New XPS Production Delays

So just got off the phone with Dell Customer Care to get a more detailed status of my order. Since my order has been in production for 2.5 weeks (placed on 11/1, in production 11/2) and others' systems with the exact same configuration have shipped in a much shorter time than mine, I wanted to know what the hold up was. Apparently there is a "thermal issue with the palmrest" and it is being tested. I asked if this was a specific problem with my unit or a general problem and the rep could not tell me. My order has been "expedited" and will be shipped out as soon as the issue is resolved...

 

Thanks for sharing that. Well, that could explain the phrase "engineering hold" if Dell engineers have identified a general problem with the laptops (as opposed to something specific to yours).

 

That's very interesting information indeed.
May I ask you which country you are from? I spoke to the CS representative in the UK who was unable to explain the details of the engineering hold.

 

If you call and want your order expedited, but already chose overnight, will they just credit you all or part of the shipping price?

 

I'm from the United States. I think the information you get largely depends on the rep you talk to. This rep seemed to know what he was talking about, and put me on hold for 5 minutes to actually look into it.

They might refund the overnight shipping since your order is taking so long. If you call CC, they will expedite the order for you, though. Not sure what that exactly means, but apparently they can prioritize an order if you call and complain about the production time. Who know if this actually means anything though .

 

@nk290: Is your new EDD also the 7thDec? My rep has actually sent me her communication log with the Chinese manufacturing plant... It looked like they had internal communication issues...e.g.

CS Rep: "Please advise what is causing the engineering hold and how soon it is to be shipped."

Manufacturing: "On Eng Hold "

And this has continued for three days or so...sigh...this is driven me nuts.

 

My EDD actually hasn't changed. It is still listed as November 23 (ship date of November 22 with overnight delivery), but I doubt it will actually be on time. The rep said it was still slated for delivery on time though.

Don't you love it? An engineering hold is causing the engineering hold .

 

Well, my rep has said the same thing to me... the day before my EDD was pushed further by 2 weeks. I just don't understand why our XPS 17s have these palmrest heat issues, while some others have already been shipped out?

 

Doesn't sound good ..

Going to give it till the middle of next week and call again.

Did you guys call your sales rep? , The number on your order , or ?

When I called the other day , I called the number on my order and the "Ext" and didn't get anywhere . Got a CS and they gave me another # to call for International Support (what ever the that means as I am in Canada).
The number I called was 1.800.915.3355 and the number they gave me for Dell Int Support was 1.800.285.1653 .

M

 

And mine is actually a XPS 15, so it is not limited to the XPS 17, if indeed they suffer from this thermal palmrest issue. For all I know, it could just be an issue with my particular system, or only the XPS 15 units, or it could be affecting both the XPS 15 and XPS 17 systems. Maybe we could get some other people whose orders are delayed to call and insist on more information?

 

Yea that's the only thing that confuses me. I saw people post their XPS 15 and 17s shipped in a week from the order date. Probably won't do much good to complain yet since my EDD is 12/8, but what is weird is I chose overnight, and the ship date showed 12/2 the whole order, so that to me would be EDD 12/3.

 

For Shi*ts and Giggles I just did my build on the dell.com site.

With my exact build XPS 15 ,1080p screen , 6200 Wireless and Backlit keyboard and it shows the following .

Preliminary Ship Date: 12/8/2010 ( which is my current ship date ordering almost 2 weeks ago)

And then this blurb when popping open the link for what Prelim Ship date means .. don't know if this link will work Find a Laptop, Notebook, Desktop, Server, Printer, Software, Service, Monitor or TV at Dell. but here is a paste of it too.


Build Time 14 days
Longest Option Delay 0 days
Impact to Preliminary Ship Date (up to) 14 days
Preliminary Ship Date 12/8/2010

Build Time
The estimated number of days to build your XPS 15.
Selected Item Build time
-XPS 15 14 days

 

Haha I did the same thing.

 

F*cking' Dell! I just called them because my order was "modified" (my shipment day due was tomorrow!), so i wanted to see what was going on, and they told me it was because of some manufacturing problems, because they change from supplier for "certain piece" and they had to change the control number of it (the sales rep couldn't tell me exactly which piece), so they made me a new order, with EDD for christmas eve!! they told me to call next week to see if everything was in order by then... And if it's not, I might get a HP Envy 14...

 

since she told me about changing the number of the pieces, i did my homework and checked the different pieces on both of my orders and these are the differences, all are the same except for these ones:

the old order has these pieces that the new order doesn't have


1 421-0356 WINDOWS LIVE SEARCH,CNB
1 421-4289 DELL SPRT-CTR SW 3.0
1 430-2600 INTEGRATED NIC

while the new order has these ones that the old order doesn't have


1 421-0187 DELL SPRT-CTR SW,64BIT,2.0
1 430-4038 INTEGRATED NIC
1 421-0757 SKYPE VOIP SOFTWARE APPLICATION,CNB

I really don't think that the Skype and the Windows Search are the issue here, but what are the Dell SPRT-CTR and the Integrated NIC?? I'm betting that the reason of the issue is here...

 

Dell SPRT-CTR is the Dell Support Center Software 3.0
and the Integrated NIC is the Integrated 10/100 Network Card .

Its probably the network card.

 

Got this today. To quote Marvin the Martian, "Delays delays"

Hi Bruce,

Good day!

I received an email from our order fulfillment team regarding your order for the XPS L501X and according to them order is currently have an engineering hold due to an issue on the palm rest. That was the reason why it has a longer lead time. I have sent them an email again requesting for an ETA for this and will let you know as soon as they send another update.

I have also copied your sales rep in case you wanted to switch to a different system to get the order faster.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have questions.

Thank you and have a great day!

Regards,

Erwin Condicion
Canada SMB Customer Care Specialist
DELL | CSMB Customer Care

 

I wonder what an "issue on the palm rest" could be. Heat issues, obviously, but what sort that results in some systems being sent out and seems to be across both the XPS 15 and 17? A palm rest isn't a complicated part and I doubt it is electrocuting people, so causes must be limited...

 

I gotta agree with you there. I can't see how a palm rest would result in a significant delay. At least I sure hope not.

 

I have the same problem (I'm from Argentina) :S

 

well, I'm from México, so it seems they have a different excuses for each region: overheated palmrest for Canada, backordered backlight keyboard/Intel's 6300 antennas for the US and for Latin America they changed suppliers for "certain piece"... =/

 

Sorry, I submit earlier without noticing. Please read my next post.

 

I`m writing from Colombia, I placed my order on Oct. 21 for sending on Nov. 11,. It was modified on Nov. 2 (after the first order status was 'in production') to be sent on Nov. 19, and now I checked it out to find that it was modified again and the new order hasn't even been created. I have already contacted with CS and they just responded in a rude tone that the order was placed on Nov. 02 so I had to wait. I think the delays are the norm, I have just visited the DELL US page and there are complains too.

This is my fist laptop and the first time I order using Dell.com, I'm so disappointed .

Just to let you know, here in Colombia, the standard configuration starts with intel i3, I hope that if someday it arrives, at least it don't overheat as much as the reviews say .

 

Well I have to say, my XPS 15 with specs in my sig has been in my hands for days, and there are no issues with heat in the palmrest for me.
Yes, the left rest gets warm, but no more than any other laptop out there, definitely not uncomfortable or unreasonable. In fact there is nothing wrong with my palmrest at all.

The only single, small problem I've identified with my XPS is the subwoofer occasionally popping.

 

Aus Delivery. My EDD is still 6th December. I queried this with my sales rep and this is the reply I got

"I have heard back from them and we been facing some issues with installing some Microsoft applications. We should have a solution for the same by the end of today and it seems to me that we don’t have any part shortage issues."

This sounds like BS to me.

XPS 15 | i7-840QM | 640GB hdd | 8GB | GT 435M 2GB | 15.6 B+RGLED | 6cell | Intel 6300 WiFi | Win 7 Ult 64bit

 

Anyone else getting the certificate out of date error on the UK Dell website when accessing your order status page?

 

AU Here,

Order now showing as cancelled within the past 30 mins....

I'm starting to doubt the previous 29/11 EDD now!

C'mon Dell get yer sh*t together! For such a big/worldwide company they sure manage to stuff alot of ppl around!

 

Au as well

My order was cancelled as well. All those excuses are bull . Now they say they need to create a new order because some part numbers were wrong. and they are changing their system. There is no way to know what is true and what is not.

XPS 15 | i7-840QM | 640GB hdd | 8GB | GT 435M 2GB | 15.6 B+RGLED | 6cell | Intel 6300 WiFi | Win 7 Ult 64bit

 

True about the BS, however if they did have a shortage of parts and have sourced them from elsewhere I can see why they would need to add these new parts to the system from a new supplier and therefore cancel and re-place orders... Let's hope our orders were almost ready to ship and they just re-place the orders, wack the new parts in and 'bob's your uncle'! On the plane!

Although it seems mad, I can see some sense to their system not being able to make changes once orders are placed. And in AU we don't get customisation options from ANY other laptop manufacturer (almost, and not to the degree dell offer!!), if another company offered such customisation then Dell would be up the creek, hey I can see a niche here - what ever happened to Zepto!?!

Let's just hope we're not delayed another 2-3 weeks!

 

My rep told me it would be built in 2 to 3 days. I hope so. Time will tell.

XPS 15 | i7-840QM | 640GB hdd | 8GB | GT 435M 2GB | 15.6 B+RGLED | 6cell | Intel 6300 WiFi | Win 7 Ult 64bit

 

Let's hope indeed! I'm sure the info the reps get is all messed up, it's not like they would work 'at' the factory so they rely on what they get told... upper management (supervisors, managers etc) are the problem with lack of or wrong information!

 

To increase my anger, I post a review in the dell site about this delays, and it doesn't show, but new orders are showing with sending date on Dec. 2, less than 2 weeks, mine has almost a month and nothing, it doesn't have an active order now . F**K YOU DELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

For the last 3 weeks the estimated ship date has been anywhere from Dec 1 to Dec 6. I think this really has to do with parts shortage (or change in supplier for parts or something with the parts). And they probably expect to get those parts sometime in the next week or by the end of the month. Then they can build all these orders and ship them out.

 

Still no change on my EDD, so fingers crossed!

Ordered: Oct 29
EDD: Nov 25

Canada

 

Me either.

Ordered Nov 1
Shipping on Monday 11/22
EDD: Tuesday 11/23

Time will tell!

United States

 

My computer finally changed from production to delivery prep late last night and this morning is SHIPPED! YEEEHAAAAAAWWWW

Im in Canada
Order Date: 10/29/2010, I acutally ordered on the 24th but it was delayed 1 wk
Estimated Delivery Date: 11/25/2010

XPS 15
Intel Core i7-740QM 1.73GHz
56 WHr 6-cell Li-Ion Primary Batt L501X
6GB,DDR3,2 DIMM (L501X)
8X DVD+/-RW Tray Load Drive
15.6FHD TLF LCD L501X
Backlit Keyboard (Internal) - English
500GB 7200 RPM SATA Hard Drive (L501X)
Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6200 (L501X)

 

Great, dell doesn't have the resources to deliver the orders, but they have people checking the internet for bad reviews to create contra response of the bad service they deliver, this kind of post where that motivated me to do the order, "The laptop arrive early", bah.

If they can't deliver what they promise, why they still telling lies, deliver date: Dec.02.

 

I have just received this update from my Dell sales rep. about my US XPS 15 order: "The factory has advised us that your order is on the priority building list and it should start building soon. "

My EDD is 12/09

 

Woot!!!!! Received my shipping notice this morning .. In Canada.

Order Date:11/9/2010
EDD was 12/8/2010
Shipping Method: Canada Standard
Shipped Date: 11/19/2010
Estimated Delivery Date: Order Shipped
Carrier: PUROLATOR

XPS 15 - Intel Core i7-740QM 1.73GHz
15.6FHD TLF LCD L501X
Backlit Keyboard (Internal) - English
Dell Bluetooth 3.0
Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6200 (L501X)
Options changed.


M

 

The NIC is the ethernet card.

 

My guess is the real story has something to due with sloppy jobs on the thermal paste. A few probably got pulled off the line for QA purposes and failed. They went back and checked, found something miscalibrated. and not the affected products are on Engineering hold.

Would explain why I'm seeing 10C higher temps on a core I5 than some with the I7.

 

Picked up my XPS 17 this morning, ordered November 4th with EDD of Dec. 6th so some are definitelg getting out on time or early. There must be a legit reason some are being delayed so long.

 

where are you and what spec?

I'm uk i5 460 with 435m otherwise standard ordered 31/10 still O/S

 

I got a call from my rep at CC (the rep who previously told me about the thermal palmrest issue) who said that my order was in the final stages of production and should ship out on Monday. I'll keep you guys posted!

 

In Canada, spec is as follows:

1 XPS L701X (Direct) $1,446.80
1 92 WHr 9-cell Lithium Ion Batt $0.00
1 6GB,DDR3,2 DIMM $0.00
1 Intel Core i7-740QM 1.73GHz $0.00
1 Intel Centrino Wireless-N 1000 (L701X) $0.00
1 JBL 2.1 Speakers with Waves Maxx Audio 3 $0.00
1 8X DVD+/-RW Tray Load Drive $0.00
1 Anodized Aluminum WLAN L701X $0.00
1 NVIDIA GeForce GT 445M 3GB (US) $0.00
1 17.3 in HD+ (900p) LED + HD cam (L70xX) $0.00
1 Windows 7 OS Label,CNB $0.00
1 Backlit Keyboard - English (Internal) $0.00
1 Resource DVD L701X $0.00
1 500GB 7200 RPM SATA Hard Drive $0.00
1 Adobe Acrobat Reader 9.0 MLANG CNB $0.00
1 MCAFEE PEARL MUI,15MTH,W/O,CNB $0.00
1 PC-RESTORE, DIM/INSP $0.00
1 DELL WELCOME,SW,DIM/INSP $0.00
1 DELL CONNECT 2.1,DIM/INSP/XPS $0.00
1 DELL DOCK CONSUMER,INB/XNB $0.00
1 DATASAFE LOCAL BACKUP $0.00
1 COZI-CALENDAR,INB $0.00
1 DELL-DOWNLOAD-FLAG $0.00
1 DELL SPRT-CTR SW,64BIT,2.0 $0.00
1 WINDOWS LIVE SEARCH,MUI,CSMR NB/DT $0.00
1 SKYPE VOIP SOFTWARE APPLICATION,CNB $0.00
1 DOWNLOAD-STORE-LINKS,CNB $0.00
1 DELL SOFTWARE,ROXIO 1.0, CNB $0.00
1 WIN 7 HOME PREM, 64, ENG,S/XNB $0.00
1 EBAY-WEBSLICE, CNB $0.00
1 Dell Webcam Software 2.0 with Kit, CNB $0.00
1 INTEGRATED NIC $0.00
1 XPS WARRANTY SPRT, INSPIRON, INIT YR,CA $0.00
1 HW WRTY+SVC,XPS L701X,UNY,INIT,REL $0.00
1 NBD OS,XPS L701X,UNY,INIT YR,REL $0.00
1 CC ACC DAM SVC,ANW NB,3YR (DHS) $0.00
1 XPS WARRANTY SPRT, INSPIRON, 2 YR EXT,CA $0.00
1 HW WRTY+SVC,XPS L701X,UNY,EXT,REL $0.00
1 NBD OS,XPS L701X,UNY,2YR EXT,REL $0.00
1 SHIPPING FEE $0.00
1 MICROSOFT OFFICE STARTER 2010,CNB $0.00


Ordered Nov.4th and delivered by Purolator Nov.18 (missed) and picked up on Nov.19th.

 

Seems to me that UK orders have lower priority as stated previously in this thread. I've ordered mine on the 2nd Nov and although it has been expedited, the EDD is still 7thDec

 

order date: 27th oct
1st EDD: 14th nov
2nd EDD: 19th nov
3rd EDD: 6th dec
location: malaysia

dell xps 15 with
i7 740QM, 435m, 15.6 HD (1366x768), 4GB RAM, Intel WiFi Link 6200, Backlit Keyboard

what is going on with dell?? i called the dell customer service a few times but they are saying that there is a problem in the factory.. that's all.. dell order status page is still showing "Work in Progress".. this is my 1st dell purchase and i think its going to be the last.. thanks alot dell!! =(

 

I can echo that Traveller888 - I'm from the UK and placed my order on 11 November. It had 23 November down as the expected date until the status moved from Work in Progress to In Production, at which point the EDD changed to 15 Dec

 

My order date was 11.5 with an EDD on 11.22. This morning it was changed to 11.29. I finally got through to someone who could tell me what was up....video card (NVIDIA GeForce GT 445M 3GB) is back ordered!!
I am wondering if the thermal issue I have read about here is caused by the video card and they are working on a fix?
In the US

DELL XPS17, i7-740QM , 6GB, DDR3, 2DIMM, NVIDIA GEFORCE GT 445M 3GB W OPTIMUS, 640 GB 7200 RPM SATA HARD DRIVE, 17.3 HD+WLED TL 1600X900, TRAY LOAD BLU-RAY DISC R BR R/W DVD/CD, INTEL CENTRINO ADV WIMAX 6250, 802.11 A/G/N, BACKLIT KEYBOARD,WINDOWS 7

 

Fellow UK colleagues, my order has been shipped today according to the order status site - still awaiting a new EDD. I didn't receive an email though.

My details again:
L701 - Basic config + BT 3.0
Order Date: 2nd Nov
EDD: 19/11 -> 7/12