you will need to buy TWO memory modules in order to have eight gigs of RAM in your laptop. Nowhere on their website does it say that they take the CHEAP path and install two 2-gig memory modules in their laptops to save them money and inconvenience the consumer. Because THAT is what this is. It is an inconvenience to me and others like me when we have to buy two 4-gig memory modules to populate our laptops with eight gigs of RAM. Now, pray tell, what does one do with the two 2-gig memory modules that they will never use?

Why thank you, Toshiba.

This is a major problem in the tech industry. It is deceptive and consumers are, indeed, ripped-off every day by practices like this.

On the plus side, the Toshiba laptop is one of the better-made brands and I hope to make good use of it for quite a while, but consumers still feel as though they are not well-treated by companies that want their money.

This kind of marketing is simply bad business.

One final note: Had Toshiba put a message on their website telling consumers that in order to have eight gigs of RAM in your laptop, you need to purchase two 4-gig memory modules, I would have done so and I would not have driven all the way across town to buy another 4-gig memory module. In Columbus, that’s a forty-five minute drive in traffic one way.

Thanks Toshiba, I love you, too.