On International Warranty and your Friendly Neighborhood ASPs.

First of all, sorry to double-post this. I'm just afraid that people won't read the other post simply because it's in the Latitude D830 thread. But I think it serves as a cautionary tale to anyone outside of the US (or other territories where Dell has a corporate presence) who's thinking of buying a system from Dell, and hoping their International Warranty will be of any use.

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So far, my $400 Gold International warranty has cost me over $200 in diagnostic and servicing fees. Some warranty.

Caveat Emptor to all you international buyers of Dell computers. Call your local ASP and find out exactly what they will cover of the warranty you paid for, and if there will be any additional fees. My mistake, I know, but the CSR assured me that gold international warranty would cover everything - I guess I should have asked him to be a bit more explicit.

So after leaving my D830 for warranty parts replacement last Monday, I was assured that everything would be completed on Wednesday. So Wednesday came and went and they said the parts hadn't arrived yet. So I was told to pick it up on Thursday, before lunch. Okay. When I called them, they said parts had arrived late and they would need at least another day to install them since the engineer was busy. Fine.

So I arrive on Friday morning, 2 hours after the promised pickup schedule. When I get there, they had just finished installing the parts and started running diagnostics. This was getting to me as I needed that system for work badly, and I'd been out of commission for nearly a week because of this.

When they complete the diagnostics, no errors were reported. So they booted up the OS. Guess what? The performance problem was still there. As if nothing had changed. The engineer proceeded to try to pin the blame on me and software I had installed. He said my system tray programs were the reason for the bog, and that I shouldn't install so many things.

To be clear, this is what I had installed since the last format:

1. Logitech Setpoint (for my VX Revolution)
2. Yahoo Messenger
3. Windows Live Messenger
4. MS Office 2007
5. Adobe Master Suite CS3
6. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom
7. Some random assortment of five or so sidebar gadgets.

Tell me, are these programs enough to cause my processor to intermittently peak and hang around 98% activity for half an hour? Even when no programs are running?

What gets to me is that it seems like a full format and OS installation is the only solution they have to any problem. Like I mentioned in earlier threads, I've taken my system to them three times, and they've charged me $35 for every incident - which, coincidentally, always ended up in a full system format and OS reinstallation. This time around, with the installation of replacement parts, my "diagnostic and service fees" are at $60. And they suggested the format just before I left my system with them (again). I wouldn't be surprised if they tacked on the extra $35 bucks for their kind consideration.

Times like these I wish I got a mac. Really. I'm almost sorry to say it.

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Good luck to everyone else, though. I hope you have much better experiences than I do.

 

Fish,

Not sure what OS your using on your system but with Windows XP I have two words for the 98-100% CPU utilization - Windows Defender. Several times I have reloaded XP from scratch and found after running all the patches (lord knows there is enough of them) and security fixes, the auto download prompts for info about installing Windows Defender. After which, stupid me says yes put it on there, I find performance cut in half, or worse. In one case on a newer Toshiba, I could move the mouse about 2 inches on the screen about every 4 minutes. If your running it try removing it or not installing it or any other excess MS security patches. (do a google search on Defender CPU utilization, you'll get plenty of hits, with work-arounds)

I do agree Dell has become one of the worst of what was once the best at customer service and support, a growing trend in IT that basically snubs it's nose at it's clientel with the thought "hey where else you gonna get this for so little money?" and we accept it

As for Apple, please refrain from cursing, children might be watching

Hope this helps, if not, know I feel for you.

Cheers,

Jason

 

So the last time I wrote here, I was griping about service. Here I gripe again.

I finally got my computer back on Friday evening. Freshly reformatted (for the nth time in half a year) and everything supposedly good to go. When I arrived, though, they weren't done with the drivers installations. And the few drivers they DID install were the old ones, the factory fresh ones - in spite of the fact that I left them a DVD with ALL the current drivers EXPLICITLY to have those new ones used. Meh. But I couldn't wait any longer - I'd already left my computer with them for a week and I had real work to do, a career to pursue, all that.

When I get home, I proceed on the longest, most boring weekend in recent memory - reinstalling all my software and drivers. Basically, restoring it to its previous state so I could finally go back to minding my own business. One of these driver installations included the UPEK drivers and the Wave Embassy Security Suite, for the TPM and fingerprint reader. Okay, so far so good. I was a bit suspicious, though, that when I started setting up my login security, I found that not only was my userID and password still in the TPM, so were all my DM data and fingerprints! I thought to myself, maybe they found a way to migrate it. Oh well.

Come Monday, I activate the Windows Login via Biometrics and Password and leave for work. When I arrive, I find I can't get into my OS. No matter how many times I swipe my finger or type in my password, I keep getting the same error: No such username or password exists. Dammit. I call the ASP up and ask them if they really replaced the TPM chip along with everything else. They said yes. I explained the situation and they told me to drop by.

When I get there, I show them the problem. This really got me angry because I had just spent the WHOLE weekend restoring my computer to a workable state. The CSR then brings in the tech and shows him the problem. It turns out, they didn't even so much as crack open the palm rest. So yes, my old and defective TPM is still in here. I demanded an advance replacement but they said they could only try. They put the order in. Supposedly, they will advise me when the part comes in and I will drop by to have it replaced on site, while I wait.

Here was the problem: even if the TPM were replaced, I still wouldn't be able to log into Windows. Why? Because the biometric/password security is built into the OS, and not into the TPM. So if I boot up with a new TPM, Vista will still ask me for a password or a fingerprint. The only difference now is, where I used to have a defective TPM with my security data on it, I will now have a fully-functioning TPM with NO security data on it. So I'd be SOL.

So I persisted. I stayed in their office for close to an hour, just hammering out my username/password over and over and over and over again...

FINALLY! After close to an hour the OS finally succeeds in accessing the full security data set from the chip just long enough for me to squeeze through. I immediately turn of Embassy and disable all User Account passwords - just to be sure. I back up all my data again and pack up. I go home. I tell them to let me know as soon as the TPM arrives and I can have it swapped in.

Oh what a nightmare this has all been.

 

Hey Jason,

I'm using Vista Ultimate. I've long since disabled Defender - I don't really feel it's as effective as it claims to be. So I just use Avast, SpyBot, AVG and AdAware. I purchased an 18-month subscription to McAfee's Security Suite, but I found it, too, was much too much of a resource hog. I discovered the source of the problem, and I posted it in the D830 Owner's Lounge. Long story short, it was the result of multiple stacked installations of Vista with the last one constantly trying to access data from the previous ones. Don't ask, I don't understand it either.

Ditto on Dell, as well. This is most likely the last Dell system I'll ever purchase so long as I'm in this country. If and when we do decide to move to New York, I might reconsider if the on-site techs finally get their act together as well.

.....

Apple! Apple! Apple!

Hahaha.

J/K,
Michael

 

To update and to add fuel to the fire:

Well, I spoke to a Dell Gold Support tech. When I gave him a full accounting of what had happened (down to the parts replacements - motherboard, LCD, optical drive and palm rest) he said it was strange - there was no record whatsoever in my Service Tag history of any parts having been replaced. Moreover, he found it strange that the ASP did not replace the processor as well while the motherboard was being replaced. It turns out, they may have just been replacing my parts with whatever they had on hand, and did not log any repairs - or any activity at all! - to my system history.

So he created a case file for my situation and sent it off to Dell Malaysia, CC: Dell Philippines' ASP, Micro-D. So I have to call Malaysia up first thing in the morning, give them my case number, and they'll ship a whole new set of parts over to the local ASP, tagged and recorded. The ASP should then install all the appropriate parts into my system and log all the activity and work done on it, to be cross-checked by the global central database.

They're replacing the motherboard again, as well as the palm rest, the RAM and the processor. I joked: all I need now, I said, is a new keyboard, a hard drive and a chassis and I'll have a brand new computer!

Here's hoping this is finally resolved and that I can finally move on to other things.

Keep a close eye on your friendly neighborhood ASP. Michael, out.