Compaq dodges dodgy floppy drive lawsuit

Texas judge ruling

By Linda Harrison • Get more from this author

Posted in Business, 6th March 2001 12:36 GMT

Compaq has escaped a customer lawsuit that accused the PC giant of knowingly selling defective machines.

US District Judge Thad Heartfield dismissed the lawsuit on Friday, according to Bloomberg. The suit alleged that Compaq had for years been flogging computers with dodgy floppy disk drives and controllers that failed to detect data errors.

The suit was originally filed in the US District Court in Beaumont, Texas, in November 1999 on behalf of two angry Compaq customers.

At the time Compaq accused the lawyers of trying to copy their recent success in a case with Toshiba - the Japanese manufacturer lost a case regarding floppy disk controllers in its notebooks, and agreed to fork out more than $1 billion as a settlement.

Yesterday Gilbert Low, prosecuting attorney, remained upbeat - he said the decision would not affect a similar suit brought by his clients against Big Q in a state court in Texas. ®