Trying to understand Alienware Tech Support?

Ok, here is my situation. I have had nothing but GPU issues out of my 6970m crossfire setup on my M18x recently. Alienware has been out three times to try and fix it. They have replaced the GPU's twice, the crossfire cable once, and the heatsinks once. The most recent attempt at replacing the GPU's the tech that was put said that he could not fix the problem and I would be getting a call Friday from Alienware resolution center. Well, Friday came and passed with no phone call. I called in today to try and see what was going on, and the rep said they had no record of there being an escalation on my laptop, but that he would be happy to look into the issue for me. Eventually after being on hold for a while he came back and said that it was possible that the ticket was being handled by DELL directly and that he would open a ticket on with Alienware and if I liked would transfer me over to DELL. I said ok, send me over since if they are handling the ticket then they would be able to tell me whats going on.

After being on hold again I get in touch with a DELL rep who refused to look into anything for me since my computer is an Alienware, and insisted that I had to talk with them. The rep immediately tried to transfer me back to Alienware, but I stopped him and insisted that if he had to send me back to send me to a supervisor or someone that could help me. He agreed and transferred me. After being on hold yet again, I get back to Alienware and am in touch with a rep. I explained the situation to him, and he said that he could not help me since the ticket was just opened. I tried to get him to understand that the ticket should of been opened up this past Thursday, but there seems to be some confusion somewhere, and the previous Alienware rep I talked to earlier said he would open a ticket for me. He insisted that there was nothing that could be done as the ticket had to be looked at before anyone could do anything. I yet again tried to explain that someone should of already looked at the ticket since it was opened on Thursday. He politely called me a liar, and told me that I just had to wait. I asked to talk to a supervisor, but there was none available. I asked to stay on hold till one was, but that was apparently not an option and he took my information and told me I would receive a call from a supervisor later today.

Well I have yet to get a call back, I have no idea what is going on to fix my computer which has not been working right for about a month. I am beyond frustrated with the situation and was wondering if anyone had any suggestions on how to proceed with this. I love my M18x but if it is not working it is just another paper weight. I have had to lose productivity at work three days while the tech tried to fix the laptop, since they will not come after business hours, and the laptop is still not working. I am not getting the calls back that I have been told I would receive and at this point I am thinking that I am just going to have to live with the laptop broken, or fix it on my own.


Thanks All!

 

Brother Luis ...please help our fellow friend .....OP Luis Paros is our alien ware team member active on these forums best of luck .
I know Dell can sometimes be hard but they'll definitely fix your issues.Don't give up.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

lol sounds like what i went thru.. hope it gets handled quickly..

 

Thanks for the support guys ill keep the thread updated as I don't plan to give up.

 

I too advise that one of the Alienware reps here on the forum might help you out. Depends on your location as I believe they can only really assist owners in the US or Canada. I'm from the UK but cannot get support via US/Canada so I have to deal with Dell EMEA myself.

I reckon it would be an invaluable idea for Dell to introduce an Alienware rep. on the NBR forums that CAN actually escalate things for those outside of the US/Canada. Even if they are based out of US/Canada, they could maybe do some of the liasing with Dell departments that are outside of the US or Canada.

If you're in the right place, you can get some great help here - if you're not, all the AW reps here can do is perhaps try and advise you how best to get things sorted.

Good luck either way!

 

Not sure if I missed it but what's wrong with the laptop?

 

I have severe flickering and artifacting in 3D games. I see in it SC, WoW, BF3, BioShock, and even in Heaven benchmark. In addition to that my xfire performance is sub 400 on the benchmark.

 

Sounds like they should have replaced the mobo. Seems like the only logical thing to do if replacing the gpu's didn't fix it. And if replacing the mobo doesn't work they should probably do a replacement for you. But with them saying they can't fix it they are probably going to replace the unit for you. Just seems that they are taking there sweet time with it. Easiest way to get this resolved in my experience is call in verify your info and state right off the bat after that you want to speak to a Sup. if they refuse, call back and do the same, usually on the 3rd or 4th time of straight call in and requesting a Sup they get you one and you explain your situation to them and they usually will either just setup for a replacement which would probably be a m18x r2 of equal or better specs or they will send out the proper parts to repair the laptop. just don't let it get to out of warranty because thats what standard dell reps try to do is push it back till after the warranty falls out and then they get the right to tell you sorry your warranty is up and basically tell you where to stick it. (alienware reps is a different story they tend to be better about it)

 

Following this advice, I called back in and the rep I got would not let me talk to a supervisor. Instead he told me that the escalation was been reviewed and I have to wait at least three business days for them to find a replacement system. The rep said that the supervisor who is in charge of my ticket is out of the office and he is the only one who can give me any other information. I don't quite understand this, as if they have agreed to replace my system why it takes three days to find a replacement. I would be more than shocked if DELL/ Alienware did not have a ERP system that has a built in SCM which will let them know what supply the company had in stock. Furthermore, I do not quite understand why only a single person in the company can give me information pertaining my ticket, as I am sure the ERP also has a built in CRM with a record for my account which information is entered.

Anyways at this point it appears they are going to replace the system, but with what, and when is still left up to debate. Bottom line eventually I will have a working system. The reality of it is I really could care less if my system is replaced, I just want a working system. Either by replacing MB and GPU's, or by replacement I don't really care. At this point I just want to be done with the process.

 

you can try to tweet @dellcares or you can also email Michael Dell... you might get a better responce that way...

 

At this point I'm going to wait my three business days to let them do whatever they are going to do and see what happens. I have a lot going on this week to keep my from gaming anyways. Thanks everyone for the support and suggestions. I will be sure to keep the thread updated with the latest info.

 

First of all i understand what you are going through ..i had to wait 4 months ...before a completely working system In any case ...do not settle or give up ....your time is worth every minute spent....also they will take there time to look up for a replacement system ....because if they cannot find one ....they have to replace it with a new system ....give them the 3 days ....they have asked for ...also remember ....you should qualify for a similar or better replacement ...hence i would suggest ...what ever system you are being offered ...youc an discuss it with us here if you feel like getting a second opinion ...else ofcourse you are the best judge .....but like i said ..we are all here to help you out..........Good luck my friend .. keep us posted

 

Sometimes I thank God that I have an Alienware system and not a Dell/Alienware. Even that I bought it at 2009 they still help me when I call them.

Good Luck my friend.

 

Holy cow! 4 months! Now my month isn't seeming as bad. I feel your pain that's for sure. I will see what they are offering as a replacement in three days, but what would be comparable? I would think any of the new systems are better than mine. Which is why I think they are giving me such a hard time.

 

It can be less than 3 days. I was told 5 days to find a replacement for my laptop but I got a call within a day and a half. Now if they are building you a new system, it will take another 2 weeks for them to build so yeah.. I've been out of laptop since April 4th as well. Let's hope that you will get that call soon!

 

Hope you get the system you deserve. I'm not trying to defend Dell any way, but Dell is a big company, and what you get really does depend on luck of the draw. One thing I can definately tell you is that don't take no for an answer from them until you are satisfied. As for status of them not telling you the specs of the replacement, it's just how they do things. Just make sure the replacement system works as it should, and it's atleast better than what your original system is.

I do agree they should've replaced mobo as well, but some techs just don't have common sense. Good luck.

 

Well atleast we know now that they took your calls seriously because now they are going to just replace the unit and most likely they are going to put a m18x r2 in your hands with xfire 7970 and probably a regular cpu unless you had a XM cpu then they will put a xm in for you.

 

Well my question with this is what actually counts as days? My support ticket was supposed to be escalated this past Thursday, is that when the days start or would it be from today?

I dunno, from the sound of it they are trying to find another R1 to send me.

 

I'm guessing it would be from the day when the replacement request has been approved by a manager. I can't say for sure sorry. I'll give you a quick breakdown of what happened with my case and see if you can compare and roughly see when they'll call you.

Monday - 3rd repair has been attempted. Failed. Requested replacement.
Tuesday - I called early in the morning to double check if the request has been made into a ticket. Nope. Since it hasn't been 24 hours, I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt. After the hour passing the 24 hour mark, I called to see if the ticket has been created. Ticket has been created and has been approved. They told me to wait 5 days for a phone call about the replacement.
Wednesday - Nothing
Thursday - I got a call around noon to go through the replacement specifications which resulted in a M18xR2.

I hope you can resolve this quick.. If not, when Monday comes along, perhaps AW Luis can help you out ASAP!

 

They will replace it with a m18x r2 trust me, they wont be looking for another r1, they almost never have them in stock plus they always replace with better or comparable.

 

I am rather surprised by all the support from the forums, especially since it seems everyone thinks I will be getting an R2, and even possible having to have a system built as one member pointed out. I can not express how much easier the community here has made it while dealing with this. Yesterday, it seemed as if I was getting the run around, and then through the suggestions of the members on the forums, and the support on the community it seems like I wil be getting a newer R2 system in the coming weeks. Which I will be very grateful for since this afternoon while working on some homework my system turned off, and when I turned it back on my media panel was not working and I can't seem to get it working. There is something going on with this R1 which is far more deep than just the GPU's so hopefully Alienware will get this taken care of sooner rather than later, and with the support of this community I think they will. I am hoping to get a post from Luis tomorrow as I think he can still help.

 

Don't get hopes up too high until you actually get it. I've seen some crazy upgrades sent to people who didn't even meet the old specs, and seen situations where they had to go through some hell to even match the current setup.

If they try to replace Gen 1 CPU with Gen 2 CPU, that's fine, but if you have XM Gen 1 CPU, and they try to get you a regular Gen 2 cpu saying the spec is same or better, you have to make your arguement that it's not a fair upgrade, and what you paid for.

Dell usually does treat you right, and that's why I've been Dell customer for a long time (since XPS Gen 1), but some times you have to make your stand, and ask what you paid for.

 

I guess im lucky since I have a base gen 2 CPU that won't be hard to match. Where I might run into issues is when my system was ordered the 6970m's were the best GPU's for it. I can see DELL saying that saying 675M SLI is the same. Either way your right until I have something in my hands there is no telling what I will get. Since we are on the subject though I think I would be ok with an R2 with a 3610, 0r 3630 my same 16GB of ram and a pair or 7970's hehe. I think 680's would be stretching it a tad.

 

Hey ...just don't get your hopes up high...but do argue your case ....let's hope you end up being another happy customer......at the end of the day it's important you have a working system ....matching spec to spec is almost impossible ....also don't settle for the 675m since they are rebadged 580m....I meant almost similar ....if they do offer that ....please tell them you are an amd person ...and the rest would be taken care of .....though I personally am not a big amd fan ..I'm nvidia all the way .
Hopefully your issue gets resolved soon ....I have a super strong feeling ...if you are in the US you'll hear from them by tomorrow/Tuesday and it will be the escalation team
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

I am in the US, from what I was told I have to wait till this one particular manager and his team comes back to work on Tuesday for anything to be done. We shall see, but so I am prepared is there a resource which will let me know the video card rankings that way I know going in which cards are better than the others.

 

I really don't have a resource but here is my order

1. SLI 680m
2.Xfire 7970m

On performance basis these cards are equal but for me personally from a reliability perspective I would go with 680m ..also I wouldn't include any other cards since at worst you can accept a single card for either one and SLI later instead of getting a SLI 675m ....that's just my perspective.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

K thank you, any idea why there is only one person in the company that can move my replacement forward? The repalcement has already been approved so I don't get why there is only one person who can spec out a new machine and get the ball rolling.

 

Usually it's an.entire team .....that hunts down a replacement from the outlet and if it's a new system any rep once.he has.the approvals.can.go.ahead and place the order

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

It can get pretty frustrating though

Many reps will just send you a replacement system without telling you

I have received crap refurb system that don't even turn on while some reps gave me very nice upgrades with new system without me asking for it

Just a luck of the draw and it will test your patience

 

I was told that I had to wait for the manager to come back to the office tomorrow. I guess he has a special team he works with as well. I will post back tomorrow as soon as I know something.

 

Sounds great ......remember we are all here to support you....of course ...only you can feel the agony but be rest assured we have all gone through this process and in the end dell always does the right thing May the force be with you

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

I just got off the phone with Alienware and now they are saying that I will be contacted by the end of the week regarding the specs of my replacement. I was also told the manager for my ticket will not be till later today and if I wanted to talk to him I would have to call back. The rep at first thought I was not even supposed to be getting a replacement and tried to convince me that I was not going to have my unit replaced.

As others have said... In the end... They will make it right... I just wonder why make the road to the end so difficult.

 

Please make sure you get in touch with the manager ...keep calling till he comes on and ensure that all case notes are being out against your case and get a case I'd ...so you can follow it up

 

I called back to try and talk to the manager, and the rep this time told me that I have to call back at 5PM to spec out a new system. I am taking notes myself of who I talked to and what was said, I have to be honest here and say this is one of the most ridiclious processes I have ever dealth with, but thanks to the members here I am staying strong lol. I am a little worried as my warranty does end in the near future. I was planning on extending it, but I am worried that if I do that it will not transfer now that the system is being replaced. Do I just wait till I get the new machine to extend it or do I extend it now?

 

In my situation ..i made them cover me for the period i lost due to the constant calling and repair time ...they reversed that time period for me...so you might wanna discuss this with them ....if it goes to 2-3 months ....also i am not the most experienced person when it comes to warranty ..i would suggest you take others opinion on this ...but i would extend it ...so they have excuse later ........also if you anyways wnana get the warranty there is no harm ....and your warranty will be covered for the new system .....but you might need to make some calls ...which happened with me ...where my warranty got lost and suddenly i was out of warranty ...but like i said ....dell always does the right thing in the end.

 

Thanks i think ill wait to extend it. Also I got an email from a dell rep saying they are in the processes of building a system of similar parts using refurb parts. What do I do with this? I have not agreed to accept anything or been told what I am getting.

 

You can extend the warranty to replacement (exchange) systems. In fact, that normally happens automatically. So, as long as your warranty does not expire you should be able to extend it to the current or replacement system. I have done this several times and other than waiting while it is processed, it's not a problem.

 

Thanks mr fox. That makes sense, now if I can only make sense of what is going on for the replacement.

 

I know the waiting and conflicting information can sometimes be a hassle. A lot of us have gone through that process before.

On a positive note, be glad that there is such a process available for you to go through. With any other brand, you're pretty much stuck with whatever you purchased... even if you buy a defective piece of trash, it's a "caveat emptor" scenario with the other brands. So, hang tight and patiently work through it and things will likely turn out fantastic.

 

Mr. Fox, that is exactly why I went with an Alienware to begin with. The hard part for me is trying to dig through the conflicting information to find the truth. I have been told that by 5PM today if there is not a refurb unit availble that matches my specs I will be building a new unit which can takes weeks to recieve. On the other hand I have also been told that they are currently working on building a unit using refurb parts which can take some time as well. I understand that it is a process, but I would like to know what I am being replaced with and when I can expect to recieve the replacement. Right now it seems like Alienware is doing as other have said in this thread, and that is trying to buy their time. I would imagine there is some limit for how long the replacement process can take so that the customer is not dealing with a broken\defective unit for an unreasonable amount of time. For me I need my laptop for work/school/ and yes games. I am just past the midway point of my masters and have a crap ton of research to do for an absurd amount of papers I have to write. While I can get access to a lot of the information I need at work, I do most of my writing at night when I am home. So without my laptop I am getting behind on my school work.

 

If I had a lot riding on the situation, I'd be inclined to go buy a disposable Walmart laptop to get things done while waiting for this to get sorted, but I know that is not a good answer for most folks. $299 for a pile of junk hp crap-o-matic lappy with a pathetic AMD C series CPU might as well be $2,999 for many college students.

Once you talk to the right person, the stress level should improve. It usually takes a couple of weeks for the system exchange to go full circle, depending on the circumstances.

 

The price or money is not so much the issue with that answer, the issue is how is it to type on. There are very few cheap laptops that have decent enough keyboards to type on. The last thing i need when writing my papers is a ton of mistyped words from a keyboard missing keystrokes. Or a keyboard that is very uncomfortable to type on. At any rate I will post back once I have more information on what is going on. I have sent an email to the rep who emailed me saying my replacement was being built, asking what parts they were trying to throw in it. We shall see what he says and what happens.

 

Yeah, most of the chicklet style keyboards on modern laptops are just pure garbage. A cheap USB keyboard will fix that when accuracy and comfort is most important, but it would be better if they would stop putting lousy keyboards on laptops, including the inexpensive models.

 

Very true Mr. Fox very true. At any rate, I have sent an email to the Alienware rep asking which parts he was looking to put into my custom built refurbished R2 unit ( sounds weird huh) and have yet to hear anything back. The more I think about this, how would they build a unit using all refurbishued parts? Does it get genreated a new Service tag and express service code like a new unit? Or does it keep an exisiting one from a previous owner and they just transfer the ownership? Also how about the windows install, does it still go through the factory install process and does the laptop get built by somneone at the depot or do they send the parts off to be assembled by someone else. The whole thing has me very curious as I understand why they would want to do that, but from a logistics stand point it seems like a nightmare.

 

Well if they fail to get the R2 pieced together in time..

R3 for you my lucky friend

 

What do you mean, aren't the R3 supposed to be out in a few months? I am really hoping to have this resolved well before then.

 

I seriously doubt this is going to take a long time to resolve... certainly not long enough that you would get a newer model than what is current today. You're near the end of the tunnel right now. Unless something has changed recently, they are not going to cobble something together from a wide assortment of refurbished parts. They don't have the resources or process in place for that. They probably will not even change out the CPU or video card. I have seen a couple of times that they sent a refurb and then dispatched a tech with other parts to install them at your residence, but that is unusual as well. I believe the few times I saw that was done it was only because a mistake was made where the wrong configuration was sent on the replacement. I had that happen with WiFi card, RAM and optical drive, and they just sent me the correct parts and I sent back what came in the unit. It was not a big deal.

If a correctly configured system is not available they will typically replace it with a new system because that is more expedient and probably less costly in the long run. Either way, you will get a new service tag and any warranty remaining on the old system will be transferred to the replacement. FYI - you do not gain warranty time on a system exchange, so whatever time was left on the old one is how much time you will have on the exchange unit. So, you will definitely want to extend the warranty if you are nearing the expiration date on the original system.

No need to worry about the OS... it will be imaged the same a new system.

 

Mr. Fox what do you think they are going to try and send out? I have a 2630qm 6970 xfire 16gb of ram. Also this what the email said from the rep "
We will build the system matching the performance of the configuration of the alienware that you currently have with refurbished parts, as soon as I have the specs of the replacement unit I will let you know."

 

It will most likely amd unless you have a solid arguement that it should be nvidia

As for extending warranty wait until your original warranty is transferred to the new system then worry about it

It's going to cost a bit though

I think I paid about 600 for less than 3 years of extension

It was either that or pay like 400 for one year so it was no brainier for me

 

That is what I was thinking. Since there is only one choice for amd on the r2 I don't see why they are giving me such a hard time. Anyways I think I'm going to take your advice on the warranty as well it seems more safe now if I can just get this done

EDIT:

Ok now I am a little ticked to say the least. I was told this morning that they would have the system spec'd by the end of business and to call back after 5 central time if I had not heard anything. So I call back and get a new rep, who absolutely refuses to assist me in anyway other than lying to me about what my rep who is supposed to be handling this is doing. I was told two different reason in a matter of a minute why he could not talk to me. In addition to that that rep told me that I am to wait for an email from the rep assigned to my case and it could take a week or more until they find a refurbished system. What irritates me more than anything about that call is when I asked to talk to a supervisor because I was told certain things and promised certain that were not being fulfilled I was again refused access to a supervisor and again was assured they are going to spec a refurb'd machine and when they are able to do so my unit will be replaced. I did not want to get nasty with the rep so I thanked him for his time and hung up.

So my question now is how much time is enough time, and when do I start to push harder? I was told that if they were not able to spec refurb'd machine by 5PM today that they would start a new build, but now am being told they are going to take as much time as they need to spec a new machine.