Some VARs remain worried about Dell’s channel strategy. They keep asking if they can trust Dell. But perhaps those solutions providers should worry more about a potential betrayal by Hewlett-Packard. Here’s why.

Dell has been working overtime in recent months to assure partners that the company is sincerely committed to the IT channel. Meanwhile, HP has quietly entered a partnership with CDW to aggressively target small businesses with 500 or fewer employees.

Ouch. This isn’t going to be a fun weekend for HP, as partners will surely flood the company with complaints and concerns over the CDW relationship.

The folks over at Everything Channel broke the story. Now, a few Dell insiders are more than happy to make sure the world knows HP is sleeping with CDW in small business.

HP-CDW sure looks like a killer relationship — but will it kill HP’s relationships with VARs?