This post is more than 5 years old
7 Posts
0
28183
Refurbs sold with Known Failing hard drives?!
Last year I bought a refurb Dell XPS 8300. But was I actually sold a FAILING HDD?
Is it just me or does it actually say HDD is failing?
My system started acting wonky a few months ago, so I ran Crystal Disk hard drive utility. The results were poor my drive with (only 1.5 years of usage) is PHYSICALLY DYING.
I understand the risks in buying a refurb. But I think its terrible if they actually sold me a known dying drive.
Is this worth to complain or call customer service? I think I'm entitled to a new HDD or at least significant discount. Seagate said to take it up with Dell.
thanks all
RoHe
10 Elder
10 Elder
•
43.6K Posts
1
January 23rd, 2013 18:00
I pinged Lorna M in Dell Customer Care and asked her to review this thread. Hopefully she'll respond to you via PM (private message) through the forum. So watch the Inbox link at top of the page, next to your user name, when you're logged into the forum.
I don't work for Dell and I can't promise they'll do anything for you...
Anonymous
5 Practitioner
5 Practitioner
•
274.2K Posts
1
January 24th, 2013 10:00
Hi Cathr,
I am writing on behalf of Dell, at the request of RoHe, regarding the HDD issue you are describing on the Dell Community Forum – Desktop. Please allow me to apologize for any frustration or inconvenience this issue may have caused. As troubling as this may be, it seems highly irregular and I am certain it was an oversight and is not a standard practice.
Please contact me privately and provide your customer account information. I am happy to look into this matter further.
Name:
Email Address:
Shipping Address:
Phone Number:
Service Tag Number:
Order Number:
Thanks,
Lorna
DELL-Chris M
Community Manager
Community Manager
•
54.2K Posts
1
January 26th, 2013 11:00
Cathr,
Check your private message for the dispatch number.
OracleOfDelphi
13 Posts
1
January 27th, 2013 08:00
Although it was a relatively long time ago, and he wasn't a technician, there is a Donald Dickerson that worked for Dell. As well, Dell had over 109,000 employees in 2012 so it is very likely there are/were other Dell employees named Donald Dickerson and one of them generated the sticker on that hard drive. It is very unlikely that a defect sticker like that one, with a barcode, would be generated by a customer, especially one who purchased an XPS consumer model.
www.linkedin.com/.../donalddickerson
Controller
Dell Computers
Public Company; 10,001+ employees; DELL; Information Technology and Services industry
October 1997 – April 2001 (3 years 7 months)
Federal Sales Segment (1999-2001) - Responsible for pricing, accounting, annual/quarterly plans, budgets, financial and operations performance analytics, quota setting, incentive programs and new business acquisition.
Workstations Manufacturing (1998-1999) - Responsible for accounting, annual plans, budgeting, financial performance analysis, activity-based costing, production planning, capacity analysis and the Brazil production facility launch.
Worldwide Manufacturing (1997-1998) Responsible for world-wide manufacturing in Texas, Ireland and Malaysia, financial and performance reporting, accounting and launch of Dell in Brazil
shesagordie
10 Elder
10 Elder
•
46K Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 07:00
Cathr
If you have a warranty in effect, I would suggest contacting Dell for a replacement hard drive.
Bev.
Cathr
7 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 09:00
My warranty has expired. I am not sure if its worth renewing it for $50 and all the other hoops I have to jump through.
Bev in your experience, do you think I'll get thrown a bone if I bring up this issue to a customer service?
OracleOfDelphi
13 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 09:00
knowledge.seagate.com/.../207957en
OracleOfDelphi
13 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 09:00
Even though your computer is out of warranty, Dell owes you a replacement because, as indicated by the Dell applied defect sticker, they knowingly sold you a computer with a defective hard drive that you would not have discovered until you or a technician opened the computer case and removed the hard drive. As an ordinary consumer/end user, you are not expected to remove the hard drive, end users are not technically competent to determine what the computer problem is caused by and take it to a service technician for diagnosis and repair. If you had done that, Dell would have to refund whatever you were charged for that service. Check into the consumer protection law in your state/province as well.
OracleOfDelphi
13 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 09:00
You may be able to fix it yourself. Read this: techreport.com/.../seagate-releases-fixed-firmware-fix-for-barracuda-7200-11s
shesagordie
10 Elder
10 Elder
•
46K Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 11:00
Cathr
Morally maybe Dell should work with you on this, but without a warranty in effect, I think you will be out of luck.
Personally, I don't think it's worth the aggro and time, I would spend the $50+ to buy a new replacement that has a manufacturer's warranty myself.
New hard drives are sold with a one to five year warranty.
Bev.
Cathr
7 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 16:00
OracleOfDelphi,
This seems to be a physical issue, not just a firmware conflict?
I also wonder what is the best avenue in which to address your suggestion, call customer service?
Bev, yeah I already bought one, but at the risk of sounding greedy, I'm still miffed at being sold a failing HD, so if I can get another HD with minimal aggro I should attempt.
OracleOfDelphi
13 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 19:00
Regardless of the type of defect, Dell had determined that it was defective, labelled it so, then sold it to you as part of the computer you purchased. That's fraud.
Cathr
7 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2013 22:00
Thanks RoHe, I appreciate the action.
Its funny, if the QA guy wasn't so honest about labeling the HD, I would have chalked it up to bad luck. If it had a certified repair tag, I would have also just thought bad luck.
Being sold a known failing drive isn't the worst injustice in the world, but I think its worth a free replacement drive of similar capacity.
OracleOfDelphi
13 Posts
0
January 24th, 2013 08:00
It isn't good for Dell's public image to be caught selling known defective goods. In today's paper, I read that Microsoft is interested in buying Dell and making it a private company. They deserve each other.
DELL-Chris M
Community Manager
Community Manager
•
54.2K Posts
0
January 25th, 2013 06:00
Cathr,
That small label on the HDD was not produced by Dell. There is not a Donald Dickerson that works at Dell. It looks like the label was created by customer Donald Dickerson and placed on the HDD. Maybe to try to explain the issues he was seeing with the HDD when he sent it back to Dell. Since the warranty you purchased expired on 6/21/12, the most we can do is send out a refurbished HDD. You will have to install the operating system and drivers. Do you want me to proceed with sending out the HDD?