Death of my G73JW

You should get a matching item to what you purchased, or a better system. The JH is NOT a matching system since some of your software (Creative X-Fi MB2) will NOT install to that system, and you have a legit license.

 

Thank you al for your feedback. I agree wholeheartedly and just sent them this response, being as cordial and specific as possible, while getting my point across:

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Thank you very much for the apology and kind offer of a replacement system for my dead G73JW-A1. I'm truly appreciative, however, I do have a few concerns about the possible replacement before I can consider accepting. Based on my prior extensive research of the G73 series, the G73JH is actually not identical to the G73JW, although they share the same chassis. While the G73JW-A1 and G73JH-B1 have predominantly matching configurations, a few of the key differences for which I specifically purchased the JW model instead of the JH are the following:

1) I wanted an Nvidia card (the GTX 460M in the case of the JW) instead of an ATI card.
2) The JH models lack USB 3.0
3) I dislike the single mouse button on the JH series. I find it uncomfortable to use having tested a JH in a store previously. The JW has two separate mouse buttons.
4) Many users have reported getting lower system temperatures with the JW versus the JH (partly because of the Nvidia card).
5) Not counting mine as a typical occurrence, there haven't been as many issues with the JW line as opposed to the JH builds (at least so far)

Is the JH you have available a brand new G73JH-B1 unit, or a refurbished one? Would the Intel 6200 wireless card upgrade from my existing JW (as listed in my RMA's parts sheet) be transferred to it? Is there not another G73JW-A1 available to send me instead? If not, approximately how much longer might I have to wait for parts for my existing system if I decided to keep waiting? (it's been over 7 weeks so far now.) Also, is there no option to receive some sort of refund or credit from Asus (with managerial approval) since I purchased the system from an authorized reseller (GenTech Computers) and I would prefer the same model? With these questions answered, I can determine whether or not I can accept your offer. If a replacement G73JW is available, I would accept that more easily. Thank you very much for your assistance and I look forward to your response.

Regards,
...

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Now the ball's in their court. Considering the answer I expect back, I wonder whether I'll see my system again by Valentine's Day...

@Chastity: Good point about the X-Fi software. I'll mention that to them later as well, if need be. It's amazing to me that Asus would try to push a JH as identical knowing full well that they cater to a technology-enthusiast sort of buyer who would know the difference. If some random brick & mortar store were doing so, I could understand, but not them. They must be getting a little too accustomed to dealing with more non-techie EeePC users lately.

 

You can also remind them that one reason for getting a JW was for CUDA & Physx support.

 

That'll come up if they try a "Why do you need an Nvidia? ATI is good for gaming too" comment.

 

I just received this email 30 minutes ago:

This is to inform you replacement parts were received and original unit completed repair and was shipped with FEDEX tracking number: xxxxxxxxxxx. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Thank you for choosing ASUS products.

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It arrives on Christmas Eve! Hopefully this is truly my JW and not the JH they tried to offer. Those two emails came a little to close together for comfort. Not that I received a reply yet from that rep, but we'll see what happens on Friday!

 

Whoa nice! Hope it's the JW and it's in perfect condition. That would certainly make for a nice Christmas surprise.

This gives me hope about my recent RMA. I sent my JW in for repairs(most likely a mobo replacement) about a week ago.

 

Ninjak, a lot of us have been reading about your RMA experience, you've definitely kept cool and patient throughout it. I hope you do get your original system back in good shape and not the JH that you don't want. Keep us updated.

 

I got a reply from Gary saying he was looking into the cases here on NBR. I guess he looked, since it magically got fixed and sent. Keep us updated on what you got.

 

Thanks, Chastity, I appreciate the helping hand! Someone may have just needed the proper nudging down there. Hopefully everything goes smoothly on Friday *fingers crossed*. This is exactly why I started my other thread so that others can figure out how to go about their own RMA situations. Sometimes it just depends on who you can speak with as well as understanding one's rights as a purchaser.

 

It looks like mine is now broken too!! I dont know why but as i tryed to flash the VBios from the Beta Bios to Chastity´s VBios i got an ROM error and Winflash aborted. After a restart i got no picture on the screen. Even not while booting!
I tryed to reflash blind but it didnt worked.
As all this happend nothing was overclocked or unnormal in anyways.

HELP, what can i do...................jeahr customer support

 

This happened on a G73JW?

 

Sorry no it was on my JH

i dont know why, i got really nice temps and it went always stable
Im at work know, i will do a "hard reset" @ home and post what happend.

any idears?

 

When WinATIFlash aborted, you should have ran it again with the old vBIOS you had on it already. BTW, I assume you were using WinATIFlash, and not WinFlash for the motherboard BIOS utility.

The flash failure could be from the vBIOS being locked, and the only way I know of unlocking it is using the DOS atiflash.

 

...do you mean WinToFlash utility?
http://wintoflash.com/download/en/

 

No, I meant WinATIFlash

 

At 12:53pm, FedEx delivered my repaired G73JW! When I retrieved the package from my apartment complex's mail room, I was happily shocked to see that Asus had actually shipped it in its original box! I wasn't expecting that after having read of many people who didn't get their boxes back. I just powered on the system in the past hour (was out holiday shopping) and it was then that I discovered my second surprise. I was all set to restore it to the Sept 23 Acronis backup I'd made only to realize that they hadn't wiped my hard drive either! All the screws were intact, my power brick was included, and they did reinstall my 6200 wifi card after replacing the motherboard, CPU, and GPU. The screen was clean and, other than a couple of negligible white marks on the palm rest, every thing looks great. I'm definitely pleased with the quality of the repair work done thus far. I've just completed antivirus and Windows updates and will run some stress tests on it overnight.

 

Congrats!
What a nice Christmas present.

Hope all checks out ok...

 

Thanks! It appears that they did actually wipe the D drive, which had almost nothing on it anyhow, but left the Win7 partition intact. So far, this is definitely a wonderful Christmas present.

 

It's funny how in the op you said that electronics have feelings. My G73JW almost PSOD'd on me and as soon as I saw it, I just kept saying "NO DON'T DO THIS TO ME BABY"...haven't had a problem since.

 

first i tryed to reflash the beta bios in dos and it worked than i used winflash for the new moddet (beta based) bios.

now the notebook dosnt boot or gives any feedback. just a black screen.

 

You'll need to RMA it, as your unit is now bricked. I suggest sticking to EZFlash in BIOS or the DOS utility in the future, with the firmware on a USB stick formatted for FAT/FAT32.

Tell them your unit will not POST, and not about a bad flash, until things get sorted out in regards to the warranty.

 

already done

 

This reminds me of my old G2S story..... It had video issues so I sent it in 06/08... got it back with same issue sent it in again and returned 08/08..... sent it in yet again waited and they finally 10/08 told me they did not have any mobo/gpu in stock and would I take a g71 as a replacement! I got the g71 and later it also had a video issue and that took 2 months they did not have parts (again) so they replaced it with another g71on 02/09 (still going strong no further issues!). I really like Asus products even if you have issues with their repairs they will make sure that they take care of you (upgrades or profuse apology or both) But seriously as far as the quality of their indy facility..... two thumbs down but the cali one is good oddly. Recently I sent in my G72 with video issues as well it was in shop only a short while. (indy, they replaced gpu and thermals) But when I got it back It had a totally different issue the cpu was horribly overheating and I got bsod out of the box!! When I went to reboot it I got the bios error cpu overheat!! I got permission to open the case from the tech over the phone and I made sure the heat sink was seated well found the 2 bottom screws were loose over 4-5 full turns! I found that the gpu is very cool now, but the cpu still runs hot more so than before I sent it in and the fan sounds very loud compared to before. So after the holiday I will be sending it in again on the new rma I have three g71gx and 1 g72gx they are great performers and for me keep quite cool even under heavy use. undervolted with Throttlestop (+rep to unclewebb)

 

Wow a 2 month turn around time for repairs?? That's nearly half the shelf cycle of these products before a refresh is introduced. I go bonkers whenever Dell takes more than 1 business day to fix any faulty parts in my computer. I could never take 2 months and then be happy about it. Guess we all have different degrees of patience.

 

That really stinks! At least they offered a replacement. I have a really old Alienware and it hasn't broke ever. Dell support is pretty good from what I've heard. The ASUS laptops seem to have a lot of problems and I'm sure the people who leave their happy ending stories untold are just too happy enjoying their laptops. The ASUS laptop I'm looking at gives me more bang for my buck, but on the M15x route I would get better support from the looks of it.

 

Well my dell stories are worse........ Thats what made me stick to asus...... first of all dell didnt honor a warranty on an alienware I bought new with their extended 3 year in home service with accidental coverage. I never opened the case but while under warranty the first time it was ever dropped they would not fix or replace it.... I was told I had voided the warranty! I was SO pissed I wasted an extra 400$ and for nothing! in the end I ended parting it out on ebay after 6 months back and forth about the warranty+ extended warranty+ I had accidental AND 2 years of that left..... in the end they stuck to saying that I had modified the laptop and therefore voided the warranty. I had not ever even opened the case.

 

Yeah that sounds believable.

 

Im amazed that you left dataa on the HDD. I would have done a secure erase on the hdd to make sure nothing gets into the wrong hands...

 

There was no personal data on the D drive, so nothing to fall into the wrong hands. Just a download directory with generic software executables that weren't needed. I removed the C drive and securely wiped my personal data and My Documents etc before reinstalling the drive and shipping the system to them. Not like there was much on it considering I had it a month before it conked out.

 

Now, to be clear, I am, thus far, happy with the quality of the actual repair work done concerning the condition my system came back in; it's not all scratched up or missing screws, receiving the original box, transplanting my 6200 card, etc. However, while I am a patient person, I'm not happy at all about the length of time it took Asus to tell me that the system was waiting for parts, let alone how long it takes them to actually get parts from Taiwan. It's as if Asus doesn't do much advance planning as far as stocking repair centers overseas with enough spare parts to cover its popular models. (I wonder how they're handling the influx of EeePC 1215N users now who are experiencing broken power pins.) And the lack of communication between the techs and the support reps was atrocious in my case.

 

Any thoughts on the quality of service (or lack thereof) from the Jeffersonville, Indiana plant?

I hear better reports from the Fremont, CA repair center...

 

All of my reported experience comes from dealing with the Jeffersonville, IN plant, or at least with service reps trying to get information updates out of them.

 

'nuff said...

 

Mine is on the way home. I shipped it on 11/20/2010... I think. They received it on 11/24 and shipped it out on 12/27. I'm supposed to get it back from California to Texas on 12/30. It took over a month but to be fair there were two holiday weeks in there. I've heard that Cali does great work and I'm looking forward to not having any more problems with my laptop!

 

mine is gone today

 

Hey guys i got my notebook back from the RMA, they replaced the GPU. I got a very little bit less heat but i think its a bit louder now.
Im using the new bios beta 3 and the vbios beta and will bring my own vbios version out in a few days.
RMA was fast just a week.

 

Congrats on the quick RMA! Hopefully the loudness is just temporary since I know that can drive some people crazy.

 

Now that I finally have some free time to play with my JW this week, I'm going to go ahead and perform a clean install. I haven't had any issues since its return, although I did finally experience my first occurrence of the notorious, widely reported system freeze problem. But since it doesn't seem to be a hardware issue, I'm not concerned about it right now (unless it starts happening with some regularity). Anyhow, having a clean install is just nice to have. For anyone needing a hand doing a clean install, Chastity has put together a nice G73 driver app and reference guide. Driver and utility updates are being reported regularly, and remember, if you worry about messing something up, you can always go back and restore everything with the original restore dvds. I'll additionally be using WinBubble to put the Asus OEM info and icons back into system properties. Sure, I don't need them, but it gives the properties page a little sense of style! Then, at last, I can install some real games on the machine and confirm its stability!

Oh, and happy new year, everyone!

 

Not only "just a week", but throw a holiday in the middle!
Which repair center?

 

yesterday i got it back

and yeahr there was a weekend ^^

.........but.........i have to say...........sorry i life in germany and the techcenter is just 60 km away from my home

 

I do a clean install and I'm suddenly unable to install the Atheros LAN driver. So I restore the system to factory defaults to discover the same thing. What on earth are the odds that the controller went defective just in the act of doing a clean install? They worked before then. This better be something software-related and easily fixable. I've already inquired about options in another thread. Here I'm just hoping to hell it's not suddenly defective because I am not about to go through the RMA process again for something so idiotic as this. About to boot with a Knoppix DVD to make sure it's not just a Windows issue. Here's hoping...

Update:

Great. It's starting to look like the new mobo may have a dead LAN chip. Windows doesn't even seem to see it. When I got the laptop back, I looked for any problems in device manager, but didn't find any. However, I didn't look for items missing and, since I tend to use the wireless connection most, I may simply have not noticed it these past 2 weeks until today when I happened to try a wired connection. Now I'll probably have to call Asus back.

 

@Ninjak if you suspect hardware failure, give an Ubuntu livecd a try to test your network interfaces. It'll rule out windows drivers being the issue.

 

Dear Ninjak, you have some of the worst karma I have seen on the interwebz. I don't know what you have done in the past but the Roman god Fortuna is definitely cross with you.

I sincerely hope that they have a motherboard on hand. Waiting for parts is the biggest portion of the RMA time from what I have seen and your previous tribulations attest to the fact.

If you don't really need the LAN port, you might consider keeping your laptop and using it for a while until the JW model is a little older so there will be more parts in stock at the repair centers. I was without my JH for a month but they were waiting on parts they don't usually replace like the palm rest and some sort of audio board. They did replace the mobo but they had the JH mobo in stock.

 

One step ahead of you, but excellent advice. I had already tried a Knoppix live DVD since my last post. The LAN is dead as a doornail. I've also already spoken to the manager I'd previously dealt with at Asus. Although he promised to set up an expedited repair and testing as soon as my laptop arrived, I told him that that wouldn't help me much unless he can confirm for me whether or not they have another motherboard in stock to swap into my system. He informed me that they have no way of knowing if a part is available until the system arrives for RMA. So I told him I'd think about it, but seriously, I really have no interest in shipping my laptop back to them just to risk having to wait yet another long amount of time. I've barely gotten to touch the thing as it is, and the price has already dropped again since my purchase in Sept. Plus there's a $100 mail-in-rebate on top of that through the end of the month. Heck, I could even pre-order an SW now if I wished. What I'm going to do is talk to GenTech on Monday and see what they can do. Maybe I can just have a shiny new one cross-shipped and they can return the other one to Asus as defective. Otherwise, the only thing I can do is wait most impatiently again or just buy a new one and sell the repaired one on eBay whenever it comes back from Asus. This is truly sad considering I've yet to have a chance to enjoy a game more powerful than Torchlight since I got the system almost 4 months ago.

 

You could try a $20 Intel 6200 first. Do you have an old lappy with a wifi module you can test with?

 

Thankfully I've gotten my already-installed 6200 working again just fine, so I can use it, but for the amount of money I spent on the system, I expect every part to work, even if it's something I'd barely use such as the webcam. Plus, since it'll sit beside my i7 desktop and I'll be sharing lots of data, I would like to use the gigabit ethernet for file transfers via my router. But I do see your point, Chastity. It's not as if the system is unusable, but I need that ethernet. Had my desktop's nic died, I'd just get a replacement card. But, naturally, I don't have that option on a laptop, and this is just unacceptable for a newly replaced board. And I hadn't even bothered mentioning that I'm pretty sure my Hannstar screen has more light bleed now (on every side) then when I first bought it (only bleeding from the bottom).

 

Interesting. According to David's G73 disassembly guide, it seems that the NIC is not a part of the G73 mainboard, but an attached card. That means it’s possible that it could be 1) loose/disconnected, 2) a bad NIC card alone, or 3) bad connector on the mobo where NIC goes. While on the one hand this means it could be something I could actually fix myself, everyone agrees that taking apart a G73 and reassembling it are a huge pain in the butt. Plus, even if it was something simple, I’d end completely voiding my warranty to find out. Not worth it at this point. I wonder if this is a sign that I was meant to wait for an SW instead... At the rate my tech luck is going, I hope a wheel doesn't fall off my wife's car simply because I touch it. Hm, maybe it's time I check out some of my servers here at work...

 

You do realize that getting access to the WiFi mini-card is the easiest thing to do in the G73 series? Just unscrew and open up the bottom HDD panel. You'll see it there with two wires attached to it.

 

Oh man, I read this entire post and I am so sorry you had to go through this. It would be hard waiting a week, and I could probably only wait two - the level of communication they lacked is just astonishing and unacceptable. It's one thing to have the problems Asus seems to be having with the G73 line as a whole, it's another thing entirely the way they handle fixing broken systems.

You, sir, deserve a medal.

 

Yeah, changing the wireless card I could do in my sleep, but, unfortunately it's the wired ethernet port that's dead, instead. I'm surprised enough that that's a separate part just like the wireless card. Though at this point I'm not gonna touch the system. GenTech's helping me deal with Asus now. Thanks to everyone for all their support, help, and encouragement!