Alienware 17 R2 not charging, Dell warranty problem, any help would be great.

Hello everyone! I'm looking for some advice concerning my Alienware 17 R2. Here's the situation.

Bought laptop in May of 2015, warranty until April 27, 2016. In August, the laptop stopped charging. The icon in Windows would go from "plugged in, charging" to "plugged in, not charging" to just the battery icon. Contacted Dell, they sent me a new power brick, it worked. All is right in the world.

Fast forward to March this year. The exact same thing occurs. They send out a guy, he replaces the DC jack on the laptop and gives me a new brick. (He also broke the wifi card trying to install the jack, but that's a whole 'nother story) Problem goes away again.

Warranty expires April 27th. July 5th, exact same problem happens again. Now, Dell says since I am out of warranty, tough luck. I say since this is the same exact problem you've failed to fix two previous times, you're still obligated to, you know, FIX IT. You can't just delay the problem until the warranty expire with hack repairs. I have spoken to a supervisor (so he says) and he told me to pound sand. Any advice on how to go about getting this repaired with them footing the bill? New phone numbers, an email address, anything? Or am I just jack out of luck? Or, something I can try to fix it myself?

As an aside, I'm pretty sure the problem has been a faulty motherboard this whole time. And yes, I obtained a new power brick to attempt to band aid it while I get this sorted out, but this time it's not working. Bios identifies the adapter properly and says the battery is working normally. I'm out of ideas besides calling Dell 10 times a day until somebody helps me.

Thanks for your help, any is appreciated.

Matthew

 

Read this thread and see how "good" their service is.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/alienware-15-services-woes.793310/page-7
If i were you and was able to sell off the laptop, i would and buy a clevo or asus. At least wouldn't have to deal with this service. Don't buy dell till they revamp their service regime and follow a unified just policy instead of relying on the "supervisor"'s whims

 

Hahaha oih man are you in for a ride if you need Asus techsupport. If you have an issue then and statistically Asus and Dell have similar failure rates. You have to send your laptop to a depot, depot's that are outsourced and fix all kinds of brands, acer, asus, dell etc. You rlaptop will be often worse off than a Dell technician coming to your home.

 

At least i won't have a supervisor denying my requests because HE thinks 96 degrees is normal CPU temp when gaming; won't say that temperatures measured by XTU are definitely wrong; won't say that throttling is perfectly normal and the list goes on

 

Those kind of crap happen with pretty much all brands. I pretty much had all brands of laptops.

Still your experience isnt the overall experience of every user out there. Some people have bad luck. Its **** i know, especially for an expensive product. Doesnt mean that every user out there has the same issues.

 

Doesn't mean that no other user will get this issue like i did. But anyways its off-topic, OP your best bet is if PORRAS escalates your issue especially if you are in the US

 

I had the same problem, I was also out of warranty and I got a MOBO replacement (it is waiting next to me now, it isn't installed yet ), a new power brick (upgrade to 240W) and probably an SSD after the MOBO gets installed. What I did was to email Michael DELL and CC other executives below him. I sent them a full report of what's going on with the laptop. If I got all these, I'm sure you can get a replacement MOBO too. On paper, I am not even the owner of this laptop btw it was a gift to me.

 

Oran if you can direct me to those email addresses I would be eternally grateful. Anything is better than being told they won't help me. Thanks so much.

Matt

 

I agree, DELL is way better than those rest of ****s, when it comes to servicing, I had a Asus laptop and a lenevo Y series, both sucked hard when it comes to servicing, but again when it comes to hiding some faults in design, every company does that.. even razer does throttle so bad.. even apple does have flaws.. so nothing is perfect.. hopefuly Clevo steps up in game and bring us some better models. current ones are ugly bulk, cant be called as laptops as its not a carry around device, but specs wise its a beast.. and FYI porras already escalated the issue to India Alienware social media team, but trust me it doesn't do anything.. all I can say whatever the story he told you regarding 96c, spilled liquid could be a lie, after I posted all those facts and hammering them personally at DELL HQ, showrooms, they somehow needed to shut me, so they agreed for a refurb replacement...

 

Dell should straighten out all their support teams. FOr example in the NEtherlands they are pretty good, in India they seem to be like ****. Why not have the same standards the same in any country.

I do like the latest Asus ROG 980M 15inch laptop. It seems to be pretty good in its class.

 

Did you buy a Dell OEM brick or did you try to get off cheap with an ebay special? Because a new power brick not working sounds like a new issue.

If it's not an OEM brick I would try to find one and see if that helps. If it does I would try a BIOS upgrade and see if that helps. IMO, a new motherboard isn't going to solve a design flaw in the 17r2.

 

Another battery issue with a 17R2/15R1? Uggg

 

Funny enough i am having the same problem. Had someone come around today to replace the charger and DC in connector.

Surprisingly it didn't work and still having the same "plugged in, not charging" issue.

So having either the same person or someone else to come tomorrow or the day after with new "parts" to get it all sorted, only a month left on warranty too.

Try this, plug it in as fast as you can or plug it in and move it about a bit until it works permanently, this works for me.

I think in your situation it was just bad luck, like you said you had a replacement charger and that worked fine for months, until it happened again. They simply don't want to help if you're out of warranty.

 

Thanks for all the advice. John Green, I purchased an UPGRADED Dell OEM brick, the 220W one, and no dice. Didn't help. Also updated the BIOS, have the newest one, didn't work either. Kontralien, the plug is firm in the DC jack. No amount of wiggling helps, and honestly, there is barely any wiggle at all. Don't let them get away with not helping you before your warranty expires!!

I took the laptop to a local repair shop that does Alienwares, and I got the answer I was dreading. It's the mobo. DC jack is inputting the proper voltage at the board, so the brick / DC jack isn't the issue. Battery is outputting the proper wattage as well. Might have some news from Dell later today, gonna wait until it all runs its course until I report back.

Matt

 

Cheers for the details Matt.

Another guy popped in today and replaced the mobo and guess what? same problem, WTH Dell!

So now this guy is saying that the DC in wasn't replaced properly by the last guy and this causes the charger to plug in at an incorrect angle, that's why wiggling it about causes it to work.

They may as well replace my laptop!

Will see what happens with this.