Help! Motherboards, and CDN tech quality?

So I have the A04 motherboard with the A09 bios and the southbridge whine (lower right palmrest near FP reader and expresscard slot). Talked to (Canadian) Dell tech support today who said they would send me a replacement board and a tech to fix it.

Are the new A05/A06 revisions *guaranteed* to fix the problem? I don't want to go to all this effort to end up with nothing, or to end up with CPU whine.

Tech said his info shows that the problem is only A04 motherboard and earlier, but I wanted to check to be sure. The other thread is not very helpful unfortunately as to a definite answer.

Re the techs themselves, I told the rep I didn't want to take any chances as I've heard horror stories, and didn't want to get the laptop scratched etc. He said the techs here (Vancouver) are good and know what they're doing and he's never had any complaints.

Anybody had any experience with them? Got scratches, etc? I'm trying to decide whether it's worth switching the board out at all or whether I should entrust it to them or do it myself...

Thanks

 

well I just had a tech out today to replace my screen he did okay but lost one of the little covers that covers the screw on the bezel and when he was trying to remove the bezel he gouged the bottom of the bezel you can only see it when you close the lid. The new screen didn't fix the problem so they don't know if it is the video card or the mainboard so they said that they are replacing the whole notebook otherwise I would have told them that I wanted the plastics replaced from the damage the tech did. If you get an experienced tech you should be okay but if you have any issues make sure you call Dell back and let them know

 

ok fair enough. well that's good to know, thanks. I plan to take the notebook apart before he gets here so that he just has to switch the actual board out... and put it back together myself, or under his supervision so that he doesn't screw it up.

would anyone happen to have a concrete status on those motherboards?

 

Hi, just very curious, what type of warantee do you have? I thought the only Canadian tech support was return to depot and that there was no in house service?

 

That's odd. I actually got a US warranty because I bought it through the refurb outlet but I'm in CA right now - however when I talked to cust serv in the US they said that if I transferred my warranty they would give me onsite. I think? (The rep wasn't entirely clear...)

 

Nope. Dell offers Next Business Day onsite warranty repair with their laptop in Canada. You just have to pay more for it.

My M1530 has 3 year NBD onsite.

 

The dumb thing is that if I want to transfer the warranty to CA (canada not california!), they want me to buy a 4 year limited warranty in order to take advantage of complete care *rolls eyes*

 

Bump... still really need any and all info on those motherboards. Anyone know if the A05/06 boards are confirmed fixes for the CPU and southbridge whining problems?

Thanks...

 

Thanks for the clarification on the warranty. As for the motherboard issue, from all I have read, some motherboard replacements help, some don't. There is no definative answer. However, I think you have nothing to loose, especially with your good plan of taking apart the laptop before and overseeing what they are doing. The problem is you hear the bad stories here, you don't hear the stories of the techs who do the repair without problems.

 

I have next business day onsite warranty as well you do pay more but for me it it worth it because as long as your system isn't dead you can still use it until the tech comes to your place

 

yeah i prefer onsite too, that way i can watch what the tech does and freak out if he starts losing parts

anyway... he's replacing my motherboard monday - apparently it's a getronics (?) guy on subcontract from dell. I guess we'll see how it goes... though I'm a little worried because when I asked him to check the motherboard revision and call me, he didn't know the A0X #s referred to board revisions as well as bios revisions! Oh well.