Dell has this supposedly useful feature where you can watch your computer going through the process as it's being assembled and prepped for shipping to you. However, it's not entirely satisfying. The steps are:confirmedpre-productionin productionkittingbuildtestingboxingshipping prepestimated ship date (which I assume will change to "ship date" when it ships)The deal is, almost immediately, my order showed as "confirmed" and "pre-production," where it sat for four or five days. Then, in the course of a day, it went form "kitting" to "build" to "testing." Now "boxing" is highlighted, but not checked, so I assume that's where it is.

The upshot is, all those intermediate steps are pretty, but they are irrelevant if I don't see the moves happen.

Our current "estimated ship date" is Friday, October 29, 2004, but should it really take five days for "boxing?" Maybe they're trying to teach it the uppercut.