MALIBAL Reviews

PM Malibal for additional discounts. The default device should be ok, but I would recommend the Intel 6300 because its 3 antennas offer superb reception and range. The thermal paste upgrade typically lowers the CPU and GPU temp by 4-6C. Using a cooling pad would further lower the temp (how much lower depends on what cooling pad your using) Whether or not that is important is your call. The dead pixel policy is basically a 30 day insurance. If you find any dead pixels on your screen, they will replace it for you (and cover shipping both ways).

 

Other than a miscommunication that we had about overclocking and the p170hm3 I have nothing but good things to say about Malibal. One of the only times I used their ticketing system I received a response within a couple of hours even though I opened the ticket outside of their normal hours. Even after I decided to cancel my order they remained courteous throughout the email exchanges we had discussing the cancellation. If asked of my opinion, I would not hesitate in giving them a recommendation.

 

I sent Malibal several questions via PM and received a response within twenty minutes on a Sunday around midnight.

I can't think of a single company with that type of customer support/service. I'll be purchasing a laptop through them shortly and will update this post with further information.

 

Thanks, please PM us anytime and we'll be glad to help out.

 

I just put my order in this weekend and am patiently waiting the shipping and arrival. Good or bad I plan on posting my experience. So far it has been positive. I was originally waiting for the better graphics to be made available after hearing about the price a few other members got, but once I saw the PSU upgrade will cost 45 instead of 20 and the upgrades went up in price I figured I don't play games enough to warrant me spending the extra money. If I wind up needing it down the road I can always try to pick one up for cheaper than the upgrade would have cost me .

 

It is right 1AM PST right now and they have been dealing with me via PM for about an hour. I am really impressed with their service. Had they not shown such service, I would have probably pulled the trigger on an ASUS from newegg, as it was cheaper, but they were quick, nice and catered to my needs. Really great customer service.

 

Thanks Vedya, we're here to help out at all hours - so please let us know if you ever need anything else!

 

same here--they emailed me like an hour ago and we're in the same time zone. Some great service and why I picked a reseller over a big corp like Dell or Asus.

 

What is the standard reply time for Malibal in private messages? I need to purchase my laptop by Friday to ensure I get it on time, but wanted to get the promotional free shipping before ordering.

 

go to their website and use their live chat.

 

Hi Syia, you can't PM until you have at least 5 posts - but if you click the Live Chat link in my sig - we can help you out with the discounts. Thanks.

 

Hello there, i'm thinking of buying the Lotus p151hm1, and i've been wondering if you ship to Romania too. On the website this option isn't available but i'll ask for being sure.

 

Hi, yes we ship to Romania - please check the country list on our site again.

 

Rather disappointed. I ordered 8/4/2011, and apparently they tell me "today" the V.7 glossy screen is backordered 10 days! I appreciate them for complying with me when I wanted a 204 heatsink, and then changed to a GTX 580m...and this does take a delay in my order....but the screen I had ordered and never changed for about a month already! Sigh...I don't know what to do.

 

Yes, my bad. 765$ hm... i guess i'll ask a friend to bring it.

 

Hi Terminus, we have the 95% Matte in stock and can upgrade you to that one for no extra charge.

 

Wait... The V7 is backordered? Will this affect me too?

 

Hi Jerry, if you have the 95% Glossy Screen, yes it will affect you. However, we can give you a FREE Upgrade to the 95% Matte Screen if you don't want to wait. Please contact us in PM or through the site if you want to switch. Thanks.

 

Malibal's doing a great job in a unfortunate situation. Whichever screen (95% v.7 glossy or V.4 matte) one can get me my notebook first-- I'll take it!

 

Okay, will do!

 

Why can't I send you a pm, MALIBAL?

 

Hi, you need at least 5 forum posts before you can PM.

 

Ok, sorry for being offtopic.

 

I'm feeling no love for Malibal at the moment. Placed an order with them for a P150HM on 8/26/11 and the only thing I've gotten from them is an email informing that my order had been processed. Really need a method of keeping customers in the loop as to what stage their respective order is currently at. I even paid extra for 2-3 build time, waste of money if it's taking the same amount of time as the regular 5-7 day build time. They haven't earned any props in my eyes...

 

Geedub, the 2-3 day service is subject to availability, did you contact us before placing the order to make sure all parts were in stock?

 

I do kind of agree that more updates on order status would be nice. Staring down the unchanging "order has been processed" message for days on end starts to make me kind of neurotic.

But I'm not in such dire need of my laptop that I feel justified bugging them about it nonstop, I figure it'll be done when it's done. And they've been pretty helpful with the few questions I've had so far.

 

I placed my order about 3 hrs before Malibal was open since I'm in a different timezone. No one from Malibal followed up and shot me an email to let me know that the video card was not in stock. I would have gladly changed my order to the GTX 580M to avoid further delays. I dealt with a competitor on 2 prior occasions and came away satisfied with the experience. I chose to go with Malibal because their price came out cheaper for the configuration I was interested in. If they were unable to fulfill my order in a timely manner, I should have been given the choice to change or cancel my order. That's a sign of being good at what you do, you don't give your customers the opportunity to hem and haw while withholding payment for services rendered.

 

So far so good! It took Malibal only 3 Business days to build my laptop and get it shipped out. What seemed strange is that it shipped from NY and I thought they came from Las Vegas. Since I am in NH this is welcome but makes a bit nervous. Is there a Malibal facility in NY?

 

I have nothing but praise for Malibal, I received my order of P150HM from MALIBAL a few days ago and I had a problem with it, pm Malibal and get a response within 10 minutes and provided real time tech support for 2 hours and that was after 11pm! we found out there's a memory problem and I received another pm from Malibal 7:30 am next day about my rma and they are building me a new one. I was so impressive with Malibal and decided to buy a p151hm for my wife as well. thanks again Malibal!

 

Somebody knows if Malibal is gonna provide any kind of discount for labor day?

Thanks ^^

 

you should pm them, they do price match

 

Received my P150HM yesterday. I have to admit, I am very well pleased in the way it was packaged and its performance so far. This thing must be hiding a V8 under the hood. I can also say nothing but great things when it comes to hearing a reply to a PM on here or emails to customer service. I can't really say anything was poor about my overall experience. I know alot of the delay came from my initial graphics card choice and the relative supply and release schedule. It also appeared there was a problem with the heat of the cards as well. ( I sometimes joked to myself, "hey, it's vegas, they probably bet their supply of 6990's at Caesar's Palace and lost it") Either way, they came up with the 6990 to 580 upgrade to those of us who had been waiting. My wait ended up letting me go through another pay period and I was actually able to get the computer I really initially wanted. Thanks to all of you who have gone through this as well, and posted any updates regarding your order, it's supplied a wealth of information. If your waiting on a laptop now, no worries, I'm sure it won't be long. Malibal, thanks for your awesome product, the midnight replies to emails, and your support of this forum. We will definitely be doing more business in the future.

 

PS, you forgot the hood ornament.

 

same .

 

Alright, so this review is going to be a novel. Very long.

On July 28th, 2011 I placed an order with Malibal. I chose Malibal for two main reasons.

First, their price was the lowest. I don't like to get on a phone and haggle. Save the haggling and negotiating for used car dealers. Just give me your best price on your website and let's get this transaction done. Well, Malibal did just that - the prices on their site were the lowest amongst the resellers I was choosing between (Xoti &, LPC-Digital).

Second, Malibal is extremely accessible. Between their quick responses to PM's on NBR, their quick responses through email, and their website chat availability, it seemed as if whenever I wanted to talk to them, someone was available for me.My original order was for a P150HM with 95% Matte screen, 2630QM, 8GB, 6990, standard hard drive and hard drive caddy, and 6230 wireless.

Malibal gave me the free shipping option as well as the $35 RAM discount.

The 6990M was originally priced as a $245.00 upgrade. The same day I ordered (July 28th) I asked Malibal what would happen if the 6990 were to lower in price and they assured me that if the price lowered, I would get the lower price and if the price raised, I would still get the lowest price. Sounded good to me!

Lo and behold, Malibal started offering the 6990 as a $175 upgrade (this only lasted for a few days). True to their word, Malibal modified my order and reduced the price by $70.00.

So August 2nd rolls around. I came from a Gateway P7805-U (17" gaming laptop) and I began to second guess my choice of a P150HM. Portability is a non-issue for me as the laptop always stays in the house. After some deliberation I decided to see if I can switch to the P170HM as I like the bigger screen and having 2 drive bays plus an optical drive (i burn lots of CDs/DVDs). So I contacted Malibal and changed my configuration to: P170HM, 2630QM, 90% glossy, 8GB, 6990M, 750GB drive, Bluray drive, and 6230 wifi.

Malibal assured me they could and would change my order if I wanted. Before I committed I told them NOT to change as I would stick with the P150HM.

The next day (August 3rd) I decided I wanted the P170HM after all, called up Malibal, spoke to Matt, and he changed my order without a problem. I made some adjustments to the configuration, downgrading to the stock Hannstar screen and upgrading to an Intel 510 SSD. Malibal sent me the new price and I noticed a small oversight on their part - they had overlooked a supplementary payment for $25 I had made when I made a small change to my configuration. They quickly realized the error and adjusted the price minus that payment. I paid Malibal the difference and all was ready. Cool! Now all I had to do was to wait for Malibal's estimate that 6990 laptops would be shipping by August 15th.

August 15th (Monday) rolls around and I receive an email from Malibal stating that the 6990's are delated and that I would receive a 2nd day shipping upgrade for the inconvenience. I emailed them to thank them for notifying me of the delay and inquired if I upgraded my shipping to overnight, would I have the laptop by Friday August 19th which was my birthday. Malibal tells me they will try but can't promise anything and would upgrade my shipping to Next Day for free! Wow! I was stoked! Because they were so generous in giving me an upgrade I didn't even ask for, I requested that they add-in the IC Diamond 7 paste. I figured it was probably their largest percentage profit item and it was the least I could do for all the nice things they were doing for me.

Unfortunately, the laptop didn't ship by my birthday so I had to wait the weekend. I finally received my tracking number on Monday night the 22nd. Tuesday came and I received the laptop on Tuesday, August 23rd @ 10:30am.

Everything looked and felt great! While at work I installed Windows 7 Ultimate and my drivers and some other minor apps. Took the laptop home after work feeling nice. After dinner and spending time with my family, I started the laptop up that night prepared to do some gaming. I loaded up Metro 2033 and noticed the fans were going absolutely nuts. Hrmmm. I quit the game and installed Furmark and CPUID. Played Metro 2033 for about 10 minutes and the fans were going nuts again. Quit game and looked at CPUID which showed a high mark of 105 degreed Celsuis!! Whoah now. So I quit Metro and ran Furmark which hit 106 degrees. Loaded up GPU-Z and set logging enabled for a third opinion and after running Furmark, GPU-3 was reporting as hitting 112 degrees! Yeowch! So I made some screenshots and sent them off to Malibal.

Malibal immediately responded and first off expressed remorse and apologized for what they said was "the biggest failure in their 7 years of selling laptops". They were very ashamed and assured me that they would refund every penny of mine including shipping both ways. They stated they knew that wasn't enough, and that the error was unforgivable, but they weren't sure what they could do. Before I returned the laptop though, they sent me two different BIOS to try flashing and some other troubleshooting over the next two days. Unfortuantely nothing was bringing the temps down so I received an RMA shipping label from Matt and I sent the laptop back on the 25th.

I still wanted the laptop so we exchanged some emails and PMs and Malibal said they would build me a new laptop and send it out. Over the next few days (25th, 26th, 27th), I began reading more and more posts on NBR related to 6990 temps and just about then, the confusion with the heatsinks occurred. My faith in this 6990 was completely destroyed between my experience and the increasing number of posts talking about 6990 temp issues.

I got on the phone with Matt and we discussed some options. Due to my inconvenience of waiting a month for a laptop only to receive a lemon, we worked out a deal where I would switch to a 580M instead. Malibal was also having a promotion that weekend for free 3D screen upgrades and 1600mhz RAM. So Matt threw those in for me at no cost.

On the morning of August 30th, Malibal emailed me letting me know that my laptop was going to ship that day. Woohoo!

Argh. But then later that day, Malibal told me they had accidentally forgotten to put in the 1600mhz RAM upgrade and would have to unbox the laptop, put in the new RAM, and retest the PC. So shipping wouldn't happen until the next day (Wednesday August 31). No worries. I had waited long enough at that point, what was another day? Especially when the system would be getting tested for a second time. I told Malibal no worries and waited...

So yesterday my laptop arrived! I didn't have a chance to open it up all day long until around 8:30 last night. I tossed in my SSD (I had kept the original SSD which already had Windows and everything on it), uninstalled the ATI drivers, driver sweeper, and then installed the new NVIDIA drivers. Before I even opened it, Malibal sent me an email to check for a STYLENOTE screen on bootup. I reported there was no such screen so they had me flash the BIOS with a new version and after that, everything was fine.

I am happy to say that this P170HM3 is even better than the first P170HM I received, temperature issues aside. The 3D 120hz 2ms 72% matte screen is absolutely gorgeous. I played Metro 2033 last night for 3 hours followed by a 2 hour stint of L4D2 Versus and the GPU temperature never exceeded 75 degrees Celsius. This laptop is absolutely purring.

Conclusion:

I waited over a month for a laptop. The bulk of that time was due to waiting for a piece of hardware that wasn't yet released. That is no ones' fault but my own. If I wanted a laptop quicker, I should have ordered something that was in stock. Another thing to consider is that it took exactly 1 week from when I reported the temperature problems with the 6990 for Malibal to help troubleshoot the problem, when the problem didn't resolve send me an RMA number, build a new laptop and then have it arrive in my hands. I'm extremely satisfied with that turnaround time.

Malibal was nothing but gracious, generous, and informative throughout this whole experience, even during my flip-flopping on configuration 3 times the first 3-5 days after placing the order. Sure I would have liked a working laptop the first time but stuff happens. No one is perfect and the important point to remember is that Malibal did not intend to ship me a malfunctioning laptop. I think people really need to keep that in mind when something goes wrong with their reseller. These folks live and die on customer satisfaction. If they ship you something that doesn't work properly, please remember that they DIDN'T MEAN TO DO THAT. It costs them more in time, money, and inevitably giving you freebies to correct that error. So if you are shipped a malfunctioning laptop, show your reseller of choice some patience and politeness. Give them the benefit of the doubt and let them make good on their error. I assure you they will if they have any care for the reputation of their company.

As far as I know, I only dealt with Matt. There could have been someone else behind the Malibal PM's and Chat nickname, but as far as I know it was always Matt. He was always very patient, calm, understanding, and very very sympathetic to my situation. He and Malibal as a whole went above and beyond to make good on an unfortunate mistake with the only goal being to make sure I was happy. And I can wholeheartedly say that I am.

Thanks Matt and Malibal for a great experience and being dedicted to making this customer happy throughout the entire process. I would not hesitate to recommend your company to anyone I know.

I love my new Satori P170HM3!

PS: Malibal - I'm still realy curious why the first laptop was hitting 105 degrees! Would love to know.

 

Been in contact with Malibal over the past couple weeks via PM, phone, chat and support ticket as I've been trying to figure out a way to combine the 6990m and the NP8130's plastic chassis, as I had heard had been done for another NBR member. There's a bit of a time crunch on this, as my current laptop is dying, and I wanted to take advantage of the Labor Day sale if possible.

Opened a sales ticket to ask what the cost would be to upgrade the GPU in the NP8130 to the 6990m. Got the automated email saying the ticket had been created, but checked it again today to find that it had been closed without any response whatsoever.

The first couple PMs were pretty good. They said that they had made a mistake in doing it for the NBR member, and that they lost money on it, but would still honor it since they had said they would do it. I got a suggestion from MALIBAL that I could potentially configure a NP8150 and then put those specs in the NP8130, but at NP8150 prices.

According to their website, the price for the 6990m upgrade is $245. On the NP8130 configuration page, the cost to upgrade from the 120W adapter to the 180W adapter is $45. Thus, the cost to upgrade the NP8130 should be $290.

A call to Matt at Malibal led to a discussion about how in-demand the 6990m+NP8130 configuration was. He mentioned how they lost money fulfilling the one 6990m+NP8130 order where the user just paid $265 for the upgraded GPU+PSU. I suggested that I could pay the full $95 they charge for an additional 180W PSU. He said he wasn't sure about their supplies and current stock, and that he'd need to check. He estimated the checks would take a couple hours. I didn't hear anything for a couple days.

I filled out another support ticket on their site listing two quotes, one for a P151HM1, and another for a P150HM.

Quote 3629
Lotus P151HM1 - $1,294.00

Display: 15.6" 1920 x 1080 FHD LED AUO B156HW01 V.7 95% NTSC Glossy Display (LCD-FHD-15-U)
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-2630QM, 6MB L3 Cache, 2.0-2.9GHz (CPU-i7-2630QM)
Memory: (8GB) 8192MB, PC3-10660/1333MHz DDR3 - 4 SO-DIMM RAM-10660-DDR3-8GB-2)
Graphics Card: NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 560M 1.5GB GDDR5 (GPU-560M-GTX)
Hard Drive: 750GB 7200rpm 2.5" SATA 300 (HDD-750-7200)
Optical Drive Bay: Hard Drive Caddy For Optical Bay (N-CAD-ODD)
Wireless: Intel® 6230 Advanced-N 802.11A/B/G/N LAN and Bluetooth Card (WE-802.11-Blue-A)
Cooling: IC Diamond 7 Thermal Compound, CPU & GPU (T-ICDIA-1)
AC Adapter: Full Range AC-in 100~240V, 50~60Hz, 180W AC Adapter, DC output 19V, 9.47A (AC-180W)

Quote 3588
Lotus P150HM - $1,624.00

Display: 15.6" 1920 x 1080 FHD LED Backlit Glossy Display (LCD-FHD-15)
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-2630QM, 6MB L3 Cache, 2.0-2.9GHz (CPU-i7-2630QM)
Memory: (8GB) 8192MB, PC3-10660/1333MHz DDR3 - 4 SO-DIMM (RAM-10660-DDR3-8GB-2)
Graphics Card: AMD® Radeon HD 6990M 2GB GDDR5 (GPU-6990M-HD)
Hard Drive: 750GB 7200rpm 2.5" SATA 300 (HDD-750-7200)
Optical Drive Bay: Hard Drive Caddy For Optical Bay (N-CAD-ODD)
Wireless: Intel® 6230 Advanced-N 802.11A/B/G/N LAN and Bluetooth Card (WE-802.11-Blue-A)
Cooling: Stock OEM Thermal Compound, CPU & GPU (T-OEMCO-1)

I showed that to upgrade the GPU in the P151HM1 would be $245, bringing the total to $1539, so in essence, I was paying $85 more for a lousier screen, lousier thermal paste, and a rubberized finish. I said that if the 6990m upgrade to my first configuration wasn't possible for whatever reason, that I would like the second configuration. I asked if something could be worked out. All I got in response was "You need to find a different store to purchase from".

Now, I certainly can't argue with Malibal's prices, which are definitely lower than anything else I've seen on the web. Matt also seemed nice on the phone. However, from what I've read about how resellers/retailers are really flexible and willing to work with you, I'm very disappointed with my experience with them.

 

They are very flexible people, I know this first hand. But if they're losing money, then they're losing money, so flexibility is out of the question

My suggestion would be to take advantage of the 100$ off $1500 Labor Day sale that Sager resellers are having (Xotic, PNB). Ask to see if you can get it matched by Malibal.

 

I kind of know what he means. I got great service from the live chat system but when I did the confirmation call the dude didn't seem to eager to speak with me. He seemed a bit dull from the beginning and when I told him what kind of card I have he responded with something along the lines of "Oh great another credit union" in a semi-nasty tone. Again I received awesome customer service with live chat system, very quick and painless. I'm not complaining about the phone call but I see where you are coming from.

But honestly, Malibal is awesome. I'm kind of afraid my order might not ship this weekend(Today is my 5th day) because of the labor day weekend and I might not get it until late next week . But Malibal has the lowest prices, awesome customization ability, an aesthetically pleasing website and customization menu. I was a little blue balled when I used Google Chrome because something went weird and it told me I could get my laptop for 1300 but that was a mistake and It ended up being 1450 with the 100 dollar discount. I honestly can't wait until I get my laptop and I'll be sure to make a nice review for you guys. I'm not active enough to receive any NBR discounts which would've been great. I probably wouldve upgraded to the 6990m haha.

 

Hopefully my order ships today--I'm constantly checking my email awaiting that shipping ticket!

 

Well, according to this post, he got the 6990m upgrade for less than the actual upgrade price (I seem to recall reading $175 somewhere, though I could be mistaken), plus $20 for the upgraded PSU. In that case, they're definitely losing money.

I'm not asking them to do anything that would lose them any money, as near as I can tell. The upgrade to the 180W adapter is offered for $45 on the NP8130 configuration page. The upgrade to the 6990m is offered for $245 on the NP8150 page. This should be very simple, without much flexibility required at all. I'm even willing to pay the full $95 they charge for an extra 180W adapter instead of the $45 for the upgrade. I just don't see how the claim that they'd be losing money holds any water.

I also sent a PM or two that were just ignored entirely.

 

me to, when did you order?

 

We should have some really good news shortly!

 

I just placed an order for the Lotus P151HM1 after speaking with a representative for the second time on the live chat. They gave me a couple discounts that were helpful in shaving off a little bit of the price. I found out that the 95% NTSC glossy screens were currently out of stock, so I let the representative know that I was going to look around elsewhere because I wasn't sure if I wanted a different display or not. However, I ended up going for it and went back to the live chat a little while later.

Both of the reps I talked to (I'm pretty sure they were different people) were very friendly, patient while I thought about what I wanted, and quite helpful. The first rep was still polite when I decided to look at other places before I committed to ordering there. Also, when the second rep saw my email address, it turned out that he grew up where I live, and went to the college I'm currently attending, which was just a nifty little coincidence. They were both pretty quick to answer the questions I had.

Right now I'm glad I decided to go with Malibal. Now I'll just have to wait until I get my laptop, hopefully without any incident. Assuming nothing goes wrong, I would be happy to recommend them to anyone.

 

my order has shipped today--so has yours!

yay MALIBAL! I should be getting it by tomorrow!!

 

Just found out that my computer probably won't ship until like tuesday even though I order last sunday. So I won't get it for another week. labor day.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/reseller-feedback-forum/608589-guy-deserves-review-malibal.html This is my link for my review. Malibal is awesome

 

I am planning to buy one one too,except that I have some different set of questions...

 

I think your best bet is to PM Malibal with your questions. That way they can also tell you about their discounts as well.

 

doing that,thanks.

 

Good News!