Tell us about the three worst LT OEMs through yours or others' experiences

I agree with the statement about Toshiba. They're POSes. At work we have 10 of them - not even a year od and 9 have had to be either replaced or seriously repaired.

Also I'd have to say Gateway/Emachines like you did. Can't believe they'd sell a wildly popular line of notebooks where literally every one had a the hinge crack. Also I had a Gateway desktop for a while - nothing but problems from day one.

For my third, I'd say Dell as well. Over 4 years my girlfriend has three radically different Dell laptops and all three have failed completely at one point and had a string of other problems - though the only thing that makes Dell third is, they stand by their shitty products if you buy the extra warranty - it may be a pain, but she always go it fixed.

As for the worst reseller? IBUYPOWER, hands down, no competition. Can't believe they're still in business... its not a matter of years, its more like months, weeks, days... before they're gone.

comment on icacciatore's comment...i put ibuypower on my "good list". even though they were slow to ship (24 days..hey..still faster than AW) the quality of the system and the service from them has been fairly good.

my dell experience...i have 2 desktops, both solid, never had an issue to call tech support about (do just about 100% of maintnance/upgrades myself)

now on topic:

1) HP / Compaq.
I've had to help many of HP owners resolve their problems because tech support wouldn't help. From personal experience, i called them about a HPNA networking kit, and the representatives did not appear to be aware that the company ever produced such an item, all but 1 didn't even know what HPNA was, and 1 straight out denied this product was ever manufactured. i spent nearly 2 hours on hold...between 15 minutes of talk...that did't even help me resolve my issues. Further more my HP Deskjet that was used occasionaly (built in late 2000), died in summer 04....short life...really short. And my 2nd deskjet (built in may 01) is being really stupid..just doesn't work right sometimes for no reason, and my 3rd hp printer (psc1315) tends to suck in more than 1 sheet of paper at a time and for a brand new item (only got it 2 weeks ago, used it 2 times so far), the scanner is REALLY REALLY LOUD.

#2) hypersonic:
for a "premium gamer system reseller" their tech support is really slow, it took them 2 days (i emailed them wed early afternoon, got reply friday night) to get back to me after i informed them about an error on the CL56 order page and asked them a few ?s about that model. 2 days...really? and i though compaq was slow with 2 hours on hold.

#3) (this is not really on topic, but since i had no experience with other bad hardware sellers, here is some software/service that is computer related). Microsoft (MSN specificaly):
I used to have MSN 56K for a while, had to call in once in a while....not bad over all support, but hold time was quite long on some occasions.....a little too long.

Your experience seems to be the exception, rather than the rule, and I'm glad for you.

I'm sure you know my experience (summary: 50 days without the system, returned to me with the same problem it went out with and without any of the accessories I sent in with it, noteably the AC adapter and Shinza Sleeve).

Though these seems to be their M.O. these days. When I bought from them (June 04), they had a 6-month Reseller Rating of, I believe, ~ 8.6. If you look now it is a rather pathetic 5.9 and seems to be sinking (it was 6.28 something about three weeks ago).

Most people found them as I did; rude, condescending, unwilling to fix problems, and often making promises they have no intention of keeping. Here are a few excerpts from reviews on resellerratings.com

(this guy's computer was a few weeks old when it died - so he would be covered under their supposed 1 year warranty).

(from someone who sent it in for a hard drive with faulty sectors).


That's just a sampling from the first few pages of reviews... Sure there are good ones, but not really from anyone who has had to deal with their customer service or tech support. It's the rare lucky ones like you that never develop a problem for whom everything is peachy.

The Only thing I have going against any company right now is HP/Compaq. I get a Laptop the X6000 the keyboard is busted and the right button on the track paid is smashed. Fine send me the parts and I'll fix it my self everything is good in the world. Sorry we cant do that why don't you send us the laptop and will take a look at it and send it back out to you 7~10 bussiness days. IT WAS !@#$ing broken when i got it plus it shipped a week late. So i return it on the 14th it gets to Compaq on the 16th. Yaeh everthing is good account will be credited end of story. On the 19th today I get any email we have a poilcy of contacting the customer on all returns to try and reslove the issue since we could not contact you the return has been cancled any pending credits or exchanges will not be processed. Please contact us at 1-888-XXX-XXXX. Guess what no one is #$%@ing there. Call all of the extensetions finaly get a hold of someone that I can Barley understand she gives me a case number with Quality Control who i can not call and then say sorry that is all i can do.

THEY HAVE HAD THE LAPTOP FOR 3 DAYS THEN TELL ME I CANT RETURN IT WTF.

*edit any ideas Guys/Gals?

only toshiba here, Worst Company and Worst products ive ever used in my life

had a toshiba satelite pro in a period of 2 years
went thru
8 HDDs
1 LCD
1 LCD hinge
1 DVDROM
1 MOBO

my college buddies laptop also went thru 1 LCD, 1 Hinge (its alctually both hinges) 1 DVD, ANOTHER college classmate went thru 1 LCD, 1 hinge, 1 mobo, 1 floppy
thats 3 laptops defective in my group of friends, which i find it TOTALLY unaccpetable. i had the loner laptop more than i did my real one.


Toshiba standalone DVD player (cant remember model but it was the first one to have mp3 capability) - completly died for no reason 2 months after i bought it, kept blowing fuses, took it apart, nothing is burnt, i didnt see any charing on any of the components. sold it on ebay for 20 dollars, bought a panasonic dvd with mp3 and that panasonic after 4 years is still in use for testing dvdr's.

Toshiba DVD-RW drive - on my dads compal CL56 the POS can't burn half the dvd media (AML, Benq, Memorex, CMC Magnetics, RitekG05) where my pioneer and it has burnt them all flawlessly and the dvds movies it has burned can be played on any standalone dvd player. the toshiba's dvdrs that were burned as movies can only be played in my newest panasonic dvdrw 5disc changer but with errors.

Toshiba HDD in my dads CL56 - this peice of crap is slow, expensive, has unbareably shitty transferrate, its LOUD as hell, louder than my 6yr old maxtor 3.5" HDD. (how can they sell this garbage?)

Toshiba CDRW in my OWN laptop - i had no choice but to buy it since the store i got the Asus from ONLY carried the toshiba model HDD, the panasonic drives were notout yet for the laptop. this cd drive can only rip at some stupid garbage like 2x for DVD-R's, it takes #$^%$ 33 MINS to rip a 4.3GB DVD-R to my HDD, where as my panasonic and some old samsung 8x DVD (same speed as toshiba) can rip it in 20-22 mins, how can a new drive be beaten in performance by 2 older crap drives? thats rediculous!! luckly i haven't had any burning problems or i would just smash this peice of crap right now.

toshiba is totally blacklisted now, i dont care what kind of new garbage they have but im never buying anything from them again. i think ive given them enough chances, those dvd drives and players arent free, they are actually more expensive than other drives that are faster and more reliable.

IMO the worst lappy is IBM thinkpad of course - just kidding Hardball. I am jealous because I cannot afford them.

No experiences with Tosh. But my exp with Dell has been alright. True the hinges gave away on my inspiron 5000 - but that was after 3+ yrs and heavy use. That being said .. read in another thread that some people were having some sort of hinge problem with the highly rated Asus M6Ne after one year of use.

However the Dell Latitudes wre pretty well built ( as least used to be) Have seen/used a few at work and the build quality is definitely superior.

Dell's customer support is crappy though. But once in a while I reached a tech who was really knowledgable. Most other times it has been almost worthless.

my experience with toshibas only goes to the point of TVs, i have 2 tvs at home, and both work great (4 and 3 years old). however, a hard drive i had (40gb 5400rpm) pooped out after 2 weeks of use.....

true, dells are not *THAT* bad, i have an old i8000 inspiron, it still works perfectly but its so ugly, heavy and not a symetical shape the lcd cuves over the rest of the computer, the chassis bends in and out, its just stupid. i think it was a fad at the time because toshiba did the same thing. why the hell would you want your lcd hanging over the sides of the rest of the computer? to make it look bigger? thats rediclous

averatec for me.

I was on the road for work and needed mobile computing quick so I stopped by Wal Mart (yes WM sells computers) and picked up a athlon 2800/512mb ram/15" notebook for 900+ Had to return it within a few days to a wal mart in a different state because of overheating problems. Could barely boot into xp w/out major heat issues. Poorly designed :down:

I know that this is a worst thread, but did want to mention that I have had no trouble over the past year with my current Gateway desktop or IBM notebook. Everything worked right out of the box, and has kept working.

Given time, I know I will wear out the hard drives. I always do. But hard drives are easy to replace.

#3 Sony who FAX'd me a repair quote, then told me there was no way to discuss with the tech, but I could FAX them a note which they answered by adjusting the quote to read that the customer refused repair, another FAX'd note which was answered by upping the first quote by $300. Why not just tell me to go screw myself?

#2 Maybe not technically OEM, but TechDepot who had 4 reps working on my order yet still managed to promise a product they did not have TWICE, give 10 delivery dates and met none, finally get my order (100+ laptops) and send it by a trucking company that passed through my city in the morning and returned for delivery in the aftn (trucking told me TechDepot could have paid for direct deliv, but chose not to). Icing on the cake was an email after the fact hoping they could do better "next time"????!!!!

#1 By a mile - Toshiba - we purchase almost $200K worth of laptops ea year, for 5 models we'd been loyal Toshiba customers and recommended them. When we get their Satellite Pro 6100 hotbox and begin having massive, catastrophic problems I can't get anyone to listen. I get 1-800 customer service numbers that are disconnected, I get introduced to my regional rep who promises help and then disappears w/o a word--literally, his phone was disconnected--, they want to engineer a swap, but can't tell me what it will cost or which computer for a month, don't answer questions or phone calls... you get the picture, or look here: http://www.thesqueakywheel.com/compl...plaint6341.cfm

HP for me... both me and my sister bought pavilions less than 2 years ago... she went for the extended warrenty and after 4 HDs, 7mobos, and an LCD it was declared and she got refunded for everything except her extended warrenty... I didnt go with the warrenty and the things wrong with mine now are... a broken cdrw drive (it pops open randomly and wont stay in when watching/listening to cds, 3 dead pixies, a broken pcmcia card slot (fails to recognize anything), broken wireless card, broken ethernet port and AC adapter port... to fix those i gotta replace the mobo... i contacted HP before the warrenty ended and i sent it in... 12 days later i get an email saying it shows signs of abuse and they wont fix it... at the time only the ethernet and ac port were broken... and everyone i know with this computer has the same problem... oh well.. it still works if i connect wirelessly through a USB wireless port :-D

Luckily my company bought the Toshiba i work on, it's the Satellite with the static-freeze problem. But I guarantee that it is enough to keep me from ever buying a Toshiba for myself in the future.

its strange, people that have problems with toshiba KEEP having problems and then they just dont buy toshiba anymore. but people that have good luck with toshiba keep having good luck. it doesnt make sense at all

Gateway for me:
http://notebookforums.com/showthread...ight=nightmare

Though my girlfriend just had to deal with them for her laptop, and I must say there were signs of improvement...

We HAD good luck with Toshiba. Back to the Satellite 100 & 200s, we were happy with 500+ Toshibas. Then came the SatPro 6100 and it all went to hell. The product is terrible, the tech support useless, the customer service all but hidden and then evasive when found.

Our luck changed dramatically! It was as if we'd only purchased laptops from Dr, Jeckyll and suddenly Mr. Hyde showed himself.