Alienware Redeems Themselves

Hi everyone,
You've no doubt read about all the trouble I've been having with my Area 51 m9750 since purchase. It's been a long, hard battle, but you'll be pleased to know that Alienware's excellent customer service team has come through. Today, Alienware made the decision to let me exchange my defective Area 51 m9750 for an all new m15x. I'm more than thrilled, and Alienware has sold me as a future customer.

Here's my config:

[1] Area-51® m15x

Design & Display: Silver Skullcap Design
Display: 15.4" WideUXGA 1920 x 1200 LCD (1200p)
System Lighting: Alienware® AlienFX® System Lighting - Lime
Video/Graphics Card: 512MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8800M GTX
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T8100 2.1GHz (3MB Cache 800MHz FSB)
Operating System (Office software not included): Windows Vista® Home Premium with Service Pack 1
Notebook Tuners and Remotes: Without Media Center Remote Control or TV Tuner
Memory: 1GB Dual Channel DDR2 SO-DIMM at 667MHz – 2 x 512MB
System Drive: 120GB 7,200RPM (8MB Cache) w/ Free Fall Protection
Optical Drives : 8x Dual Layer Burner (DVD±RW, CD-RW) w/ LightScribe Technology - View Demo
Wireless: Internal Intel® Wireless 4965 a/b/g/Draft-N Mini-Card
Sound Card : Internal High-Definition Audio with surround sound
Keyboard Options: AlienFX® Illuminated Keyboard – Exclusive Design
Warranty: 1-Year AlienCare Toll-Free 24/7 Phone Support w/ Onsite Service
AlienRespawn: AlienRespawn v2.0 Recovery DVD – Windows Vista® Edition
Alienware Extras: Alienware® Mesh Cap
Alienware Extras: Alienware® Mousepad
Alienware Extras: Alienware® Mobile Binder
Alienware Extras: Alienware® Personalized Nameplate
Alienware Extras: Owner Identification Card
Alienware Extras: Area-51® m15x Protective Cloth Sleeve
Alienware Extras: Area-51® m15x Keyboard Diagram Overlay
Alienware Extras: Area-51® m15x Smooth Mylar Touchpad
Avatar: Alienhead 3D
Window Style: Default Window Style
Mouse Pointers: Standard Mouse Pointers
Wallpaper: Alienhead 3D
Wallpaper: Alienhead Glow
Wallpaper: Alien Cyborg
Power Plan: High Performance
Automatic Updates: Automatic Updates On
Sidebar Gadgets: CPU Meter
Sidebar Gadgets: Weather Forecast (default location)
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Time Zones: (GMT - 7.00) Mountain Time (US & Canada)

Many thanks for all the support,
Gabe

 

wow - gave you a trade-up. Awesome!

 

congrats sounds almost like just what AW did with dhoang. hope you will be as happy with the m15x as him.

since dhoang hated AW before his m15x maybe you might have a change of heart and decide to like AW again.

 

Yeah, I love my m15x and AW. That's great news, I hope that you get what you deserve finally Gabez!!

 

im glad to hear that. Congrats on your new system

 

WOW.lucky you

 

Sorry to hear about your first system not working out, hopefully this will make up for it.

 

Congrats, and yes sorry to hear the M9750 did not work out. Enjoy the new system and keep us updated

 

Wow! That is a pretty awesome trade-off. Congratulations and I hope you enjoy your new system!

 

You consider the m15x a good trade off?

Jeeez, you just got screwed over big time mister. Should have just gotten a refund and gone with a Sager 5793.

 

I think thats a pretty generous trade off....

 

@Deathwinger - I think I got a great deal. Keep in mind that Alienware exchanged this system after over 2 months of continuous problems. They upgraded my processor to a 2.1, my video card to an 8800, and my hard drive to a 120 Gb. Just when I thought it couldn't get any better, they let me choose the new skullcap, the lightup keyboard, and allowed me to customize a nameplate (I think that's awesome since the m9750 doesn't have one). They took the liberty of paying for the shipping of my old system and upgraded it to 2 day. I couldn't possibly ask for more.

Under no circumstances did Alienware have to help me (other than another repair). I clearly overshot the acceptable return time frame. The fact that they exceeded my expectations as a company makes me respect them despite my difficulties with my m9750. No where will you find a company that's will to resolve customer satisfaction to the level that I just described.

Gabe

 

@GabeZ - Nice outcome on that. If your laptop had 3 problems in a row there is something called the lemon law for computers though but I'm not sure if that is your case or not.

 

i am officially envy!!!!!!!!!
m9700->m9750->m15x

 

good deal.

One thing Deathwinger some of the older laptops tend to have more problems then the new ones.

 

I'm really pleased for you. You deserve some return for the hassle you had. It just shows that even though they get flamed on here sometimes, they do listen and care...well sometimes

@Deathwinger, Monty is being tested by Alienware at the moment, so Sager won't be the only manufacture producing it in a notebook, besides the m15x still looks much better, no offence but the Sager looks a little boring...IMHO

Gabe, i hope everything works out for you, hope you'll be taking a few piccies of you fully customised m15x...?

OB

 

Nice one Gabe,congratulations.

at least theve found a new home for my returned system
as long as it works the m15x is the dogs dangley bits.

 

So what is the next step m15x to m17x??

 

gratz and all

but in all due respect don't u work for Dell?
regardless if u came to fix my laptop would be cool to see a m15x

im sure u have earned it after all that mess and i hope you have a great time with it buddy woot woot

 

It sound for me as the first step, what Dell is doing to renew the image from Alienware!

Have fun with the awesome m15x ....

 

YAY!! finally some people posting positive feedback about AW CS.

Everyone seems to only want to complain about their bad experience... so the change is nice.

Congrats on the new laptop, and here's hoping it's without fault.

 

wow, this is excellent, you are so lucky.
However first, if I have a 17", I think I wont want to go back to a 15".
Second, can u lower the screen res & buy a T9300. it will be better ^^!

 

Congratulations! It is good to hear they took care of you! I am hoping for AW to redeem themselved to me too.

Uh...we complain because we have problems to complain about. Before I started having problems in May I was one of the happiest of the m15x owners. I hope you don't think we are just *****ing and moaning for no good reason.

 

@Heath - He doesn't work directly for dell. Instead he works as one of the people that they call to service computers. This means that he isn't like one of their tech's at the office, he is just certified to work with their computers. I want to try to get certified, may as well.

 

Sorry but how is a 120gb a step up from dual raid 80's? 80+80=160, 40gb difference

 

@simonmpoulton - It's kind of hard to see the upgrades they gave me for the m15x, being that I've upgraded my m9750 so many times that it's far beyond original specs. Also, 80+80 = 139. The raid volume takes some space for configuration.

Original m 9750 specs:
Vista Premium (Bumped up to Ultimate)
2.0 Ghz Processor
1 Gb of memory (Bumped up to 4)
Dual 8700 Gts
Single 80 Gb hard drive (bumped to a dual raid 0)

With that said, Alienware can only improve upon what they have documentation for. Like I said before, Alienware chose to help me. All I was entitled to was endless repairs. How can I ask them for a refund, credit, or anything like that.........???? They've already extended themselves enough by giving me the option of a brand new system. They could have just offered me a brand new m15x with all the lowest specs, and it still would have been a fair deal. The very fact that Alienware chose to let me have 3 upgrades means that they really do care about customer satisfasction (an Nvidia 8800, 120 Gb drive, and 2.1 ghz processor didn't come free to them)

@haquocdung - I think anyone would be willing to accept a 15 inch screen for an Nvidia 8800 GTX. Also, when I placed the order for my m9750, I was thinking more about the specs than the screen. If anything, I wanted the whole laptop to be smaller. It's not easy carrying around a 17 inch notebook on my travels (a sacrafice I was willing to accept as long as it worked)

@everyone - I work with Dell at an indirect level. I am, in fact, a traveling Dell respresentative/technician. Although I may not be employed by Dell, I am part of the Dell team. Just like their internal employees, Dell relies on me to provide the same level of customer service and support that meets or exceeds the Dell standard. As a contractor, I'm able to be more flexible and experience more adventures than your typical in office representative.
Also, as a contractor, I am able to be a respresentative of more than one corporation without fear of a conflict of interest. I'm am equally a representative of IBM, Sony, Apple, HP/Compaq, EMC, Vizio, American Systems, Systemax, GOS systems, Hallifax, and many more that are too numerous to list.

Gabe

P.S. - Many of you may be wondering the same thing. If Gabe is so close to Dell, then why has he had such a tough time with his Alienware experience? The truth of the matter is that Alienware is still very much their own company (And I have yet to represent them..... possibly in the future). Dell is slowy integrating themselves. The fact that I represent Dell has no bearing on Alienwares decisions (although some of them jump when they find out). I experience the same support that every one else does.

 

Why not represent AW then? Maybe then you could do something positive for them.

 

How's it going Milcs,
I am currently waiting on Alienware to offer certifications and the privelege of being an Alienware respresentative. The minute that door opens, I'll be there.

Gabe

 

Congrats on getting your new system Gabe, my m9750 has been sent back for repairs 3 times now, and I am now working with the critical issues team on getting this fixed. Third times a charm I guess, and I hope it will be fixed this time. If not, I hope I can get the same level of customer service that you did.

 

Hey Gabe, I hope you're going to post some pictures of your new machine, i think it's great that you got is sorted out.

It's actually good to hear some positive comments about the CS

OB

 

I only have positive remarks regarding CS. Nothing really to complain about.

 

Lol, Have you got your machine back yet?

OB

 

No... but they always treated me well.

 

Well, Hers;s hoping you get it back soon and it works great?

OB

 

One can only hope... We will see. They have changed case and GPUs and supposedely, while testing it, they found a problem with a heatsink.
It's been there for almost 3 weeks now... Getting a bit impatient.

 

I'll bet, i'd be going up the wall by now... (only a little impatient lol)

I hope it comes back to you soon, then you can do a review on your "fixed" machine

OB

 

haha I dont know why they did not replace the whole thing. But milcs I hoope they get it fix soon.

 

Well... I just received an email from AW with the following subject:
"ALIENWARE ORDER CANCELLATION NOTIFICATION."
And it goes like this:
"Your cancellation request has been received. We have assigned an RMA number to your case, which we will use to track and identify your request. Please make a note of this number and include it on the packaging when you return the item. Your RMA number is...."

Now... I'm intrigued. I never requested a cancellation. Where does this comes from?

 

I think it's time for you to call them

 

milcs,

Rest assured that your order is being processed accordingly. We'll keep you up to date on its progress and you may freely PM me if you have any questions.

Thanks!

 

Ok, I just had a phone call from the famous "Penny". I'm quite amazed as she was completely on top of everything going on the forum. Scary...

So, here's what happened... Someone from this forum (which I assume might have been Alienware-James), talked with Penny and apparently, they are cancelling my old laptop and building a new one for me. So I guess these are good news. Obviously I wasn't planning on waiting such a long time to receive my laptop back, but if it comes in perfect conditions then I guess I can only be happy.

They are going to keep my old M15x to use it in their lab for testing purposes. Poor little thing...
Apart from that, I do appreciate this from AW CS, but I just really wanted my laptop back. I didn't want to have to wait for 3 more weeks!

There was only one thing that left me a bit "unhappy". At a certain point she starts talking about the 4GB I bought and that these RAM wasn't verified on my laptop. I explored it a bit and told her I have emails saying that using RAM and HDD bought from external sources does not void the warranty and she kept on saying that they haven't verified the memory... I really didn't get that very well, so I'll have to clear it out.

Bottom line... I think we are being heard by Alienware. I think that if we put our strenght together we will be able to make things happen and improve costumer's satisfaction which will only, in the long run, benefit AW's image and business.

I would like to take this chance to stress the following. I know people might associate me with a horrible AW experience, but I always said that my experience wasn't that bad. I do make lots of noise because I am hoping AW to do their homework and come up with real solutions that WE CAN ALL take advantage of. At a certain point during the converstation I had with Penny, I felt like I was an Anti-AW villain. Which, I'm not. I just want the right thing to be done for all of AW's costumers.

To finish... Thanks to Alienware-James for having personally looked at my problem. I can only say that I'm a fair person and, if AW does prove to be what we all "bought" in the first place, I will put as much effort as I've been doing lately in praising you guys.

Cheers to all,
MC

 

As always, milcs, your feedback is greatly appreciated; as is everyone else on the boards. We take note of issues described by our customers to better serve and enhance your Alienware experience.

We're here to help!

 

Thank you very much indeed James.

And appart from what people might judge from my attitude... I'm here to (try and) help as well! I hope AW will take this amazing chance to work closely with your costumers to improve quality and give a significative boost to AW's image.

 

It very much seems as though AW CS is doing exactly that! Good job, guys!

 

This makes me hopeful... I'm very happy for you Milcs! I am hoping for good news as well very soon...hoping...

 

Good Milcs! You deserve the best!

 

Ahahaha... That put a smile in my face. But in response to your "You deserve the best!", I can only answer back "We all do!". This is what we should try to accomplish.

Sometimes people think this is some kind of "battle" between fans and haters. Not at all... Most of us are here, in the exact same boat (maybe on different sides of it, but on the same boat), trying to go in the same direction.

Anyway... I'm quite hopeful that we will see some changes soon. Today was a positive day.

 

Can someone please let us know whats going on with the current CPU issue.

 

Obviously the "Redemption" is a work in progress...

 

I think you're right, because otherwise that CS rep wouldn't have known that info. As long as you guy keep posting your experiences and such, hopefully the improvements will continue . . .