Recently trying to upgrade a friend's computer, I got a first-hand lesson on the disconnect between those who engineer a product and those who support and market it. The Dell computer in question is a few years old, which in computer-speak means it is akin to the abacus, yet a diagnosis revealed that upgrading the random access memory (RAM) would be the most cost-efficient solution. I went to Dell's Web site to see which memory chips to purchase. By entering the computer's service code and the model number, a user manual and suitable upgrades were made known. Looking at the online user manual, put together by technical writers who have not necessarily been involved in the engineering of the product, I learned the maximum memory the computer could accommodate is 512 MB RAM. I purchased the recommended chips from Dell.
The parts arrived and I sat down on for what I thought would be a quick job. No dice. The computer would not start with the new chips. After various configurations, I found that with 256 MB memory the computer started fine. The problem wasn't with the chips, the computer or the installer. As I learned after a 30-minute conversation with a technician, i.e., engineer, the problem was that the Intel Celeron processor was designed to run optimally with 256 MB RAM. Despite what Dell's manual and sales said, 512 MB RAM was too much. The engineers knew this because they had practical experience with the computer system vs. marketing and sales, which only knew the supplier-provided specs.