Worst Experience EVER -- NEED AW Response!  

Hi all! I've always heard tremendous things about AlienWare, including that it was the geek-computer of choice, especially for gaming. Well, I am now regretting my purchase.

In late May I purchased TWO AlienWare Area 51m 7700s (identical systems; one for me, one for my brother). The one for my brother was intended for his birthday on June 24th. I ordered them with the 3.2 P4 with HT, 2x512 MB RAM, 60 GB 7200 RPM HDD, GeForce 6800 Go Ultra, 17" UXGA 1680x1050 with cam, internal wireless card (let me know if other features are needed, I can't remember the rest of the list offhand).

The first problem was during the credit authorization process; I filled out the application online, it told me I was given credit, sent an email with a credit line of $6000 (short of what I offered, for no reason, my credit is top notch). After this I was waiting for the paperwork to come in the mail for me to sign; I got this, sent it off, and waited. Nothing happened for like a week, so I called them. There was some trouble in the authorization process online they said (which there was, but i got the email so I wasn't worried).

They tried to take me through the validation process over the phone, gave them my social security number, name, etc. and then it got to the ~3 questions section. Here, however, they asked me about things such as previous vehicles, previous addresses, etc. I am 22 years old and I had owned 2 vehicles at the time, ever, and I was only on the title for one of these; however, the vehicles they were listing were NEVER even close. HOWEVER, and this is the kicker, I am named after my father, identically, except I am a Jr. (and he is a Sr.). I told the reps this after the first failure, realizing this was the problem. They said this was not the issue because they used the social security number. We tried it again, and it failed again. Then they told me I had to wait 3 days before we could try again. So I did. Did it two more times, giving them the information about my name situation before both, and failed both times. So I had to wait another three days. Then for the last time, I had my ENTIRE family come to listen and assist with this validation OF ME (NOT my father); I let the rep know the situation and told him everyone was here and asked if that was okay, which he said yes to. My father answered the questions and it was authorized on try #1 without a problem. So this was my *first* ridiculous dilemma. The laptop that was intended for my brother's birthday was delayed until the FIRST OF JULY! This was completely unacceptable, but all I got were some "I'm sorry" comments and *slightly* expedited service.

However, after 3 months of having these laptops, I was playing on it one night, turned it off as usual, but in the morning I got up to play some Doom 3, and tried to turn it on; the system turned on okay, I could see the power lights and etc. but the screen never kicked on. I turned it off (manually forceful power down) and then tried again. I peered closer and could SEE the Alienware logo but it was FAINT. I saw (and heard) it load into Windows, but this was identically faint.

I called the tech support within the next two weeks (work was extremely busy so I found it hard to get the time to contact them). They had me diagnose and open my OWN computer as part of their tech support service...?! (I'm a computer guy, so this was almost okay, except I don't want to be held liable if anything happens, such as losing a screw, not connecting something back right, scratches, etc.) I paid for an ON-SITE service warranty. THAT is exactly what I expect! After determining that no cable being loose was the problem, they identified it as a bad LCD Inverter Board, and ordered me the replacement.

In two weeks I had heard nothing, and received no part, so I called back. I was told by Rep #1 that there was nothing they could do, they didn't have a tracking number and that department was closed for the night. I asked for a supervisor and was told all supervisors were busy and that one would call me back in ONE hour. I waited TWO hours with NO call. I called back, told them I waited for 2x as long as I was told, and asked for the supervisor. After a little more struggle I was FINALLY given a supervisor to talk to. I told him the situation, and he looked up the order and told me that the original order was done incorrectly; I was originally required to authorize a credit card for a $10 part (ridiculous, in my opinion, especially when they wouldn't let me use my alienware card!). The supervisor then cancelled the order and issued a new order and expedited the order (to FedEx 2-3 day; I was told the wrong carrier the first time anyhow). I asked whether the in-home service was done by a specialist, or someone contracted out to, and whether it was a local computer company. I was told, no, it was NOT a local computer company. I was also told they would be able to come out day or night, except no weekends, which was good for me, since I work 8-5 (sometimes later).

This was problem #2, 3, 4, and 5.

Within another two days I was contacted from a computer company...but it was a local computer company, much as I EXPECTED! I setup the appointment and had the guy come out ASAP; the problem was that he was NOT available day or night, but until 5:30, so I had to take off from work early, much to my disgust and disappointment. He had never worked on an Alienware laptop before, and actually had printed instructions for it. It was simple enough, I EASILY could have done it myself.

The repair was on Monday, and on Friday I was playing World of Warcraft for about 12 hours (enjoying my day off, day after Thanksgiving). As I got to a very intense moment, my screen went black (computer still on), then it shut off abruptly so I assumed it overheated, and THEN it started ***SMOKING***! I nearly went crazy! I've never in 10 years of working on/building computers since this happen on ANY computer (and I worked as a Computer Tech for a year and a half)!

This is problem #6.

So I called up the support line again, went through the fiasco that is Tech Support/Customer Service. FINALLY got them to understand that it was shot, got an RMA for repair work, sent it off (what happened to ON-SITE AGAIN??!!) It is now currently at their repair shop.

However, as I anticipate the problem to be overheating due to the CPU, the HDD, and the GPU, I can't foresee replacing burnt-up parts as alleviating the poor cooling design of the laptop!! I always had mine on a flat, marble surface, so there was plenty of airflow, too.

Then, as if things couldn't get worse, my brother had all-the-while (and mostly unbeknownst to me) been having severe overheating problems as well! His laptop would shut off after 5-10 minutes of ANY game he loaded. This is a VERY consistent problem. Recently he turned the graphics settings to the absolute minimum and was able to play for about 30 minutes before his graphics card couldn't handle an alt-tab back and forth. It gave some corrupt looking video image to the screen. After this he attempted to restart, but the computer then went into a Blue Screen of Death reboot cycle, IMMEDIATELY after entering Windows.

It is now in this state and is TOTALLY unusable as well. For TWO identical laptops, BOTH have experienced overheating issues and both are completely unusable after only 5 months. This is completely ridiculous; these are GAMING laptops, MOBILE DESKTOPS and are not even *close* to performing as was described in their website specifications.

I have recently been fed up with this quality of service and equipment, as they are not addressing the issue that the computers are running unsafely hot. The reps at one point said to get a cooling pad, which my brother did, although this should NOT be necessary; these computers should not overheat under maximal stress without any accessories!! With the additional cooling pad, tilting the laptop to an uncomfortable/unusuable angle and this was shortly before this final problem where it became unusuable, shutting off still without any actual help from the cooling pad!!

We have now spent $7500 for two laptops that experiencing a SEVERE and very obvious (as can be realized by this forum even) problem with the poor thermal design for these laptops! These are practically in need of recall for poor design mechanics and thermodynamics!

I SINCERELY WANT A FULL REFUND WITH NO RESTOCKING FEE! This is my ONLY satisfactory resolution at this point. Anything short will be inadequate for the trouble and suffering I have had to endure with this process, as my brother has as wel (since he is still in college and is now VERY likely to lose all of his data on his HDD, as I was told I would when my laptop went for service, since it is standard Alienware procedure to wipe the HDD [despite it being a burnt component on the motherboard/CPU/GPU!!])

I don't foresee a resolution to the poor thermal design, so this is why I require a FULL refund, with no restocking fee charged, as my solution to this. I contacted the Customer Service department today and talked to Alex for nearly 30 minutes, where he told me he wouldn't/couldn't give me a refund.

I hope one of the Alienware reps will contact me directly through my email address at davidlightle AT yahoo DOT com as the registered email address is not ideal, for it is spam central for me now.

Thanks

Thanks, I appreciate that. I mostly posted here so I could for one, get the message out about the troubles I've had, and two, hope that a Alienware rep that visits these forums (as I've read a select few do) can read my entire story and work to a resolution of this.

Also if others have experienced similar difficulties, feel free to add comments or what you did to resolve the matter. At this point, though, servicing the computer is not going to work for me, since there is no guarantee (as Alex told me, in fact) that the overheating issue will not reoccur. He even tried to sell me an extended warranty, since I was so worried about the possibility of this reoccuring. THAT isn't a concern; the concern is that this shouldn't be happening, let alone so much. I can't put my investments on the line with a gamble that this issue can sporadically reappear (as it took nearly 5 months for this to occur the first time).

To clear a few things up

Yes, I was a computer tech for 1.5 years at the local college, while I attended there, and I have worked on computers for about half of my life, building them from parts, etc. Because of this, however, I was mostly okay with opening up my computer and going through the over-the-phone hardware diagnosing and etc. But I don't know that a lot of people that are NOT tech savvy would feel comfortable buying a warranty to have to open up their own computer. THAT is what I was trying to say. I have recently read in other locations on the Internet that Alienware is a bit difficult to get on-site service with, despite it being explicitly mentioned in the warranty. I have not had this problem really, but, just a bit of information.

I once had some bad experiences with local computer companies, when I was about 16 and looking for a job, and so I wasn't really wanting to support those companies indirectly or to have them working on my computer. In fact, I mentioned a little of this story to the guy who worked on my computer (my age, and dropped out of college from the same college I attended, as a minor, somewhat irrelevant bit of information) and when he left, he practically tried to plug the company he works for, by saying they weren't like the ones I had those experiences with and to come see him if I had any other problems. Outside of laptops, I don't really have any issues doing the work myself, and after this repair, I realized that I, somehow, had an unnecessary reservation against working on laptops.

If you browse the Internet you will find an abundant number of horror stories about overheating with these exact models; if you search these forums, you will as well see the very high temperatures that these computers run at. Going from numbers from memory, dangerously high (shutdown/meltdown point) temperatures for a CPU die are about 85C; yet, on Alienware's website they even mention that the bottom of the _case_ AVERAGES ~50C. And that's heated by air, so the heatsink is likely much hotter, and the CPU die is hotter still. Havnig a CPU die around 70C is well within reason to be concerned about. I try to keep my desktops below 50C at load times. How I say this is a known issue (and therefore intentional) is that they know these temperatures are high, that heat cannot be dissipated from the system quick enough. Granted that I expect a mobile desktop to run hotter than a non-mobile desktop, some concern should still be raised that the temperatures at idle sit so near to the critical levels.

The problem with this is that I have no choice BUT to enter Windows in safe mode to even be able to use the laptop right now. In normal mode, it will reboot within 3 seconds, everytime, without question. This makes the entire back-up process very difficult.

Replacing components that go bad is not my problem with this; it is the fact that the thermal designs of this computer do not allow for heat to move enough or quickly enough for the computer to be run safely. Replacing the components does not correct the thermal design of this computer. Initially when I sent my laptop off, after the smoking and everything, I was going to accept a full repair; however, since I believe this to be related to overheating, and my brother's laptop has critical overheating issues, it appeared evident (after-the-fact) that the problem with the laptop stems from a problem that will NOT get resolved at the depot! That is why I wish to have my money back; not because I don't think Alienware can't replace the components (or within a timely manner).

Actually, no, you read most of this wrong, I believe. My computer was working for about 3 1/2 - 4 months, I played on it briefly one night, turned it off, got up the next morning, turned it on, dead screen. The turnaround for this WOULD have been okay except for the problem with the incorrect order procedure.

That was on Monday (before Thanksgiving); on Friday (the day after Thanksgiving, 4 days later), I played WoW for 12 hours when the laptop shut off and started smoking.

Yes, 12 hours is a long time, but it is not an unreasonable amount of time for a gamer to play on a gaming computer, but this was not my problem with the description. My problem was with my brother's computer being unable to run for more than 30 minutes in any game; this is NOT a reasonable amount of time for a gamer to play on a gaming computer. Since this is advertised as a gaming computer, I would expect it to be able to handle extended gameplay, non-stop, out-of-the-box (as my desktop can, and these are mobile desktops).

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I'm not trying to criticize you or anyone; I undertand that you and others are loyal to Alienware and I did my best, but there is a time when the straw breaks. Too many times I was just brushed off with a simple "I'm sorry, it won't happen again" but it did; especially the "Please wait 2 minutes" on the phone, which turns into up to 15 (several times this happened to me).

I am not trying to screw anyone over or anything of the manner; I am simply trying to get to a point where I am content again, but I do not see that as possible with this Alienware laptop, since I will be in constant worry that the system will overheat (and with my luck, most likely after the warranty).