Aurora R7, Warranty void due to upgrade?

Curious - why didn't you replace the 1660TI with your factory graphics card before sending it back?

Regardless, the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act prevents manufacturers such as Dell from spuriously voiding warranties simply because a third party or non Dell-branded component was installed.  Have a look at 15 USC 2302(c) which goes into more detail: https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title15-section2302&num=0&edition=prelim

In your case, the onus would be on Dell to prove your 1660TI was the root cause of the motherboard's failure.  

Personally if I were you, I'd have an attorney draft a letter to Dell explaining to them that what they're doing is in direct contravention of 15 USC 2302(c) and opens them to possible litigation.  However, hiring attorney's aren't cheap so you'll have to make a choice; get shafted by Dell or get shafted by a landshark. Either way, you're going to pay one way or another.

Yeah, best practice is to put it back the way you purchased before doing warranty repairs.  But, water under the bridge now. 

1.  Brand new and refurbished R7 motherboards are readily available for purchase and can easily be had for $120 on eBay.  Used ones can easily be had for less than $100, if you can wait for one to be available.  I personally would see no reason to spend $400 for the now obsolete R7 motherboard (obsolete b/c the BIOs upgrade for 9th gen chips is not offered on this board) - you can get the r8 board with the bios for 9th gen chips on eBay for around $285 (it's basically the same board but with the BIOs update).

2.  You might consider chatting with Dell customer service, as a current or prospective customer, and ask if upgrading one of their systems with RAM or GPU will void the warranty.  I suspect that the answer will be along the lines of no, you are free to upgrade your PC with consumer replaceable parts like RAM, GPU, storage drives, but the new parts will not be covered by the warranty, and any damage you cause by the upgrade will not be covered.  I believe this likely to be their response, because I asked Dell a similar question before upgrading my PC and that is more or less what they told me.  They also said if I purchased the upgrade parts from Dell, that the upgrade parts would separately be covered by a Dell warranty (I inquired about purchasing the AIO from Dell, which was $109 at the time). Take a screen shot of your conversation, if favorable to your case, then go back to whoever is handling your claim, ask to speak to a supervisor, and mention that you had been informed that this would not void your warranty.  If not, there's always option #1.   

Was watching from the sidelines in case @Xpiredmilk decides to go the route @amstel78 mentioned. Usually cases under legal tussles cannot be discussed in public so I didn't want to mess up @Xpiredmilk's chances.

Anyways, the community has jumped in.

Brand new and refurbished R7 motherboards are readily available for purchase and can easily be had for $120 on eBay.  Used ones can easily be had for less than $100, if you can wait for one to be available.  I personally would see no reason to spend $400 for the now obsolete R7 motherboard.

I thought about this also but what about the service tag? Is a motherboard bought through online auction or retailer going to have service tag and how does Dell handle it when it comes to SupportAssist?

Take a screen shot of your conversation, if favorable to your case, then go back to whoever is handling your claim, ask to speak to a supervisor, and mention that you had been informed that this would not void your warranty.  If not, there's always option #1. 

Totally support this. Once you have the screenshot, it puts you in a much better position. Along the same lines, get some documentation that proves you sent in your system for repair before the warranty expired.

If you decide to sit on a dead R7 for a few months and manage to pony up the $400, it's your chance to bail from Dell. That amount gets you a nice casing and motherboard which you can then transplant the 1660 Ti, RAM, storage, and CPU to a new computer and be liberated!

Yeah, the PC would end up registering with a different service tag if you swap out a defective Dell mobo with a new Dell mobo (i.e., if you went to Dell support, you'd register with the system specs that the replacement mobo originally shipped with when new).   

If you wanted to change the service tag to match the tag printed on the Aurora's case, I believe Dell Support Live Image 3.0 includes a utility that you can use to update the service tag info on most Dell PCs. For an explanation of how to do that, you may for example do a google or youtube search for a video on how to, Change / Remove Asset Tag - Service Tag on Dell PCs or laptops, for detailed instructions on how to use Dell's utility. 

Taking the opportunity to upgrade to a bigger case, and z390 Mobo is a good option too. 
 

@amstel78 

SVCTAG.exe will change a "Service Tag" 

But there are different versions for different models.

I have the ones for laptops but they probable would not work on desktops.

So it is possible but you have to have the correct version for your model.

Regards,

U2