MALIBAL Reviews

I recently bought a P150HM from MALIBAL and I must say that I am very impressed with their professionalism, and I highly recommend them to anyone who is interested in buying a high end performance laptop. Their prices are the lowest on the web and their customer support is excellent, and I was able to get several discounts. I did find one glitch on their website and they were so appreciative for my honesty that they gave me another discount. Five out of five stars for this brand, I'm really happy with my new machine.

 

Thanks!

 

In my search for a new laptop I decided to give Malibal a call. I must say I agree with the above post as the rep I spoke with was very professional and had plenty of great knowledge about the systems Malibal offers. Got a full quote on a new system and will strongly consider going with the Malibal brand.

Only downside for me would be price. When calling other sellers (Dell and Asus specifically), the quoted price over the phone was lower then the website price each time. For Malibal the quoted price is the exact same as their online price for the same spec'd machine. For users wanting some live help choosing parts I would say call them for SURE. But if you already have an idea of what you are after, just use the site as there was no price difference.

 

dont forget to ask about discounts for nbr members.

 

Hope it's ok to piggyback on this thread.
I'm in the UK and looking for a Clevo reseller and heard many good things about Malibal, including the above. Does anyone have any international ordering experience with them?
The warranty options includes 'Serviced in the EU', does anyone know where in the EU?
Is it possible to get a UK keyboard and power adaptor?

Sorry didn't mean for that to turn into so many questions....

Thanks!

 

Oh I did. Ive been a member since 2004 but while I read a lot I don't post often. So their rep held that against me and I get no discount. A bit lame imo. Still, they do come highly recommended so I'm still looking at em.

My total came in around $1860.....if he'd have come down some..$1700 or $1750...Id have bought

 

MulliganUK, yes - we can get you a UK keyboard and power cord. And we can service your laptop in a few locations in the EU, including the U.K. and Germany.

KyleGates, Free Shipping is the current NBR discount... PM us if you would like the code.

 

Related question - I know officially if I import a PC I need to pay import VAT but does anyone know how likely it is that customs would notice it's a laptop and charge accordingly?

 

If MALIBAL has service in the EU, can't they also sell you a laptop then which doesn't have to pay +-20% taxes because its a product out of the EU?

 

Possibly, although for money I could save compared to UK prices I could also get on a plane to Vegas and pick it up myself! Cant see the wife letting me use that as an excuse mind

 

Well if you do go, maybe you can bring a whole bunch with you for all the EU members. The only other option we have is kobalt, and they don't seem to be getting any good recommendations lately...

 

Kobalt currently have 3k of my caash and have done since July 4th. No updates unless I chase and no laptop yet. So yeah, not an option I'd reccomend. Wish i lived in America !

 

Although I don't think I'll be able to purchase from Malibal, I do want to say that the questions I emailed the support team were responded to within minutes and were friendly and helpful. Thanks!

If only I lived in US...

 

I 2nd purchasing from Malibal. Extremely responsive and friendly service. Their warranty plans changed from the time I preordered my P150 (due to 6990) and they upgrading my plan from 3 to 4 years for free, and swapped the servicing location from the US to Canada.

Glad to have bought from them! Hope my laptop gets to me soon now

 

I ordered a 8130 from Malibal last Friday (Aug 5). The system gave me an expected ship date of the 12th, and Malibal claims an average time to ship from order of 2-3 days, though this may be out of date ( http://www.malibal.com/content/about_us.shtml). I called in on Friday and was told to expect a ship date of the 15th or 16th. Curiously, someone who ordered an 8130 from XoticPC the same day had his order shipped on the 9th (my only config changes were to the screen and wireless card).

The customer service has been decent, but nothing spectacular. When ordering, I was offered a $25 gift certificate to offset a $35 RAM promotion that had expired a few days which was quite nice of Malibal. However, the email and phone conversations with the company have left me a bit bothered. There hasn't been anything as terrible as my experiences with Dell, but I've gotten the feeling that their representatives want to end the conversation as quickly as possible. Nothing has been bad enough to make me cancel, but I haven't felt the level of service others have mentioned on these forums.

 

That page is a little outdated - the order confirmation email that we send out to customers states that orders ship in 5-7 business days on average. We've also had customers who have received their laptops in as little as 3 days: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sager-clevo/594987-yes-got-my-malibal-laptop-3-days-d.html

If you placed your order on the 5th, then right now it's at 5 business days since the order was placed... so you are still right at the estimated dates we gave on our site and in the order confirmation email.

Also, I checked your email history and it looks like we replied to one in 2 minutes, one in 5 minutes and the other one in 64 minutes. And it seems as though we sufficiently answered your questions.

I suppose everyone has their own standards for what is considered good customer service, so everyone can decide based on the info above. Thanks.

 

You'll notice that I never complained about the return time on the email responses. And phone conversations aren't recordable, are they? I called to change my shipping address and overheard the employee say something like, "I can't handle this anymore". I hope it was not directed at me; I find that rude when I am speaking to a person. I have also gotten an exasperated tone when I speaking to your people, though obviously I can provide no proof.

I also take issue with your dismissive tone and assumption that I am unknowledgeable about the standards of good customer service. When making a large purchase, I expect more than just having my questions answered. As I stated, it was quite nice of you to offer the $25 discount after the promotion had expired. However, the way you speak to your customers could be improved.

As I need the laptop soon, I will not cancel the order. There also have not been enough negative experiences to justify that. As you stated, you have certainly been responsive to my questions. I hope my experiences are not representative of the entire company and that I caught people on an off-day, in case an issue pops up after receipt of the laptop.

Thanks.

 

I'm excited that my 8130 shipped today but the scheduled delivery date is on the 23rd coming from NY to CA. (Probably related to the screen?) Good thing I'll be on vacation but Malibal has been great so far, though I haven't had to call.

 

Ya I just hope the matte screens are OK, and don't have the red after image problems like other people are having. This is really my only concern, Also to add to the thread MALIBAL has been more than great so far on helping me with everything.

 

I haven't made a purchase from Malibal yet, but I have sent emails to them and a few of the other Clevo dealers/resellers and I recieved the fastest responses to my questions from Malibal. All of them were close though, responding during the same day, except for Origin PC which took a few days to respond to my questions. Based on my experiences so far, everything I have heard about them on here, and the reviews at Reseller Ratings I will be going with Malibal when I order my next laptop. Hoping to hold out for the P270wm, but my willpower is fading every day.

 

Wow there's no pleasing some people. Maybe you should try Kobalt for customer service, or in fact HP if you want to go bigger. Yes you pay lots of money, yes customer is king...but whatever, get over yourself.

 

I ordered from MALIBAL because they were quite flexible and answered all my questions. They also seem to offer the best warranty options for Canadians, since they service the Laptop in country.

I wanted a matte screen, 95% gamut not necessary, and an ATI 6990m. Normally for the 6990m I'd have to go with a P150, which is $150 more, and add a 95% matte screen for $95. They agreed to put the AMD 6990m in a P151HM1 and change the PSU for the $20 difference, so I save $230 and I get exactly what I want. They also let me have the 6990m at a previously announced price, before they raised the upgrade price to match other retailers.

Now I impatiently wait for my laptop to ship. Today is 7 business days after my order was processed, and normally it would ship today. But I understand that my non-standard configuration could incur delays, and the 6990m has not started shipping for all retailers.

 

If I had known that, I could have gotten the exact same specs of my PH150HM on the P151HM1 for $100 cheaper.

 

Well, yes. I knew the difference between the 2 was only the finish and PSU, and I was trying to pay as little as possible for a laptop with the AMD 6990m. I guess Sager doesn't want everyone to buy the lower priced P151 with better GPUs. So I asked MALIBAL by PM.

I could have saved even more had I ordered 1 day earlier, while the GPU upgrade was at a lower price. Oh well, it's just $20.

What grates is that I paid cash, with the cash rebate, but with my banks wire transfer fee and their bad exchange rate, I paid in CAD exactly the pre-rebate USD price. I should have paid by credit card... I may have paid slightly less with a better exchange rate.

 

How long has it taken you guys to get your order to you? My order was processed and payment completed on the 8th, and still no word on shipping.

 

Hi Ghold, I believe you opened a ticket on our site today and we replied about 5 hours ago, letting you know the reason for the delay on your order (which is the 95% Glossy Display) and the estimated ship date. Please let us know if you need anything else.

 

I wanted to thank the reviews posted here, as they have helped me decide on Malibal for my purchase, which I'll make before the end of the month (have to clear budget with wife )

 

hi, I talked today with a agent in your Live Chat and I asked to him, if I realy can combine the P151HM1 with a HD6990m?, and he tell me (no with the same words) "yes, on this week, we update our website, and we add that option. You have to check on the week". That is true? more or less, when do you think that option will be available? will be apply the same prices that of "Hedgeson"?

sorry for my english.

thanks.

 

Considering buy from Malibal, just wondering is Malibal assemble the parts and install it after getting it from Clevo?

 

And What other discount do Malibal offer? I mean apart from the cash discount, I saw the post earlier, do Malibal offer free shipping for the x7200?

 

Are people getting discounts on their machines for posting reviews on NBR? Just curious.

 

People are getting discounts if they are NBR members. You don't need to post a review to get them! But I don't think resellers are slipping additional discounts to people if they review, if that was what you meant.

 

it all depends on your negotiation skills

 

From MALIBAL's website, in DEALS:

You write a review on reseller ratings, you get a $25 gift card on your next purchase. Since I don't buy a laptop every year, I wonder how long that $25 is good for.

 

I received my discount simply after PM'ing the reseller and talking about the purchase I was considering.

I don't think Malibal is trying to game the system by giving anyone extra discounts in exchange for positive reviews...

 

Hi, just to clarify - we don't ask for positive reviews, customers are free to express their honest opinion about their experience with our company.

 

Got a super fast response to my questions on here via PM!! I'll definitely be leaving a review when I purchase my laptop.

From what some people have said on here you can call up/pm and get custom configurations that aren't available online correct? I probably won't need to do this, but it is definitely nice if it is that customization is an option.

 

kind of OOC but do malibal ship to hong kong (hk)?

 

Yes, we ship to Hong Kong!

 

Regarding shipping:

I was starting to get impatient when my order was processed on 8/16 and I still hadn't gotten a shipment notification as of last night (7th business day, but still, we wantses our preciousss) but I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and let it go another day or two before I asked.

Lo and behold I got an email this morning saying my order has shipped - but that's not the best part.

I entered the tracking number and apparently my order actually shipped two days ago (the 23rd) and despite having ordered the free ground UPS option, apparently my shipping was upgraded to UPS 2-day air - so my laptop comes today!

So I thought I wasn't going to get the package until the 29th or 30th, and instead I'll have it tonight, just in time for the weekend!

Needless to say I am very impressed with Malibal's customer service here. I have a feeling someone over there felt bad that it took so long to process (even though it was still within their anticipated timeframe) so they bumped up my shipping for me.

YMMV, but for me, Malibal was definitely a great decision.

 

Hi, I'm glad we could help out!

 

I'm looking to buy my first gaming laptop. Really happy that Malibal has so many positive reviews. In terms of computers this would be by far my most expansive purchase so it goes a long way to ease my paranoid mind .
Living on the other side of the world(belgium) also doesn't help. Will look around some more and decide soon.

Cheers

 

Hi, please let us know if you have any questions!

 

About the dead-pixel thing...Is there any way we can assure that my screen will have NO dead pixel? It's traveling a long distance and shipping it back because of some dead pixels wont be that cool

 

I would like to ask the same question!
(I'm in Europe and although there are similar companies in Europe, maybe I'll choose Malibal to buy a new laptop )

 

Malibal does have a dead pixel guarantee for $75 if you request it. Some don't like it, but personally, I do. Anything can happen in shipping so that extra guarantee covering shipping both ways in case of dead pixels is worth it imo.

 

$75 bucks are not worth it IMHO...First, I can't pay them, and secondly, it would be bad to receive a screen with some dead pixels since I will have to ship it back for RMA...when we can assure the customer there will be no dead pixel in the first place

Anyways, I'm eagerly expecting my new 8130!

 

I don't think it's that they can assure that you receive your laptop with zero dead pixels. If they could, I'm sure they would do so to maintain a great positive image to all customers they ship to. I think that the $75 you spend on the guarantee is actually some kind of warranty on the purchase itself and is more or less like a small insurance policy. Having been in the car business for many years, we used to offer our customers a paint protection product. In some ways, alot of customers thought it meant we actually applied a special coating to the paint in order for it to resist flaking or fading, but in all honesty it was just a warranty purchase that covered the paint for a year from the date of purchase. So in other words, this may be similar, and offer both the reseller and the customer a way to RMA screens otherwise that would not be covered under the standard warranty of the laptop. Personally, I didn't go with the Zero Pixel guarantee, as I think such warranties are more profitable on the reseller side as opposed to the customer. On a screen with such high resolution as it is, one or two dead pixels would be hardly noticable, unless you perform a serious in depth inspection of the screen anyway.

I may be wrong in my assumption, so don't take this as an answer to your question, just some speculation on my part.

 

I'm almost on the OCD side of screens lol...cuz I check continually for those pixels. My friend just bought a malibal 8130 recently, and I checked it completely and found 2 stuck pixels and maybe 1 dead...so we ran some software to unstuck them...it worked but I dont want mine to have dead pixels...

 

Hi there. I have been reading notebookreview for a few months in anticipation of purchasing a new laptop. I am pretty set on Malibal over XoticPC, but I wanted to see what discounts are available for me before purchasing. I have a few questions as well. First, I am having a hard time finding information regarding the wireless device. Is the default device sufficient for standard use in hotels, airports, and university campuses? Secondly, how important is the thermal paste upgrade and a cooling pad? I would primarily use the laptop on a solid desk; I do not enjoy using laptops on my lap (irony?). Thirdly, what exactly is the dead pixel policy for Malibal?

Thanks for your time.