Complete Care i9100 to Dell 1520 - Page 2

A wrap up... I received my second 1520 and this time, it had an GeForce 8600MGT card in it. Hurrah! It took me about 4-5 additional calls and additional emails, but it was worth it. Turns out that some of the calls were probably my fault (i.e., I kept on opening other trouble tickets instead of sticking with the original one that the original supervisor OK'd).

There was a snafu when the original supervisor said that they'd be replacing my laptop with one with an ATI X1270 graphics processor. I said OK, not knowing better, but once I did the research, it turns out that it was much worse than the 9800 that I had.

I made more calls, and lo and behold, I now have two 1520's. Of course, I have to return the old one with the integrated graphics. But that one had a better display (sxvga) and a faster drive (7200 rpm vs 5400), so I swapped those parts out (thanks for the service manual), so that I have close to the same machine that was covered under warranty.

Hopefully, they won't bitch too hard about the swap-outs, but if I went the "official" Dell route, I think it'd be another 2 months until they got the whole configuration right: graphics adapter, screen and drive speed. On my warranted laptop, I had the superior display, drive speed and graphics controller, so I feel somewhat justified.

I can't believe that I have two 1520's and I don't even have a credit card on file. Of course, I'll return the old new one (the original replacement that didn't meet my specs), because that's just karma, but that speaks to the goodwill and good service that Dell has exhibited here. They trusted me with two $1500+ laptops....

If only it didn't take too so to get the right system, it would've been perfect.

-Humbert