My slot optical drive broke!

Hi,
I own a Studio 15, bought in UK. Now I am in India. For some reason my optical drive has stopped working properly. It can hardly read disks and it ejects them back out. Trying about 10 times, sometime it is able to read the disk. I have tried various disks and have tried reinstalling OS too but in vein.

It has not been more than 1 year now since purchase, so if I were in UK, i guess Dell would have replaced my drive for free, but unfortunately I am in India

What are my options now?

 

call dell...?

 

You can check dell's support site for a firmware upgrade



Mines really noisy and sounds very mechanical when you insert or eject a disk ...kinda aggravating

 

What support contract did you take out with Dell?

If you took the 2 year on site then you should be fine no matter where you are I think. Anything else and you just need to contact Dell and ask them. Most likely you will have to send it in to them to fix; Dell does sell in India so they must have support options for those notebooks they sell there. More importantly, I'm pretty sure that the standard warranty does not specify that you have to be in the country that you purchased the notebook from - though I would suggest looking through your documentation to confirm this.

 

I called up Dell Uk support, and they were ready to come and collect the laptop for repairs, BUT then they came to know that my current address is India. I was told to contact Dell India Support.

On contacting India, I was told that I had some 'CAR' warranty. I had not purchased any extra warranty options, but just the basic one year one.

They said that My laptop hence cannot be serviced in India. The option given to me was that I transfer my tag to India, and then purchase a warranty upgrade for Rs. 8500. Only then they can look at my issue.

I then asked them the option to buy a new optical drive for my laptop. I was told that my model of optical drive is not available for sale in India, BUT if I purchase a warranty upgrade, then they will have it from their service stock in India

I should add that I still have 48 days left in my warranty

This is BADDDD!

Any ideas anyone?

 

International Warranty Info

However, I think the following is more relevant, taken from Warranty FAQs

It absolutely does not mention further payment required.

However, on the normal Transfer of ownership form it does say the following:

However, I really can't find anything that relates to retaining ownership but performing a global transfer and having to pay for additional warranty.

 

Sorry, so essentially what I am saying is that I can't find anywhere that says you will have to pay additional funds when performing a global transfer to retain your service warranty. I would complete the global transfer form and then challenge them on this fact; ask them to point out the UK documentation that states there is a charge to be applied.

Also, might be worth having a look on eBay for a new drive specific to your machine perhaps?

 

now is a good time to consider this:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=4936086

But also check ebay for a replacement.

 

Useful post there..... care to point out your sources?

 

Hi Fragilexx,
The link you mentioned for "transfer form" has a link after the "Submit" button that mentions "Please review this list for the most common service contract types that are non-transferable."

It mentions below information:

the conclusion is, you have to "again" buy the above mentioned service contracts in case you transfer your tag.

Hi waveking,

there seems no choice but to buy the service contract if they say so.