OEM generally means "original equipment manufacturer." Sometimes it is referred to as "bulk packed", "white box", "brown box" and "gray market".
Almost all PC component and software vendors make two versions of the same product based on a difference in the distribution channels. Retail ("distribution") is the main consumer channel, whilst OEM (to various systems manufacturers) is another.
The retail channel typically uses colourful retail boxed products, with installation manuals, software CDs etc. Of course the cost of making the nice-looking packages is passed on to you, the customer. Retail packages are also more voluminous, and therefore cost more to ship. The OEM channel distributes products mainly to system builders and integrators, for example Dell, HP and Sun (the OEMs) and many small ones such as the mom-and-pop shop on the corner and embedded systems designers. These bulk-pack products do not have fancy packaging materials and are often produced in much higher volume, both of which result in much lower prices that are not generally available to the public. The OEM products are of the same quality as their retails counterparts. However sometimes the manufacturer warranty is different, shorter or non existent. They also tend not to include supporting materials such as manuals and drivers when applicable, however these are available for download (which tend to be more current versions anyway).
Almost all PC component and software vendors make two versions of the same product based on a difference in the distribution channels. Retail ("distribution") is the main consumer channel, whilst OEM (to various systems manufacturers) is another.
The retail channel typically uses colourful retail boxed products, with installation manuals, software CDs etc. Of course the cost of making the nice-looking packages is passed on to you, the customer. Retail packages are also more voluminous, and therefore cost more to ship. The OEM channel distributes products mainly to system builders and integrators, for example Dell, HP and Sun (the OEMs) and many small ones such as the mom-and-pop shop on the corner and embedded systems designers. These bulk-pack products do not have fancy packaging materials and are often produced in much higher volume, both of which result in much lower prices that are not generally available to the public. The OEM products are of the same quality as their retails counterparts. However sometimes the manufacturer warranty is different, shorter or non existent. They also tend not to include supporting materials such as manuals and drivers when applicable, however these are available for download (which tend to be more current versions anyway).
Comments
Post a Comment