Archive for July, 2009
Dell comes through for me!
Well, what a surprise it was today when the FedEx guy knocked on the door and handed me a box with the Dell logo on it. That was an extremely fast two to three day shipping time. Guess I complained enough to get them to ship it next day air. Sure was nice of them, though I had already accepted that I may not get it until next week some time. Of course, had they cared enough and did this on the first call, I would have had the drive two days ago. It is interesting that the machine came with a Hitachi drive but they shipped Seagate. Not that I am complaining, I prefer Seagate over the Hitachi any day.
What was really nice to see is that they actually listened when I asked them to ship a blank drive, since I would have needed to wipe it anyway to get rid of the crap they add. What was even more of a surprise then getting the drive is the restore disk that came with the machine is really nothing more then a Windows Vista install disk. This means I can partition the drive in two so I can run a dual boot with Linux and only have to boot into Windows when I need to run a Windows specific program. I guess I cannot complain about Dell any more, they do understand the customer, just wish it did not have to take three phone calls and an online chat to get a hard drive shipped.
New! Dell Netbooks As Low As $349.99. Valid 7/5-7/11
Dell Tech Support?
What has happened to tech support at Dell? For over 10 years I have been a very happy customer of Dell and have recommended it to everyone. Recently I purchased a new Studio XPS 16 laptop, and for the most part I am extremely happy with it. Until this week.
On Monday I was having problems with Windows Vista, see my previous post. I blamed it on a faulty operating system because, well, it’s Windows. Later that day the machine stopped working so I decided to reboot, only to end up with a black screen. I tried everything I could think of to fix it, but with no luck. So I called tech support. After going through all the stuff I had already done, we finally ran a confidence check on the drive to verify the hard drive was dead. Good, ready to rock now, right?
WRONG! Even though I had registered the machine when I bought it in May, it was still not registered to me. So I filled out the registration form again, and the tech I was talking to also submitted all the information. This was done late Monday evening. I was told I would be called about the replacement. Nothing on Tuesday.
Finally, around 2:00 today, after hearing nothing from Dell, I called back. No record of my call on Monday and the machine still was not registered in my name. The tech on the phone puts me on hold, and two minutes later the call was dropped. So I figure I would try an online chat. Even though I gave the test results to the tech on the chat, he or she still wanted me to try and reinstall Windows. Hmm, why hadn’t I thought of that? Because you can’t install Windows on a dead hard drive. I even tried loading Ubuntu Linux on the drive and it also verified a bad hard drive.
So what does the technician on the chat do? He or she tells me to register the machine! Again! I refused, so then I was asked for my information, which I assume means they will try to register it again. Then I was told they would ship the drive to me in two to three business days. Great, so I have a $1400 brick for another half a week.
Finally, the tech asks me “Would you mind sparing 2 minutes to have a word with my Supervisor?” Hell yeah I want to speak to a supervisor! Maybe this person can help me get the drive quicker. Of course, he doesn’t commit to shipping quicker, but promises he will do his best. At least this time I was given an issue tracking number so I can see what’s happening with this.
So, to sum it all up, my Dell laptop is great, but Dell Tech Support is NOT.
