I bought my first laptop last August: an HP Pavilion dv 9500. It came with Windows Vista, which appealed to the sense of the new. That said, I was reassured that Vista was reaching the computer equivalent of toddler-hood, which I assumed would have ensured that any glitches would have been sorted.

Not a bit of it. Three months ago, I’m still getting more crashes than under Windows XP. Tonight, copying 30 photos to CD, the system insisted it would take up to 41,000 days and 7 hours to achieve the task. The internet is available some days but not others. When will the IT industry achieve even pitiful standards of customer service? Or do they think they are immune from the need to meet the requirements of the Trade Descriptions Act?