ASUS g1s repair woes and questions (suggestions appreciated!)

Hi guys,

i have an asus g1s, the first asus laptop i ever purchased. i bought it in july of 2007. works decently, although low battery life and very bulky and heavy, but overall satisfied. although from my experience with asus cust service, i may never buy another one again...

in april of 2009 (last april), the laptop's video output stopped working, nothing on the lcd or external monitor. i feared the dreaded nvidia 8600gt issue. called asus, they said, no prob, sounds like vid card, we'll fix it within 48 hours of you sending it in. i send it in after a couple of days...then i wait...1 week...2 weeks....3 weeks. i call each week, and they say they are waiting for the mobo part from taiwan and to try back in a few days. after three weeks, i am out of patience, and still out of a working laptop. i complain all the way to a supervisor, asking for alternatives from a g1sn mobo to a replacement laptop, and complaining about the nvidia 8600gt issues reported in the news (which they did not acknowledge). magically, over the weekend, the repair center has done some "soldering" work and fixed something and my laptop is alive again. i get it home, do some tests, seems ok....im on my merry way until...

a few days ago, the exact same problem occurs. so basically they didnt fix it right the first time, and if they hadnt had all those logistics issues and had sourced a mobo quicker, maybe this wouldnt have even been an issue. of course, im pretty peeved, because i realize that while its their fault that they didnt fix it right the first time, im about a month out of the 90 day repair warranty and the 2 year laptop warranty, so im probably screwed and stuck with a repair bill to fix their mistakes. i call asus to complain that their repair dept didnt fix the issue properly, and that if i send it in again, i should be able to get it fixed at no cost or at least at a discount. i told them that this isnt a new problem, its the exact same one. i told them last time the repair was already fumbled, and who knows what things they didnt do properly. i also noted with them that brand reliability means ur product shouldnt break right after warranty ends. i mean, who would buy a reliable japanese car if that reliability meant it broke right after the 3 year warranty period.

after a few calls with asus, all they tell me is the warranty spiel over and over again. the lvl 1 tech support is no help whatsoever. the repair center sends me a frankly rude "please do not reply to this email" simply stating the 90 day policy without giving me an avenue for complaints. and a lvl 2 support person essentially gives me the same bs. all i want is at least some assurance that if they find it to be the same problem, that they would try to fix it at no cost, even though the laptop is out of warranty, because it's their fault they messed up the last time, and make sure it doesnt happen again. however, no one is willing to transfer me to the repair dept to get some concrete info regarding the previous repair and what they exactly did, and im getting stonewalled everywhere.

is there anything i can do. do you think they should at least be responsible for something or am going to have to take all the risk of spending a few hundred for them to do another "solder" fix just for it to break again?

thanks for your help, i know i wrote a lot, but i wanted to provide as much detail as possible.