Dead m1330

Deciding that I needed to do an OS reinstall, and having the week off, I decided today was the day.

I got Vista reinstalled, all the appropriate drivers for my m1330, even SP1. I was then going to reconnect it to my WHS box and do a backup of it so that I always had a copy of a clean install that I could use instead of doing it manually.

Unfortunately that's when things went for a nosedive. For no reason, and without warning, my m1330 completely shuts down and I see that the power LED on the power supply is out. Right away I know that my laptop is toast but I go through the obligatory troubleshooting to make sure. I pull the battery and unplug the power supply from the laptop and wall......plug it back into the wall and the light comes on. Plug it into the laptop and the light goes out.

Knowing already it's the motherboard that's gone, I call up Dell and again go through all the same steps before the schmuck on the other end tells me I have a bad motherboard. Oh.....really?

Thinking that since I have my Dell WPD Certification (through my place of employment) I can just have the parts sent out and replace it myself to prevent any possible damage from a careless tech. Unfortunately I'm told point blank that if I do it myself, I can possibly void the warranty.......hmmm....that certification sure is useful. I guess I should tell my employer that I shouldn't be fixing any of our Dell laptops because I might void those warranties too.

Now I have to wait for them to send some gimp out to put his grubby paws all over my laptop and if I find so much as a stray hair where it shouldn't be, I'll have someone fired!

Has anyone has a GOOD tech come out to do a repair? I'm really not looking forward to it as I know some of the techs who have shown up at my work (which is why I just do all the repairs myself now).

 

I just hope it's the the darn SP1 messing w/ power, ending up killing the unit.

I'm scared to update now.

 

Sorry to hear that Khris.

I've had the same tech guy come to re-seat my keyboard, replace my LCD, and do a motherboard replacement. I luckily have a tech guy who actually knows what he is doing. I'm still very nervous while he is doing his work, but in the 3 visits he has made, he has done a great job. All 3 repairs went off without hitch. The only issue I have had is that after my LCD replacement, the bezel around the edges were not completely sitting right. That required just a few seconds of pushing them in on my part. But regardless, my experience with this tell tech has actually been very positive.

Hopefully you get a tech that is as adept.

 

Nothing to do with SP1. I've been running SP1 for about a month now and never had any issues with it. This is definitely a hardware issue.....hence the MB being replaced.

 

Khris that sounds terrible! I'm A+ certified and i was granted permission to replace my MB, replace a Vid Card etc... But my dad thought that getting a tech to come out would be easier than asking me to do it. (Also he wanted to get as much out of dell in a pseudo-vengeful notion for having his desktop crap out on him) took the guy somewhere around 2 and a half hours just to swap the mobo seal it up and then realize he left the CMOS battery out... I was just watching and keeping quiet. So yea, that being my one experience with a dell tech i don't have the highest opinion of them.

 

Yeah.....doesn't really make sense to me. I even provided them my WPD Tech ID but unfortunately they didn't seem to care.

I just hope I get someone with enough brain cells to know what they're doing. Since Friday is a Holiday, I'm guessing I won't have my laptop working until next week now.

Until then I have to use my Eee PC which is fine......I'd rather use it than have nothing at all, but still a bit of a PITA.

 

Well the tech is just finishing up but he's managed to strip the screw hole for the left side of the display and that means he has to order a whole new base now.

I plan on calling Dell back and offering them one of two choices, they can either send me the base and Ill replace it myself, or they can send me a whole new laptop......I'm not having these idiots work on my laptop again because this is exactly what I knew would happen!!

UGH!

 

It just tells how much they don't care about what they do. It's sad really.

 

Dell could have saved themselves TWO service calls now by just letting me do it myself, and that way I know the utmost care would have been taken too.

I also noticed later that the left side of the touch panel doesn't sit flush anymore, and the lid doesn't close properly.......not happy at all!!!

 

Figured out why my screen doesn't close properly......

 

Jeez, that looks horrible.

 

You may end up with them sending the new mobo with the upgraded processor; I recall this occurring at least once already. As for the side... send them the picture and ask for assistance....and some lovin'.

 

The person I spoke to this time at least had a clue to what's going on. I was previously told that I would void my warranty by replacing the parts myself......which is incorrect. If I request a replacement part and I damage it during the replacement, I'm then responsible to replace that part myself but the warranty is still valid (which makes perfect sense).

Hopefully I should have everything tomorrow although the bottom plastics may be here Wednesday.

As I was describing the issues over the phone, I also noticed a spot on the lid that the tech scratched up. I just replaced the lid myself a couple weeks ago because I lost a letter from the first one. Thankfully, I'm getting a new lid sent out as well.

Ugh......what an ordeal!! Never again will I let a tech touch my laptop. I also suggest to everyone else that if you're capable of replacing a part yourself, don't let a tech do it. If I screw up something on my laptop then I can blame myself.......if someone else screws something up, not only will I blame them, but I will be very angry about it!!