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really bad dell laptop experiences -- hardware failing,
i want to relay the gist of my recent Dell experience for all's consideration.
The whole Dell experience has been quite painful from the first time the computer failed to operate.
- August 2011 I purchased a new Vostro laptop at Staples. It was in stock and my two year old Dell SPS lap top had just failed for the second time (technician said it needed a new mother board; 6 months earlier i had replaced the hard drive when it failed) I selected the Vostro model because I was told it was more reliable/commercial/business grade.
- Nov 17, 2011my new Vostro stopped working
- I spent ~$100 at Microcenter in Cambridge MA to diagnose the problem; their conclusion was the Vostro was not repairable
- Contacted Dell and Dell denied that it was my computer despite my having the original receipt for the computer in my name from Staples
- January 2012 Dell finally acknowledges that they made a mistake on registering and it in fact was my computer but then Dell informed me that the warranty had expired because the clock for the warranty started when Dell shipped computer to Staples reportedly in January 2011 and told me to go to Staples to seek satisfaction; Staples said Dell was wrong and that the warranty only starts when it was sold to me.
- February 2012 Dell revised their determination and said warranty clock started when I purchased in August 2011 and agreed to send technican to fix my computer. over subsequent 3 weeks Dell sends 3 separate service techs on 3 visits to my office to repeatedly replace the hard drive each time leaving before they got the computer working
- March 2012 Dell finally replaces the computer with a refurbished model that clearly has a warped keyboard and states the warranty will expire in August 2011
So now I have had this Dell for 7 months according to Dell and it has operated for only 3 months.
All in all Dell, I would give Dell a failing grade for this experience. Several of the tech support folks were fine and conscientious but clearly in this case the overall equipment and Dell's response experience has been horible.
in the past I have bought and enjoyed ~10 Dells for home, kids, and business and never had a problem.
Phil
DELL-Terry B
4 Operator
4 Operator
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3.5K Posts
0
March 14th, 2012 10:00
That would be pretty frustrating. If you would like for me to take a look i will be happy to. Please shoot me a private message (just click on my Signature, then click start conversation) please include the service tag and your contact information. If nothing else we can at least get a keyboard out there. I am sorry to read of the poor experience with support.
TB
psi4000
27 Posts
1
March 14th, 2012 12:00
I came upon this post and simply had to give you my two cents worth. I have six Dell computers, three laptops and three desktops. My latest purchase was a Dell XPS-17 L702X, purchased in September of 2011. From the day I accepted delivery of it I could not access my Dell Audio Manager by Realtek, even after four reinstalls, two from the recovery partition, one from the set of DataSafe backup DVDs I made and once from the installation DVD that came with the laptop. Nothing seemed to fix the problem and Dell finally sent me a new OS drive (after trying for several months to access the Audio Manager, to no avail), which allows me to access the Audio Manager. During that time period, I have had four tech visits to my home and the laptop was sent to the Dell Texas repair facility. So far Dell has replaced the motherboard, the sound card, several USB ports, the power adapter (twice), the power adapter port within the laptop (four times) and the palm rest.
The new OS drive that was installed two days ago must be defective because when I attempted to create a system repair disk I received the following message: The files needed to create a system repair disc were not found on this computer. After receiving this message, I'm wondering whether or not the DataSafe backup DVDs I made will work if I need to use them.
This laptop, although I love it to death, has been a total disaster since the day I accepted delivery of it.
C.B.
kerry pay mann
2 Posts
0
July 9th, 2012 18:00
I bought a dell Ins. N4100 14inch and was paid for on my Wal-Mart card because I do not trust laptops since my HP 17in motherboard failed and they never once sent me a card in the mail to inform me that this motherboard had a recall due to what happened to mine. I even had an extended warranty and the laptop has been sitting on a hospital tray over my bed because I am disabled.
I bought my Dell and it was delivered just before Xmas and I bought an extended warranty from Wal-mart.
I tried to install an additional large 23 inch LG LED monitor and it wouldn't in Feb. then I couldn't install a brother printer and the startup disk from the brother printer reverted my entire Windows 7 operating system back to running all the programs DOS.
This is Crazy!
My repair disks created when I set it up didn't do anything. India CS could not help because I could not get onto the internet or do anything. They said operating disk would have to be sent and an appointment was made for July 4 at 5 p.m. for install. No one called for three days so I inserted the disk that was sent and the system they send did not look anything like I originally had. The programs were only miniscule.
Something now I look back has always been wrong because I could never use their backup and restore the way of the documentation. It would only want to backup on the DVD-RW. Since I signed up for Dell backup online service and I was given an ID number and it stated it was backing up to the online service that was free I only have documents from letters I have written saved.
When I installed the disk India sent me it did something to the partition and it took all the space up so that NO backups could now be run and moved my old system of files from the original into the D: drive.
The Dell disk sent to me didn't even run a program that had windows to walk thru anything and it never had an end. I just sat with an empty screen that said nothing until after a couple of hours I looked to see what happend. This was when programs were installed but nothing like what my original I purchased from Wal-mart /Dell setup with additional MS-Office Student 2010 or windows and it looked like something completely different.
Windows 7 at least started so I tried the original repair disks to see if they would work and they did set up the laptop like what it was but everything I had was lost. I did make backups of my documents on DVD's.
I was getting errors whenever I tried to restore or do backups of Restore7.exe error memory could not be written on all the different ways it gives you to restore.
As I said after I installed the factory disk it absolutely would not let me do any kind of backup or restore feature because it would tell me it didn't have any space to do the backup.
Also from day one whenever I would type letters my cursor would jump up about 5 lines every 5 minutes and I would have to go back and remove what I had typed in the wrong place.
The cursor whenever I hovered over a selection before I could leave it would automatically shoice it and I would have selected something I had no intention of selecting.
I'm didn't wait. After IT didn't bother to keep the appointment that was set up for the install after two days I wrote a long letter to Dell in Texas hadwritten with all the problems and that being totally disabled without my internet I cannot be without a computer AT ALL BECAUSE MY HEALTH AND MY DOCTOR COMMUNICATION DEPENDS ON A GOOD WORKING COMPUTER. They can send me a return postage paid so I can mail back and they can keep. The letter went to Wal-Mart and I am not going to pay for JUNK or have it come back and have it fail again and then not be under warranty.
My brother's HP desktop that he bought in 2003 hasn't failed once and I'm going to get a desktop. This is why my mother always told me to put things on a credit card because if they fail to live up to being a functioning product they can remove the charges and take it back.
My letter to Wal-Mart was very detailed as to all the problems and a PC should not revert to DOS just because an installation disk for a printer is used. The brother tech could not believe that my computer did this and he couldn't do anything. He said I was going to have to call Dell and get them to send out a disk because my system was really screwed up. As I had a college degree in CIS I know there is a software and hardware problem.
I have lost all the set up time and an inability to communicate or write letters because of this machine and DELL's philipine office cannot speak English. The guy just kept on telling me that he could "help me" but that was all he said and then tried to sell me "time" to fix the problem.
I said OK fix it and it didn't do a thing. The system was running in DOS and it couldn't use a single program on it.
When I did get Windows 7 installed from my repair disks that did finally work that removed the factory install disk software the backup and restore would run the program but it would only backup to the DVD-RW drive per what the "window" stated but when it started the program it asked me to put in a disk and I did then it didn't go any further . The program didn't end. After an hour it stated to remove the disk and then it ran the backup program again and said it was putting the backup in the DVD drive but it went someone else when it ended and I have no idea where it went.
This laptop is a mess and I'm just going to send it back in all my original packaging and I have written an extremely long handwritten letter as to all the stupid stuff it has done.
A copy of the same letter will go back to Wal-mart and they can credit my account because "no way in hell am I ever going to pay for this junk or waste one more minute of not having a functioning pc to communicate with my doctors!" They can cancel my Wal-mart card for all I care because I am now taking all my medical mal-practice and incompetant issues that have made me disabled to Congress because the doctors in this country have absolutely no respect for Medicare people and cannot even keep desent medical records and I can prove Medicare Fraud at this point because all the documents I backed up are in relation to I put everthing in writting and record my doctor visits due to the massive errors doctors put in people medical files.
I'm advising everyone before the medical profession kills you to get a copy of your records because your mouth will fall open when you see the inability to even write simple symptoms in a chart.
Kerry Pay Mann
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