Laptop Hinge Problem

You should still be under warranty if you have had it only 5 months.

Physical damage is not covered except by an additional cost warranty option. Hinges will not fail in 5 months unless helped by being dropped. Same for the damaged bezel. If these were defective, you would have seen something wrong initially.

That is my thought as well. Two different csr's I talked to told me they are not covered. The hinges were very tight from the beginning, this is true for a second laptop a Vostro 3700 that I bought at the same time, so I really didn't pay much attn to it. However within a month and a half the left side of the bezel was starting to pop loose everytime the lid was opened. But with a squeeze it went back into place. However, now the hinge is very sloppy on the left side and the bottom of the bezel is popped out and won't snap back in. The side does but will not stay in. It has not been don't or mishandled in any way. The second csr I talked to even seemed confused about when it was bought. He kept telling me it was bought in 2009. I was online at the time looking at my order number and date and it clearly shows the correct date of 12/2010. Getting pretty frustrated at the way it is being handled by Dell. I have bought 4 computer's from dell but if this is the way they are going to handle business there will not be a fifth. Its sad because I have always recommended dell to friends, but now ..........

This is a repost as the last one was deleted due to an objection from the mods. i have changed the words and deleted comments I think they objected to.

Well as there has been no response from any dell mods to say that the csr's were wrong I am left to assume that they agree with them. A 5 month old laptop with defective hinges and I am out of luck. I guess Dell is becomming the new Gateway. Once they get your money they really don't care about you. I did a few searches on google lately and to be honest almost every page is about people unhappy with dell. I for one will never buy another dell product.  Recently a friend of my son's was going to buy an Duo because she liked the touchscreen. I persuded her to go with a Toshiba instead. Call this a rant if you want.  All they had to do was honor the warranty they post with the product and they would have kept a loyal dell customer instead they choose not to. So be it. It will cost them more in the long run. There is a post in the dell discussion groups on FB about the studio 17 having hinge problems. Seems it happens alot but dell is not willing to accept the responsibility. Shame shame

It appears from what I've read on these forums and elsewhere that far as Dell are concerned any damage to laptop casings and hinges is "cosmetic" only.

If car manufacturers took the same approach then not being able to open or close you car door properly due to some damage or faulty locking mechanism would also be considered cosmetic only and wouldn't affect the way you use your car at all, whether or not you can lock it up or keep the rain out. Logical huh?

Good luck with your battle to get this resolved, because that it what it will be - a battle..

Well, I did talk to an agent in chat and finally got them to agree to have it shipped to the repair center to be checked out and fixed. He first said that since I talked to the out of warranty dept I would have to talk to them. I told him the only reason I talked to them was the agent I talked to last week, whom I couldn't understand a word of, transfered me there. Today's agent said they would check it out and if it was found to be "accidental damage" I would have to pay for it. I told him it is a manuf. defect and I have found that a lot of these laptops have the same problem. Even on Dells own discussion groups there a dozens of people that have the same problem. So I'm a little unsure and very distrustful after some of the posts I have read but it def needs to ge back and be fixed.

I want to update this post with the resolution to my problem. A day or so after posting about the issues with my laptop I received a call from Dell. It was from a dept called Social Outreach Services. After explaining to the agent the problem he assured me it would be a covered repair. I sent the laptop to the repair facilityas directed. They replaced the hinge cover but did not repair the hinges or the cracked lid. I then contacted the S.O.S agent and explained what happened. He agreed to have it sent back to the repair depot again. This time it came back 100% fixed. All problems seem to be repaired and correct. I want to thank this department and this agent in particular for taking care of this problem. Dell stood behind their warranty and their product.

Opps double post.. please delete

Social Outreach Services? LOL

Sounds like a spin doctors take on "Put out a few carefully selected fires in an attempt to restore damaged credibility Dept."

Wrong.... Hinges on the Dell 3330 models Will fail prematurely while under warranty and without assistance of anything other than repetitive opening and closing of the lid. ----- I have a fleet of these and they are systematically busting apart under warranty. ----- This design has been identified as faulty and is no longer in production.