« Return to: Reliability and Service Report Card
| Measure | Printers | Survey average1 | Digital Cameras | Survey average1 | Wireless Gateways | Survey average1 | PDAs | Survey average1 |
| Problems on arrival: Percentage of devices that were nonfunctional when they were first turned on. (Lower is better.) | Good: 1.9 to 2.9 percent Fair: 3.3 to 3.6 percent Poor: 4.6 to 5.3 percent | 3.3 percent | Outstanding: 0 to 1.6 percent Good: 2.5 to 3 percent Fair: 5.4 percent Poor: 8.3 percent | 2.4 percent | Good: 4.5 to 6.5 percent Fair: 9.2 to 9.4 percent Poor: 12.1 to 13.6 percent | 9.2 percent | Good: 1.9 to 2 percent Fair: 2.4 to 3.1 percent Poor: 4.5 percent | 2.7 percent |
| Ease of use: Percentage of respondents who rated the product's ease of use as high. (Higher is better.) | Outstanding: 90.6 percent Good: 83.1 to 80.3 percent Fair: 78.3 to 71.7 percent Poor: 65.5 percent Unacceptable: 56.4 percent | 74.9 percent | Outstanding: 68.3 to 65 percent Good: 61.5 to 60.2 percent Fair: 55.4 to 54.5 percent Poor: 46.9 to 45.5 percent | 59.2 percent | Good: 60.1 percent Fair: 56.4 to 50.2 percent Poor: 42.1 percent | 52.6 percent | Good: 71.4 to 68.6 percent Fair: 62.9 to 58.5 percent Poor: 45.6 percent | 63.6 percent |
| Percent of units with problems: Percentage of devices with at least one problem that required contacting tech support or that limited the device's usefulness. (Lower is better.) | Outstanding: 10.2 percent Good: 15.6 to 20 percent Fair: 26.4 to 30.9 percent Poor: 37.3 percent Unacceptable: 62 percent | 26.7 percent | Good: 8 to 11.6 percent Fair: 13.1 to 17.6 percent Poor: 19.2 to 23.9 percent | 14.6 percent | Good: 28.8 percent Fair: 34.7 to 38.4 percent Poor: 40.8 percent | 35.8 percent | Good: 19.9 to 25.5 percent Fair: 31.7 to 37.7 percent | 27.7 percent |
| Problems per year: Average number of problems per device per year of age. (Lower is better.) | Outstanding: 0.11 problem per year Good: 0.18 to 0.28 problem per year Fair: 0.34 to 0.49 problem per year Poor: 0.64 problem per year Unacceptable: 0.83 problem per year | 0.37 problem per year | Outstanding: 0.06 to 0.08 problem per year Good: 0.1 to 0.14 problem per year Fair: 0.19 to 0.2 problem per year Poor: 0.26 problem per year Unacceptable: 0.36 problem per year | 0.15 problem per year | Good: 0.6 problem per year Fair: 0.73 to 0.81 problem per year Poor: 1.08 problems per year | 0.8 problem per year | Good: 0.22 to 0.33 problem per year Fair: 0.44 to 0.61 problem per year Poor: 0.84 problem per year | 0.4 problem per year |
| Satisfaction with reliability: Percentage of respondents who said they were highly satisfied with their peripheral's reliability. (Higher is better.) | Outstanding: 94.5 percent Good: 87.9 to 80 percent Fair: 75.2 to 75 percent Poor: 65.5 to 59.1 percent | 79.4 percent | Good: 89.5 to 83.9 percent Fair: 79.7 to 73.1 percent Poor: 60 to 54.5 percent | 78.7 percent | Good: 80.1 percent Fair: 77.1 to 72.8 percent Poor: 67.3 to 60.2 percent | 72.1 percent | Good: 81.5 to 77.3 percent Fair: 73.5 to 64.6 percent | 74.1 percent |
| Short hold time: Percentage of service recipients who waited 5 minutes or less for telephone tech support. (Higher is better.) | Outstanding: 77.1 percent Good: 68.6 to 62.8 percent Fair: 58.5 percent | 66.3 percent | Good: 72.5 to 70.8 percent Fair: 66.7 to 64.3 percent Poor: 56.1 to 55.6 percent | 65.4 percent | Fair: 58.8 to 50.7 percent | 55.2 percent | Fair: 60 to 58.6 percent | 59.4 percent |
| Satisfactory resolution: Percentage of service recipients who said their problem was resolved to their satisfaction. (Higher is better.) | Good: 82.8 percent Fair: 75.6 to 70.6 percent | 75.3 percent | Good: 87 percent Fair: 74.3 to 70.3 percent Poor: 65.6 to 65.3 percent | 72.5 percent | Good: 80 percent Fair: 73 to 71.5 percent | 74.8 percent | Good: 76.2 to 72.6 percent | 74.9 percent |
| Satisfaction with service: Percentage of service recipients who said they were highly satisfied with the company's service. (Higher is better.) | Good: 61.5 to 56.4 percent Fair: 51.9 to 45.4 percent | 54.2 percent | Good: 57.3 percent Fair: 52.3 to 46.7 percent Poor: 42.9 percent | 49.3 percent | Fair: 47.9 to 44.1 percent | 45.7 percent | Good: 55.7 percent Fair: 50.4 to 48.6 percent | 51.6 percent |
1Figure refers to the average score among all companies rated in the respective measure in PC World's PC Reliability and Service report.
HOW WE TEST: We test rewritable DVD drives under Windows XP Home on PCs with 1.67-GHz Athlon XP 2000+ processors and 512MB of DDR SDRAM. To test each drive, we use the bundled DVD video authoring, mastering, and packet-writing software; we use vendor-supplied media or Verbatim media. Tests conducted by the PC World Test Center. All rights reserved.