Final review of XPS and situation with Dell

Well, as much as I hated to do this, I felt it neccessary based on the current circumstances. I'm now typing this from my old 450mhz crapper system. I spoke with dell customer care today regarding the issues I had with my system. Here is pretty much what transpired, just so you guys know what you may or may not expect. I am not making recommendations to stay away from the product, because I actually think it is the best desktop replacement out there at a reasonable cost. However my current circumstances required that I make a decision quickly, and it may be the wrong one, but I made and will live with the choice. If you have any questions that I may be able to answer, I assure you I will still give you an unbiased opinion. Or if you request a biased one, I may be able to make an exception. Sorry for the length, but I wanted to try to give you an idea of what to expect and look out for if you have similar issues.

Situation:
Dell XPS bought under Small Business purchase. Laptop ran great. It did not appear to be affected by the major issue discussed on this forum with overheating in the gpu (or possibly cpu). The noticable issues were screen leakage, and a dead sub-pixel. Both of these were acceptable and fairly unnoticable to my standards. The main issue leading to the downfall was that the fans stayed running at 4400 rpms all the time, from boot up to shut down. I believe this could possible be a reason my system didn't have a heat issue, the thing never got above lukewarm at most. I did however decide it needed to be addressed because it was a tad bit noisy, I thought in time it could hurt the system, and I decided this may be the reason I got such crappy battery life.

Support:
I had a 3 year on-site complete care warranty. I contacted support on this issue on 03/10/04. Upon trying to initially contact support, for the first 2 hours everytime I would punch in my express service code, I would get a message indicating everyone was in a department meeting and to try back in 1 hour. I eventually got a hold of a technician. The tech was fairly knowledgable and nice. He first checked for a new bios, there is none. We went through the bios and diagnostics, which I had completed prior. There is nothing in the bios or in his notes that relate to the fan settings. The diagnostics passed for all 3 fans, and it would regulate the speeds fine. Once the test was done, the fans would kick back up to 4400 rpm. To give you some idea of the situation. The tech could hear the fans over the phone, they even hicupped once during the conversation and he heard the difference. After doing the diagnostics, he had me modify setting in the system setting to no avail. He indicated the next step would be an OS reinstall, which I had previously indicated I did this on my own with not difference. He indicated we could skip that step. He then ask me to cover the fans one at a time and see which fans were on all of the time. I indicated the back 2 were most definately on all of the time. At this point, he asked me if I had a screwdriver, if you speak with support and they ask you this question, I recommend you ask "what is a screwdriver" or say "well, I'm running low on orange juice, but I have a lot of vodka handy if I need it". So, back to the story. He indicated that we were going to tighten all the screws. Did this, no change" He then sayed we were going to open it up and check the fans. O.K., first, I am a pretty technically competent person, good with tools and building and ripping systems apart. IF HE ASK YOU IF YOU HAVE A SCREWDRIVER, see the vodka comment. We began the procedure, ripped out the powerplate, keyboard, everything was dandy until we got to removing the palm rest. Did the three screws on the back, 6 on the front, uh, I only see 4, uh, well I assure you there are two by the lcd between the vent and the lcd, uh no, uh yes, uh not unless I rip off the vent or the lcd. Well he indicated he sheet did not show the vent covers, I finally wiggled them off. O.K. pull off the palm rest. Won't come off. Did 3 screws on the back 6 on the front right, right. I indicated there was another screw on a flimsy metal tab that I thought was it. While he was telling me another way, I undid the screw I was talking about and pulled off the palm rest. He said his sheet didn't show this kinda like I was inventing it as I went along. O.K. all done ripping apart. About this time I started looking at the laptop all over the place, thinking about the 3K plus I just shelled out $460 of which was warranty, I starting thinking and getting really pissed off for the first time since getting the system. At that point, I said "O.K., I see the fan that isn't running, the others are in the back. What do you want me to do now?" He said we did this so I would know how to replace the fan when he sent it, now we would do the back ones. I explained not so politely that "I didn't spend all this money on system and warranty, so I could spend hours and hours fixing the problem, and that this would be the last time I would do this" He indicated that fans are usable replacable parts. AHHHHH, O.K. I got to putting the laptop back together, my hands are kinda shakin' a little, one of the f'in screws about the size of a pin head fell in the modular bay and either went out the side or in the laptop, never to be seen again. His response was that I really needed to find it or it would take a week or two to get a new one.

End of wanting Dell XPS!!!

I said I would put it back without the screw and send it back for a refund, so I didn't care if it was missing, well, it needed the screw first. I said that maybe they shouldn't have their customers fulfill the warranty, and this kind of stuff wouldn't happen, to put a manager on. Why do you want to speak with a manager? Because the manager is going to set this up so I can get a refund. Upon transfering me to returns for refund, I was on hold 45 minutes then got disconnected. Tried back to support, was on hold 30 minutes and hung up.

All that and I have doubts that it was the fans that were bad, otherwise it would have been isolated to one. No telling where it would have gone from there.

This morning:
Called customer care and was told they ordered my fans, and I would get them within the week. I said, I didn't think that was going to happen and what did they want me to do with the fans. They said if it's too much trouble, they could send an onsite tech out to do the work and that I have until 4/3 to get a full refund. I said at this point, the thing is not put together real well since they had an unexperience person do it (me), and there may be screw floating around in the case. O.K. well we can do a replacement. I indicated the system was $350 cheaper now than before, I didn't have 3 more weeks to wait, and that there are some pretty bad issues with the GPU overheating, what can the do to eleviate these issues? 10 seconds of silence. I then said I'm not happy with the laptop, the customer support and want a refund. Well, why don't you wait out to make sure. I said this is for business use and I really can't afford the time or effort of working for them to "make sure" and that my time is a little more important to me, and to set it up now.

Transfered to Returns.
They gave me a return authorization and UPS will be out tomorrow between 12-5
A refund was no problem to process. They indicating that upon receiving it will take 7-10 days to credit back to my credit card and my bank has 30 days to post this to my account.

So time to look for something comparable.

I think I'm going to take a week to collect my thoughts. I will most likely be going with Alienware, as I've always had a fondness for them and had intended to buy one prior to the 9700 gpu. I also may take a look around the Voodoo boards to see their experiences. Prices are down with the voodoo, but still a little pricey.

I think had I initially showed no interest in doing the work, they would have probably sent someone out. But I didn't realize the scope of what he intended until it was too late.

I was just reading over there they came out with a new 16.1. I actually planned on getting the 15.4 because it seemed better for the money, but I may look into the new 16.1 and see what they have to say

Just read that, was because of supply and demand.

Will do.

I think the other threads were a big deciding factor for me. I probably would have gone ballistic if I would have received a new one only to have GPU heat issues. Didn't want to put myself through that, plus I think my 30 days would have been up before I could've made a reasonable decision.

I did mention this forum to them, and indicated that it seemed like only 1 or 2 in 7 didn't have the heat problem, and mine was one of the good ones, probably because of the fans and that those odds were a little to high for me. I wonder if the "departmental meeting" was to address that issue?

Yeah, they said 7-10 and then another 30 for the bank, my credit union shows both dates, so I will know if their goofing around with it at Dell. Some banks don't like to post prior to doing the monthly interest, more money to them. Luckily I can buy another one whenever, and am just out the interest for this month, which is nominal for the circumstances. Had I financed it or had a low amount credit limit, I would probably be a little more upset.

I was a little leary at first to post this because I didn't want to look like I was running around crazy with a flamethrower, but I figured people may want the details, especially since there was some questions on returns.

I'm one who has recommended dell to friends and family for a long time. That probably won't change because of this. I always recommended them because their support seems oriented towards people with very little computer knowledge, which describes my family and a lot of my friends. I think had they not felt comfortable with me doing the deassemble, there would not have been an issue, because it wouldn't have happened. On the other hand, all I could think of was the fact that if I were doing a desktop, I would have built my own and saved a ton of money. I didn't do that, because a laptop was to small, delicate, and almost impossible to build well in the private world, and there I was digging throught the laptop on there request. I really blame myself more for agreeing to do what they requested, it was against my better judgement.

I think I may go with Alienware, which was actually my first choice. But I'm going take a week to think it out first.