Inspiron G3 15 3590, frustrated with Dell India escalations team

hello, it is going to be a long read so i request you to kindly bear with me. kindly spare some of your valuable time to go through all the telephonic and email conversations between us and service_escalations@dell.com + technical_support@dell.com to know the entire case history (corresponding to all service request numbers, so far) pertaining my laptop's service tag. i am thoroughly frustrated. i want to escalate my issue to DELL USA support team (not DELL INDIA support team). in the past, i had a good experience with DELL USA support who are customer-friendly from what i have known from my last interaction. i am banking on DELL USA support to please do the needful to solve my problem in the best way possible. many thanks in advance.

I live in India. Through my friend in the USA, i bought a DELL G3 3590 gaming laptop (along with premium support) in the USA. i was dissatisfied with the security software 1 year subscription that came bundled with the laptop (for which i had paid around 32 USD). i contacted DELL USA support and though the agent initially said that they cant refund the money, he was very courteous and understood my problem and quickly contacted his senior and refunded me the cost of the antivirus suite and cancelled my subscription, like i had requested for. this is an example of good support to the customer by DELL USA. i was very much satisfied by DELL USA support team.

but from the day 1 of receiving my laptop, it had multiple issues:

1 even when sleep is set to never, the laptop goes to sleep after sometime.

2 turns off instead of hibernating or shut down after 3% battery

3 wifi adapter not working in 'safe mode with networking'
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4 overheating [GPU temperature >80C and CPU temperature >99C (when playing games or when subjected to testing)]

5 when i put the laptop to hibernate, it goes into hibernation, but sometimes powers on automatically after sometime; and sometimes follows with hibernation on its own

6 when i put the laptop to hibernate (with lots of tabs open in chrome), it goes into hibernation, but sometimes could not retain hibernation data when it resumes, instead BSOD occurs. this problem does not happen everytime, but

7 computer hangs randomly for 30 seconds sometimes

8 low battery health due to the overheating problems

other issues:

9 supportassist-os-recovery cannot restore from local-recovery-image (i need link to download DELL factory recovery image from DELL)

10,11 alienware command center doesnt retain cooling policy settings, power policy settings

12 www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/t/709723/new-laptop-infected-mouse-pointer-alternates-betn-normal-and-working/
as can be seen in the above link, the mouse pointer alternates between 'normal' and 'busy in background' continuously because nahimicsvc32.exe crashes and continuously creates dumps. to avoid this, i have disabled nahimicsvc32.exe for the time-being

13 DELL powermanager doesn't retain cooling policy settings after reboot

14 cannot install new version of AlienwareCommandCenter.exe from DELL.com

15 DELL supportassist cannot be detected by DELL.com

16 some executable setup.exe wont run even when elevated

i thought of returning the laptop but since it was bought in the USA and my friend delivered it to me after one month, i could not do so. so immediately i contacted DELL-India support team through phone and explained them about these. they said that since i have premium support, they will offer assistance through the phone + internet and solve ALL the problems. let me tell you an example. the first support agent who assisted me (ms. prity ojha) told me that she has been using computers for over 19 years and that there is no extra security in using a standard account in windows, over administrator account and that she and DELL recommends using an administrative account even for daily activities over a standard account (contradictory to what microsoft and everyone in the computing community recommend). daily i used to wait for 2 hours for their call, because they would not tell the exact time at which they would call (only an approximate time in a 2 hour time slot). and in case i could not attend their phone call on a rare day, they would blame me. on one particular day, i did not receive any phone call, but her supervisor (mr.md amir abdi) said that he called me but could not reach me, due to network problems (how am i responsible for that?). and he was harsh to me on a particular day - he told me that there is nothing wrong with the laptop and asked me to use the laptop as such. hence i wrote to DELL india escalations team.

the case was handed over to mr.mukesh kumar of DELL india escalations team. he was considerate, courteous and understanding. but 6 months of remote sessions passed like this, but they were not able to identify the cause of any problem. and mr.mukesh convinced me that issue 3 was normal. and i had erased the SSD 3-4 times for re-installing windows, as per their 'suggestion'. then they transferred the case to mr.vijay dahiya of DELL india escalations team. he is the exact opposite of mr.mukesh. he even erased my factory recovery partition using DISKPART CLEAN command, and when i asked why, he said that he wont proceed further without that. and they kept changing the case between mr.mukesh and mr.vijay. many months have passed like this, and i could not use the laptop for the purpose for which i bought the laptop, for all these time; i could not install anything or use the laptop for routine purposes because of fear of losing my data every time i re-installed windows; i wasted all those months of time and energy in troubleshooting after troubleshooting. in this whole process, the case changed hands between many different people.

i got fed up and i said i wanted to take the laptop to the service center since direct access to the machine had better possibility of diagnosing the causes, compared to remote diagnosis. but they kept saying that it is not necessary and that they did not want to subject premium-support-customers to such inconvenience. and one day they concluded that replacing the heat-sink + 2 fans will solve the overheating issue and replacing the graphics card (which was part of the motherboard) would solve all the other hardware problems. and they said that the parts used would not be new but refurbished only.

to anyone reading this, please imagine this situation: you go to a shop to buy a machine and you buy it for the full price and upon operating it at home that night, find it to be defective. you ask the shop-owner the next day and he says he will give a refurbished machine instead of the faulty machine. wont you feel cheated? the same analogy is happening here. my brand new laptop is having so many problems and they are saying that they will use refurbished parts to rectify them? is this good ethics?

they were not ready to do give new parts. i had to argue with them a lot to get approval for new parts instead of the refurbished ones, they suggested they will replace with. i had to re-iterate many times that the laptop was bought in september 2019 and that these problems are there from the day 1 (from the moment i received the laptop) and i immediately notified the same to DELL support. from that day, DELL has been dragging on these issues - (if i were looking for a laptop with refurbished parts, i would have easily bought a refurbished laptop, for a much, much, LOWER PRICE. atleast it would have saved me from all the frustration, i was going through, all those days. what is the point of buying a brand-new laptop, that too, with premium warranty, instead? and what is the meaning of DELL giving warranty to us? DELL wants us to pay the price of a new laptop for refurbished parts ?!)

finally, they agreed for new parts. it took very long for the parts to arrive because of COVID lockdowns. the service engineer (mr.sridhar) who visited my place replaced the motherboard and heat-sink + 2 fans. when i demonstrated to him the other problems, he said that they are due to some virus, and reinstalling windows is the only solution i must follow. i asked him how a new laptop will have viruses (i had these problems right from day 1) and told him that i have re installed windows many times. he kept on re iterating the same thing. he added that he knows only about hardware and not the software problems.

and to my disappointment, the replacement solved none (except the first 2) of the problems. i conveyed the same to them. they suggested to continue troubleshooting through phone + internet to solve the problems(!). but i said that i was exhausted with it and i wanted to take the laptop to the service center since direct access to the machine had better possibility of diagnosing the causes, compared to remote diagnosis, and they said ok to it. but due to the COVID restrictions i was unable to take the laptop immediately to the service center which was located in the town about 25 kms from my village (public transport has been stopped here). i asked the if they could extend the warranty by 1 or 2 months considering the current COVID restrictions, but mr.vijay dahiya ruled it out bluntly, saying that it was the governments who imposed the restrictions and DELL was not responsible for it. and he also FLATLY ruled out the replacement of the faulty laptop by a new one or refund of our money, in case the laptop cannot be repaired to normal. very discourteous!

meanwhile i contacted a sysnative forums that deals with BSODs and sent them the BSOD dumps (log-files) and they ruled out the possibility of any software problems; they concluded that it must be surely a hardware issue (they pointed out the location of the page fault reference), and since memtest86 returned no problems, it is not due to bad RAM. they urged me to take the laptop ASAP to the service center without delaying further, since my warranty is going to end in November 2020, believing that the service center will have technicians competent enough to identify the problematic hardware. i told them that the service engineer who visited my place was not very competent enough and he kept saying that these problems were not hardware issues and that reinstalling windows would solve them.

anyhow i finally managed to rent a car and take the laptop to the service center, which is the only one in my town. it is not exactly a DELL-owned one, it is a 3rd-party service center authorized by DELL, lenovo, asus and other laptop, tv and mobile companies. to my disappointment it had only ONE DELL engineer - the same one who visited my place earlier. i explained all the problems to him and gave him a folder of around 500 MB of reports, logs, BSOD-dump-files, screenshots, photos, etc., explaining all the symptoms of overheating, BSOD and all the problems in my laptop. without even looking at them, he concluded that all the problems except overheating are due to viruses and reinstalling windows is the only solution. i asked him how a new machine fresh from the factory can have viruses and i told him that i have already re-installed windows (after completely erasing the SSD) 3-4 times. and i told him that the forum has ruled out the possibility of any software problems. he kept re-iterating the same thing. i asked him if he could copy to my SSD, the recovery image pertaining to my service tag, since it was DELL which erased my SSD completely (including my recovery image that came factory-installed). he flatly refused to do that. anyhow, i deposited the laptop to him in the hope that my laptop's problems will be solved by some magic.

he said he will call me the next day, but did not; and neither the next day. so i called him and asked about the laptop. he said that the motherboard needs to be replaced again to solve the overheating. i asked him why again it needs to be replaced. he had no answer. he said that the graphics card was getting heated unnaturally and since it was attached to the motherboard, the motherboard needs to be replaced. i asked him if the replacement would be new or refurbished. he assured that it would be new. after a week, we called him and he said that the replacement is complete, and that the laptop is working fine; but to my shock mr.vijay dahiya from the the DELL India escalation team who sanctioned the parts, said that the replacement parts were not new but refurbished. i quoted the service engineer's assurance to him. i also quoted the clause 11.3 in the DELL India website (dell.com/learn/in/en/incorp1/terms-of-sale-consumer) that specifically states "Parts used in repairing or servicing Product(s) may be NEW, equivalent-to-new, or reconditioned.", meaning that there is provision for replacing the defective parts with new parts. i added that the laptop is faulty on arrival, but why refurbished parts have been used. he replied "every time we cannot give new parts; since new parts were used in the replacement the last time - that too as an exception, we cannot give new parts this time". i argued that if the 1st replacement of parts had solved the problem, why are they replacing the motherboard for the 2nd time. also in both times, i did not ask for replacement; it was they who said that replacement was needed both times. but he promised that they will replace the battery (which had been worn out quickly due to the overheating), subject to approval. but the next day mr.vijay emailed me saying that the service engineer reported that the parts were actually NEW. i cant understand what kind of CHEATING is this - the one who sanctioned the parts saying that they are refurbished; but the one who obtained them and fixed them saying that they are actually new; and upon pressure from our side, the one who sanctioned them saying that they are new. and they added that the service engineer is saying that the battery has no faults, and they WONT replace it (they said that they will replace the battery only if has any fault, but not reduced capacity, since it is a consumable whose maximum capacity decreases with time and use, during normal usage.). i explained to mr.vijay that that is not the case here, because the battery did not lose its health in the normal manner, but drastically lost its health due to the heating problem, and that it was the responsibility of DELL to replace the battery. then he came up with another statement - that the service engineer said that upon further examination, after the replacement of the motherboard, the battery is lasting for upto 3 hours of playing 4K video, and so he FLATLY said that he wont replace it. we all know that heat causes the battery health to deteriorate IRREVERSIBLY. i cant imagine how changing the motherboard will reverse the process MAGICALLY ! if the battery is working fine, why were we asking for a new battery?

i asked for the transfer of case to someone who can understand the customer's problems from our point of view; he initially said ok to it, but then closed the entire case abruptly saying that his decision is final. i asked for further escalation of the case but he flatly said no; instead he gave the postal address of DELL India corporate office. i asked for the email id of the same address and the email id of DELL USA team, buy he flatly refused. the manager of mr.vijay called us and informed the same. he said that the case has been closed (without our consent or satisfaction) and that there is nothing more they will do, and that we have no other choice but to collect the laptop from the service center. i contacted DELL-twitter-support, but they replied that they cannot supersede the DELL India escalations team.

all this time i thought DELL-India was a reliable and ethical company. but some people are spoiling the name of DELL, by cheating gullible people. they behave as if we are fools having odd and farcical expectations for wanting a laptop that's not faulty when buying. they will initially drag the issue for months till your warranty is about to expire, and then, at the most replace, the defective parts with REFURBISHED PARTS ONLY, saying that it is as per their warranty terms. consumers cannot trust them that they will rectify the manufacturing defects in the warranty period; and buying a premium-support has no meaning. i literally lost around 1 year of my life in troubleshooting after troubleshooting (in phone + internet) and writing 100s of emails to DELL.

to anyone planning to buy a new laptop in the future, if you get a laptop that is faulty on arrival, please return it immediately in exchange for a new laptop or refund of your money. and please don't trust DELL-India !

BTW, do you think hereafter, i would buy another DELL-India product or recommend DELL-India to anyone?

the gist of my complaint against DELL-India is as follows:
my newly purchased DELL laptop has been having around 16 problems, including overheating and blue screen errors, right from the day of purchase. i had informed DELL-support India immediately. they have been doing troubleshooting after troubleshooting through phone and internet in vain, all these days, but unable to find the causes of the problems. after nearly 7 months, they replaced the motherboard + heat-sink + 2 fans, but that solved none (except 2) of the problems. so, as per their advice, i have deposited the laptop in the service center. they said that, again, replacement of motherboard is needed. the service engineer had promised (lied) that they will replace with a new one. then he called me and told me that he has replaced with new one. but DELL India escalation team has said that as per warranty, they wont give new parts. and they wont replace the battery, whose health has reduced due to the overheating (manufacturing defect) of the laptop. i want to escalate this issue to DELL USA, on whom i have a good opinion.