All G73s are not created equally

I'm on my third G73-A2 in three days.

The first had a defective GPU - it would heat up quickly, GSOD and crash after four minutes while running Furmark - reaching 106. The left side of the keyboard also lifted away making it almost impossible to use.

The second never gave me a GSOD and ran Furmark for 15 minutes, maxing out at 105. I was happy. Until I woke up and found that it refused to turn on. It worked with the battery but when plugged into the ac adapter it wouldn't start, the charger also worked with the G73 I returned the previous day so motherboard problem maybe?

The third is the best of the bunch - It ran Furmark for 20 minutes reaching a max temp of 93 degrees. Awesome. But I've had it for all of an hour - maybe it will die again, who knows?

It seems like the more I return it the better it gets, maybe the trend will continue...

Am I unlucky or are the G73s poorly built?

Also, Asus stopped shipping the G73 with a restore . Is there any way of doing a clean, bloatware-free install without having to burn a CD? I've already tried the recovery partition, came out intact.

 

Well basically the "recovery" CD is just win7 with extra instruction to install the bloatware. The actually bloatware is the drivers and utility CD. You can install your own version of windows if you prefer.

 

Is there a way to access the recovery partition and replace the bloatware filled Asus version with a stock version of Windows 7?

 

Hmm, not that I am aware of....

 

Beause there are 2 HDs would I be able to create a second recovery partion on the second HD, install from that then format the first?

Edit: http://en.kioskea.net/faq/4093-windows-7-create-a-recovery-partition

 

I am on my 2nd G73. However both of them had GSOD so bad GPUs. On the first G73 the asus repair center damaged it bad. Got a new again GSOD. They (California this time) replaced GPU and treated G73 nicely but now sound was not working. RMA again (4th one) and this time they let it repair by a 3rd party and Voila all worked. Took 3 month but now all working and it runs quicker than my desktop. Yes I hated the 3 month but its still the best desktop replacement concerning price/value IMHO.

 

I agree, spec wise it's great for the price but none of that matters if it falls apart in under 24 hours of use. I'm just hoping my third one holds up - the lower temps are reassuring but after the charging problem on my second one I'm starting to think that they're just poorly built.

 

I haven't had one problem with mine, except for a tiny piece of plastic that keeps on kicking up. Some double sided tape should easily fix that.

 

Yea, keyboard issue with the first was an easy fix, I just didn't want to have to fix anything 24 hours after buying it.

I just did a clean install of Windows 7 (you can download the iso, extract the setup.exe and install over your current version on the same drive) Hopefully this will be good to go as the lower GPU temps have me very excited.