nVidia Class Action Fairness Hearing is Tomorrow - Almost time to make a claim!

Declaration Sent.

 

I made mistake

 

Me too! I received and emailed my declaration back just now. Hope it does some good!

 

I need to correct you, first there is in excess of 350 million for replacement computers and replacement chips for apple and dell owners. The 2 million is for reimbursement of monies paid out to repair our computers prior to the settlement. Additionally if you paid to repair yours you can claim both,However you might not get all that you paid out depending on how many claims are made against the 2 million.

 

Sent my Declaration. Sorry it took so long. Office crashed when trying to save it and I had to do it all over again.

I think it is despicable that Milburg would oppose us. At there very least they should have remained neutral and not filled in opposition.

 

I made mistake

 

My guess would be that Milberg doesn't want this to succeed because this would then prove that they didn't do their job in representing us.

I haven't posted b/c I hadn't gotten around to registering, but I have been fervently lurking on this board. I'm not one of the high-end tablet owners (more one of the mid-range machines), but still appreciate the attempts to treat all of us equitably. I don't know all the tech specifications, but appreciate the explanations of those more-knowledgeable than I.

I just want to say thank you to everyone who has been working together to try to get this right for everyone involved --- particularly to whoever brought it to Mr. Frank's attention, developed the fairnvidia website, submitted declarations, and did everything else. I especially want to thank Mr. Frank for getting involved, and for both his & Kevin's efforts over this weekend to try to get everything processed. You all rock!

 

Ok so I didn't log on today until noon my time (pac), and received the declaration e-mail. I filled it out and sent it as quickly as possible although Kevin had asked they be in by 1:00 pm eastern- hope it can still be used and if not I hope that all is going well with the process anyways..

 

I'm not going to look it up for you. nvidia took a charge of 193.9 million in 2008
and recently took nearly another 200 million to satisfy the settlement.

To recap, Nvidia has already taken charges--starting in July 2008--totaling over $450 million to cover the costs associated with the warranty, repair, return, and replacement of laptops affected by a "weak die/packaging material set" in certain graphics processing unit (GPU) products. Weak die and packaging refers to the chip itself and the chip's packaging, respectively.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-20018186-64.html#ixzz1F6XNREsm

Class Counsel will ask the Court for attorneys’ fees and expenses in the amount of $13,000,000. NVIDIA will pay Class Counsel’s fees and expenses. These amounts will not come out of any funds for payments to Class Members. NVIDIA has agreed not to oppose these fees and expenses. NVIDIA will also pay the costs to administer the settlement and will fund the settlement. Dell, HP and Apple are not paying the costs of the settlement.

 

Millberg ceased representing us the minute their check from Nvidia cleared.

To them, at this point, we are simply a nusiance, preventing some of their sharks from moving on to find another whale being circled by angry but toothless minnows.

 

That's actually easy to understand. If they support the motion and do not resist Mr. Frank, and the court compels compliance with the settlement provisions for like kind and value, it might be considered prima facie evidence that their representation of class member was not in good faith. It potentially creates a liability exposure for them as the plaintiff counsel and settlement administrators. [Edit: this would be something to be answered by an attorney.]

 

Astute observations to be sure but, Does that not now give us recourse to go after them for breach of fiduciary duty?

 

I think that is a possibility. But, I am not an attorney. So, I cannot give legal advice.

I edited my previous post to clarify I am not offering a legal opinion, just a layman's observation of something an attorney should answer.

 

Same here but given the examples shown in the actual settlement. I would make a damn good one.
This is my opinion I do not endorse the dispensation of legal advise should any of the following symptoms appear please call 911

Disclaimer: The advice given in this thread should not be considered legal advice. This thread only provides general educational information. You must never rely upon the advice given here. Your individual situation may not fit the generalizations discussed. Only your attorney can evaluate your individual situation and give you advice. Except as provided by me, you may feel free to forward, distribute and copy this column if you distribute and copy it without any changes and you include all headers and other identifying information. You may not copy it to a website.

 

"Taking charges" is simply an accounting idiosyncracy required by GAAP. It likely reflects all the costs of the litigation, including payments to both sides' attorneys (if Milberg got $13 million, the defense attorneys got at least $7 million, and perhaps much more), the cost of mailing notice to 5 million people, the cost of the mediator, the cost of the settlement administration, and perhaps even the side payments to the OEMs for their inconvenience and internal costs of NVIDIA employees who have worked on the case. Nothing obligates NVIDIA to spend all the money they've put in the "charge" bucket, and nothing about the "charge" bucket should lead you to infer that this is the total value of what is being provided to the class.

It's also an economic fiction that the $13 million doesn't come from the class's pockets. NVIDIA is willing to spend X on the settlement, and if it anticipates Y in attorneys' fees, it will reduce what it offers the class to X-Y.

 

I can't speak for Apple because I am intentionally not one of their customers.

When it comes to HP, they might end up paying for it indirectly through a massive loss of business. You would think HP would have balked about providing downgraded hardware to all class members when they were consulted by NVIDIA concerning the replacement models for class members. That seems to demonstrate a lack of regard for customers. And, have you ever wondered why HP replaced a defective product with an identical defective product under warranty? Well, I sure did. (How many people have posted that HP "fixed" their system under warranty, only to have it die from the same problem a short time later, out of warranty? That's what I am referring to here.)

With HP it has been more than this problem for me. They have been horrid to deal with on warranty issues I have presented, twice trying to deny my extended warranty and made me jump through a bunch of hoops to prove it even though they sold it to me. They also tried to deny a claim for accidental damage when I purchased the coverage from them. The last three HP computer products I purchased are among the most inferior of computer products I have owned... three strike rule applies, just like baseball. So, I am intentionally not an HP customer for the rest of my life. The CQ56-115DX (or whatever we ultimately get if something changes) will be the last HP product allowed under my roof.

Dell, on the other hand, acknowledged the issue and took responsibility for standing behind their products much faster than HP. Dell has been taking good care of in-warranty customers whose computers had problems with the NVIDIA defect all along. As soon as an updated video system was available, they began upgrading their customers instead of giving them another defective part that was destined for failure. I have had awesome warranty service from Dell, but the India call center reps are an impediment to success sometimes... To be fair, that painful part of the process was the same with both HP and Dell.

 

I appreciate the clarification I was/am aware of the things you stated. I was responding (in very Basic terms) to batman1 who was under the impression the settlement entailed 15 million dollars total and milburg received 13 of that leaving the class with 2 mil.

 

For visualization purposes, I created an image that shows how many fewer pixels the 1366x768 display on the CQ56 display (represented by the black rectangle) has than the 1680x1050 display on my dv9000z. There is a reason I paid a lot extra for a 17" laptop and then a little bit more on top of that to get the WSXGA+ display.

 

Nice demonstration dv9000owner. That certainly puts things into perspective.

I know how you feel about resolution. The 1920x1200 display on my laptop(s) took some getting used to... a couple of days... but now I hate looking at a low resolution screen. Remember back in the day when 1024x768 was considered "very good" resolution? Well, 1366x768 ain't a whole lot better... just a wide screen version of ordinary. Ordinary is probably the best way to describe all of the specs on the CQ56.

 

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIAIf you purchased certain models of notebook computers containing an NVIDIA graphics processing unit or media and communications processor, you could be entitled to benefits under a class action settlement.
The United States District Court for the Northern District of California, San Jose Division, authorized this Notice. This is not a solicitation from a lawyer.
• The settlement relates to the purchase of Dell, Hewlett-Packard (“HP”), and Apple notebook computers containing NVIDIA chips. It will provide for (1) replacement of the NVIDIA graphics processing unit or media and communications processor, which are referred to in this Notice as the “chips,” if you purchased a version of certain models of notebook computers manufactured by Dell, Inc., or Apple Inc. containing one of the NVIDIA chips, and your notebook computer is experiencing certain identified symptoms; or (2) a payment from a $2,000,000 settlement fund established for the purpose of providing reimbursements to persons who purchased a specified model of notebook computer, experienced certain identified symptoms, and paid to have the notebook computer repaired, although the amount of reimbursement may depend on the number of reimbursement claims received; or (3) a replacement notebook computer similar in kind and value, if you purchased a version of certain models of notebook computer manufactured by HP containing one of the NVIDIA chips and your notebook computer is experiencing certain identified symptoms, and if you return your eligible malfunctioning HP notebook computer once your claim is approved.

 

I had a thought concerning our pending litigation :
could we the class get/provide a third party computer expert before the court to define "of like or similar kind and equal or similar value"
as it pertains to our specified models?

 

Batman1,

The only part of the settlement tied to the $2,000,000 figure is that to reimburse owners who paid to repair computers before the settlement was announced. There is no dollar amount placed on the repair of Apple and Dell computers, or the replacement of the HP/Compaq machines. You don't appear to be seeing the "OR" between the three separate provisions of the settlement. Is $13,000.000 too much for the lawyers? DUH !! Are our claims limited to $2,000,000 in total? No.

 

If you know someone who can generate an expert report in 36 hours on a Saturday night, I'm all ears.

 

I feel you are being facetious here but....


I do have a casual relationship with a respected computer shop what exactly would be needed?
ie: verbiage email me if you need to they open at 10 mountain tomorrow I can try
shasta7 @ q .com
Based on the deceptive wording of the settlement documents I would like the option of opting out to pursue hp and nvidia

couldn't supporting documents be added prior to the hearing date on the 28th?

 

Your absolutely RIGHT, Thanks for setting me straight

 

your welcome

 

You are brilliant sir.

 

Yup, a brilliant angry toothless minnow ...that's me.

 

I'm usually the first to jump on the Lawyer bashing wagon, if I didn't in fact get the thing rolling in the first place, so I can't point fingers. But let's not forget...

Mr. Frank is a lawyer too.

 

It takes all kinds, folks. Most attorneys are ordinary people working hard to earn the best living they possibly can. It's the classic American Dream. It's the few bad lawyers (and auto mechanics, and doctors, and bankers, etc.) that give the rest a bad name. Thank goodness for successful people that make a lot of money and pay a lot in taxes. We would be in even worse shape without their contributions.

And you know what, I am super happy the class attorneys got $13M for their work. Presumably, they earned it through no act of dishonesty. I say more power to 'em. If I could earn that much money in the same amount of time, I dang sure would and I would not even think about apologizing for it. I believe most people would say the same thing if they are being honest about it.

This issue at hand is not about how much money the attorneys were paid. That's none of our gosh-darned business. It's about class members getting downgraded in the settlement, and the terms of the settlement being completely ignored.

 

Hey Fox.... so is there a form that you sign and return with your defunct computer. I say defunct instead of defective because Nvidia still denies that there is an issue..LOL!!

Couldn't sleep... though I'd do a quick check.

 

LOL…Pure Poetry

 

Hi Major!

When you submit the claim online you provide an "electronic signature" and if you print the forms to submit the docs by snail mail you give an ink signature. After the claim is approved and you get the letter with the shipping instructions, there is nothing to sign at that point. The claim form has a statement to the effect that the act of shipping the laptop to NVIDIA is an acknowledgement and acceptance of the settlement provisions.

Hope this helps. Have a good night!

 

Got it, thanks.

 

I don't know if a computer expert would help. I'm not familiar with this case's proceedings (e.g., will the expert be called to the stand), but how many experts do you think Nvidia and Milberg could buy to say that the CQ56-115dx is fair?

And how do you define expert? Someone with a BSE in Computer Engineering? Someone with years of experience in IT?


I don't think it will take an expert to come to the following conclusion: by definition, the CPU is the CENTRAL processing unit. It's responsible for handling instructions, arithmetic and logic operations, etc. A single core processor that benchmarks worse than the 4 year old AMD Turion x2 TL-50 is not a CPU that is similar in kind (1 core vs 2 cores) or value (performs worse, and makes for a much cheaper computer).

Bottom line, if their experts argue that the CQ56-115dx has more RAM or hard drive space than the XXXX model, a judge or whomever may be inclined to say "Hey, it's a fair replacement". The fact of the matter is, hard drive space and RAM is a cheap and easy upgrade. The CPU is a beast of a different matter. If you can replace the CPU at all in the laptop, it is buried deep in the laptop chassis, which probably requires voiding your warranty, and is not intended by the manufacturer. The manufacturers often make the RAM and hard drive accessible to upgrade because it's easy and inexpensive.

I would take an HP Pavilion notebook (new) without any RAM or hard drive, providing that it had a stellar CPU, over the CQ56. I've got a 640GB SATA 2.5" hard drive (7200RPM) that only cost me about $55 and would take all of 3 minutes to put in there.

 

Great, Whats next ? Maybe somebody will come up with the idea that we all go to "YOU TUBE" and type in Repair a HP TX1000 and watch a guy take one apart, put a quarter on the NVIDIA video chip, put aluminum foil over the rest of the mother board, put about an inch of solider coiled on top of the quarter, take a pen torch and heat the quarter till the solider melts, keep the torch on an extra two minuets for the video chip to re seat and then use the quarter for an extra heat sink with electrical compound, put the computer back together and say "LOOK MA" it works. No thanks, Just give me a replacement for what I have and I want one with a remote control like mine has also.

 

Just a reminder to folks are who are supposed to sign your declarations.

Please check your email frequently today; you should be receiving a PDF file soon.

YOU NEED TO PRINT, SIGN, SCAN AND EMAIL IT BACK TODAY.

If you don't have a scanner available, try your local Staples location (or ask a friend)

Thanks everybody!

 

I actually saw that one lol

 

laptops are another story from desktops. hardly ANYTHING is able to be removed/replaced in a laptop, minus the hard drive and some times RAM and optical drive. laptops have their processors and video cards integrated within the motherboard, meaning there is no replacing them. there are only a couple laptops out there today that are upgradeable concerning video cards and all. but 99% of laptops have everything soldered onto the motherboard, so good luck replacing those...

 

Uh, except that it appears that the attorneys took their $13,000,000 and then abandoned the class. If I'm not mistaken, their job was to see the settlement through to the end, arriving at a fair and reasonable conclusion.

Apple and Dell owners seem to have been fairly dealt. Anyone think that we can say the same for ourselves? Anyone? Anyone? Buhler?

 

You make a couple of reasonable points regarding Apple and Dell owners, but it's not inconceivable that mistakes are made by human beings, including attorneys. Making a mistake due to ignorance or simple oversight and deliberately improper behavior are not the same things. I simply do not believe that the attorneys would intentionally do something wrong for the class members they were paid to represent.

At this point we should be focusing on what might happen to correct the mistakes through Mr. Frank's efforts and not be making negative comments about the attorneys like the opening sentence. We are all free to have an opinion, but let's try to be fair about things.

 

Your RIGHT, But Attorney Frank is REALLY trying to help us get a fair settlement. I wouldn't mind him getting 26 million if he was the original lawyer and treated us like he is. It just ticks me off how some people get their money and then say "Well I did my job" and I'm not just talking about lawyers. A mechanic just charged my ex-wife $950.00 just to put brakes rotors and calipers on the front end of her Honda car. My son did his last summer and had $300.00 in parts. It only took him 1 1/2 hrs.to do and he's not a mechanic, he's a cop. Go figure, I guess when times get tough, the tough get going.

And while I'm talking to you, I would like to Thank you for starting this suit, my 1 TX1000 has been in the closet for 2 1/2 years. I was a little smarter with this one and bought the $79.00 extended warranty from Sam's Club. They just fixed this one on Feb. 7th and so far it works Great but we'll see how long it last. If it goes back out maybe I'll try the Quarter Trick.

 

Declarations and signed statement already sent in. Much thanks guys!

 

That is why I said the following (please see bolded sections):

My main sentiments were: HDD and RAM = easy to replace. CPU = non-replaceable in most cases when it comes to a laptop.

 

OK, let's assume that this all began as a simple human mistake. If no deliberate improper behavior had followed, we wouldn't be needing Mr. Frank's efforts at all...would we? The settlement administrator would, could and should have recognized their mistake and taken corrective action.

 

Here is my layman's perspective... (not offered as a legal opinion)

It's not so simple as saying, "Uh-oh, I made a mistake" when litigation in involved. Red tape and specific rules of civil procedure must be followed.

When experts are involved in a legal process, any errors or mistakes on the part of the experts have to be proven by a preponderance of evidence presented by the person or group challenging the experts, and that's were professionals like Mr. Frank would need to be involved no matter what.

 

I am in the no scanner boat but worked something out with a buddy that gets off work at 6 pm. pacific- I should have it signed and back by 7 pm pacific today. Hoping that that's not too late..

 

that will be fine

 

Hey Kevin,
I returned my declaration yesterday but never received the PDF today so far! It's 6:40PM here now. Guess you didn't need it?

Thanks,
Gerald

 

Ya same here, I guess you had all the signature you needed then. i am in the Group4-tx.

-Gordon