What should I do with my old M1330?

I've had my M1330 for about 1 1/2 yrs now. The first issue is that at one point 3 months ago, I was being randomly electrocuted by my laptop when I placed my hand on the open space below the keyboard. About a few days after the random electrocution started, the battery died, and won't recharge at all. Lastly, there is a constant whistling sound that was coming from the laptop ever since I bought it. I'm out of warranty. Am I able to buy a new warranty for my laptop at this time or is it too late for me? And if it is too late, should I attempt to make repairs through Dell, or am I better off selling the laptop, and then use the cash towards a lower pc, like those mini/EPC's that these companies are selling now?

 

The electrocution thing is usually caused by a poorly grounded AC adapter, causing current to travel through the metal palmrest, and into you. That makes me pretty certain you have a 2-prong power adapter. If so, get yourself a 3-prong grounded adapter, and the electrocutions should stop.

As for warranty, talk to Dell, they'll try and push extra warranty on you. I think it's like $130 for an additional year.

 

The power cord I have been using this whole time with my laptop was a 3-prong that came with it.

 

This is a known issue. I tend to get it if I connect my external USB drive to the laptop but have had it when just the power is connected. I don't think there is anything they will do to fix this. The standard 6 cell battery is good for 300-500 charge cycles before it starts loosing capacity. If yours is not charging at all then it may be the battery needs replacing or it could be a problem with the charge circuitry, which has known to suffer problems. I assume your laptop still works on the mains?

Not sure what the whistling is. Does it sound mechanical (heat sink fan / hard disc / dvd drive) or is it more electrical in nature (could be the screen/backlight electronics).

Either way, if your laptop is out of warranty then Dell are not at all interested. They will not even sell you an additional warranty as this is a form of insurance policy, underwritten by another company and as such they would be prevented from selling this when there is known problems that need fixing (it would be the same as buying car insurance after you crashed your car or life insurance after being diagnosed with something terminal).

Either check out the web for the many repair companies or if you know what is wrong and are pretty technically minded, you could always buy the parts from the many ebay sellers and fix it yourself. The service manual, available from the dell site is fairly comprehensive.

 

Dell will extend your warranty at a cost 2 years workout cheaper over the one year. Contact Tec support ask for Warranty extensions by the way your battery won't be covered by this warranty so look on say ebay if you need want a battery.

 

Thanks for the advice guys. Regards to the whistling, its a electronic thing. I can hear it and its a pain to use my laptop for long periods of time, but no one else around me can hear it. As for the battery I could just look up nextag search results and find a low price replacement. I don't think that anything is wrong with the charge circuitry as you mentioned. The battery has a indicator at the bottom of it. Prior to it dying, I would routinely check by clicking the indicator button and it would give me full bars, but now its giving me nothing at all. Would it be a good idea if I tried to leave the battery in a freezer overnight, or is that a myth?

 

Battery trick is worth a shot..

 

I seem to recall that the whistling thing was diagnosed as the capacitors or inductors - electronic, as you say. I don't think there is anything to be done about this, though I also understood that, apart from the noise, it wasn't supposed to be a problem. I had this issue with my first m1330 motherboard. The replacement one (yes, death by nvidia 8400) was fine.

 

my m1330's video card the geforce 8400gs fried 2x and had the mobo replaced 2x under warranty. I have cpu whine on the 3rd mobo. Otherwise its been pretty great to me, this time when it died again a few weeks ago, some thing is probably wrong with my laptop... Dell is replacing it with the studio xps 13 (m1340) under warranty for free.

I kinda got tired of all the problems and bought the asus ul30vt with geforce 210M last night, ill just sell the studio xps 13 when it arrives in 2 weeks.