Broken Alienware - 800 Tech Laptop repair ok?

I am normally a member of [H]ardforum but they actually suggested I come here because you guys know more about this topic. After surfing around on your website anyways I determined that I should have been here in the first place...

So I was playing a game on my Alienware m9750 and I'm assuming it overheated. The screen went black, laptop fans turned off, everything was as if I killed the power to it. The charging lights on the laptop don't light up anymore. The laptop does not respond to anything I do including trying to turn it on. No lights no nothing.

So because this laptop is my life and is worth so much in my eyes, I am willing to pay whatever it'll take to get it fixed.

I found http://www.800tech.com will repair laptops for approx 75 dollars labor + parts cost. I assume the worst and assume that the motherboard fried and needs a new one. I looked that up online and it's approx 500 dollars for one.

For the record, since the laptop is out of warranty AND I am not the original owner, Alienware will not talk to me about what I could do except give me suggestions of websites to buy parts at. No surprise from everything I have read about Alienware in the past.

So anyways, my question is do you guys think it's the motherboard (AC adapter works fine, battery was working fine beforehand as well) and has anybody dealt with 800tech.com? I ask because I don't want to send them my baby and 600 dollars and them to walk off with it. If not 800tech.com, then who else would you suggest? Local shops want approx up to 300 dollars for labor to fix + cost of parts.

Thanks,

Ryan

 

Take out the battery and disconnect the power cord. After that hold down the power button for aprox. 15 seconds, take off your finger, and do that again. After that is done, just plug in the battery and try to turn it on. If that doesn't work take out the battery and just insert the AC adapter.

If that doesn't work I do not know what to say as having something like that repaired can end up costing you a ton of money if you don't fix the problem on the first try so sorry I can't help you

 

i had this issue happen to me before. i had to replace the video card since it got fried and then the comp started to work normally again.

 

As I said before it is hard to pinpoint a specific issue so you may end up having to get a mobo, GPU, GPU Slave in order to find the issue. Hopefully you will guess right the first time

Check more with that company before you send your computer in and see if they can really fix your problem or are just taking your money.

 

Thanks for the fast responses guys. I'll do some last minute tests on the laptop hoping that it'll turn over but we'll see. My laptop in particular has the two 7950GTX cards in SLI which could mean bad news I suppose.

I love my laptop so much (been so faithful since I got it and has been my pride and joy)

Anybody have suggestions with which repair service I go with (if not 800tech)?

Thanks,
Ryan

 

OMG IT WORKS!!!!

Stone825 send me you address I'm sending you a check!!!!

pure genius!! THANK YOU!!!

 

congrats Stone. another happy customer.

 

Yay just doing my job here as a member of notebook review . By taking the battery and AC adapter out and holding the power button down, you reset your BIOS so that any changes made to the clocks or anything to the mobo were reset which luckily fixed your problem.

@Azul - What is your email address ?

Also : You do not have to send me money if you do not want to. I merely belong to these forums to learn new things and to help other users here. In addition, tell the members at Hardforum that we were a great help as it is always nice to try to help people on these forums with issues they are having.

 

Glad to hear you were able to resolve your problem quickly, azulcorvette. And welcome to the NotebookReview forums.

The fix Stone suggested is very handy . . . draining the excess electricity running around the inside of the system can fix many problems. I do it once per month with my notebook.

I suggest conversing in PM if you want to talk about emails (I hope you're not serious about the whole check thing, lol), because when they are posted in the forum moderators are instructed to edit them out for security purposes.

 

Silly Alienware wouldn't even suggest a thing like this. How unfortunate (my laptop died Saturday morning so I have been living in hell until this past hour because my life is using a computer for school work and entertainment)

Stone my e-mail is [email protected]. Accept Paypal?

Resetting the BIOS: wow! Would have figured that the laptop would return the clocks to normal speed when turned off.

Any explanation why the laptop turned off (and it stayed off)? Was heat the issue? I guess I don't understand why the BIOS would be changing settings while I'm playing a game, enough so that the computer could crash and be prevented from starting up again...

Thanks,
Ryan

 

Wow, you're serious about giving away money?

 

@Chaz - Right below that I said that the money wasn't needed and that I'm here merely to help people and learn things

@Azul - I wanted your email so that you could just email me if you needed help with anything else because your PM system doesn't work yet.

@Everyone - I'm NOT asking for money. That is very dumb as it would get rid of the whole point of these forums because everyone would say "Ill only tell you if you send me money".

 

Yes I am serious because I was about to go down to the UPS store and send my laptop off to New York and be without it for two weeks AND have to pay 100 dollars minimum to have it looked at (labor) and could depending on the service might claim parts cost as much as 500 dollars.

I very well could have been out 600 dollars if it wasn't for Stone for giving me directions on fixing the BIOS like that.

I needed my laptop fixed and I was about to pay anything to get it working again and this was an absolute miracle that Stone knew a technique to get it working.

"Do onto others what you would like others to do to you." If Stone saves me something between 100 to 600 dollars, I feel I owe him a piece of that.

 

a couple of months ago I had to that to my wifey's laptop (toshiba), but now she has to use the laptop without the battery. for some reason once you plug in the battery it turns off...oh well...

 

Happy to see someone getting their machine fixed. This is why I joined this forum and you never know the tables maybe turned one day and stone might actually need some help (kinda doubt that though) but like I've always said you have a 9750 question Stone probably knows.

 

Well when I first joined I had a LOT of questions about everything because I was basically a kid that bought an AW M5550 giving into the hype and it turned out to be the crappiest computer I've ever owned coupled with the crappiest tech support.

I learned a lot from former members here such as Ice-Tea and a lot of others. I decided to stay so that I could learn more (browsing other forums) and could give help to AW owners.

There is probably a good number of things that I don't know about the M9750 as I haven't had to encounter them yet. For example swapping the LCD on it might pose a problem but I'd try to do it.

And yes I will need help from you guys in the future because I'm going to run into something that I don't know.