First of One wrote:
The difference is that the automotive industry actually test their
prototypes. :-) Consequently the blame lies squarely with Dell and HP for
failing to do proper component integration. It isn't difficult or expensive
to do thermal shock and cycling tests on laptops.


Wow, you want to lay the blame on Dell and HP?

Why not Clevo and Compal and Quanta (who actually make HP and Dell
notebooks) or even Mitac, Asus, Acer, Arima, ECS/Uniwill.

No, you can't blame the laptop maker for a bad video chip package that
they in good faith installed.

Of course, if they knew the chips were faulty and installed them
anyway...that's a whole different concept of culpability.