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Dell Computer Corporation Laptops Consumer Reviews

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DELL Repair Depot Ruins Professor's Laptop: Sends It Back Without Repair, Replacement, or Regret
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

ROUND ROCK, CONNECTICUT -- "DELL Repair Depot Ruins Professor's Laptop: Sends It Back Without Repair, Replacement, or Regret"

DELL continues to demonstrate its commitment to avoiding responsibility to repair under warranty. Worse, philosophically it appears to be grounded in a "not our problem" point of view. Recently, DELL Repair Depot took a problematic but functional new Inspiron laptop and then not only refused to repair it, they sent it back completely nonfunctional. Still, in the interest of full disclosure I should mention that the laptop backlit keyboard will glow but the computer will do nothing else. Now it's a thousand dollar doorstop. Every relevant manager at their headquarters in Round Rock, TX knows: The President, The Vice President for Customer Care, select members of the Board of Directors, and a key representative of the Advanced Resolution Team.

Over the last year I have sent them 75 emails. My computer was under warranty when it needed service but DELL refused to honor the warranty. See a detailed discussion of how they Dodge responsibility in earlier reviews that I wrote for all the major consumer outlets.

One thing is certain:

DELL, from bottom to top, simply does not care what the consumer thinks and it would prefer to lose hundreds of dollars, thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands in sales rather than honor its obligations (even if the obligation amounts to a $300 repair).

I would like you to help me make them care. After you read this please send this to your circle of friends and ask that they send it to theirs with a similar request that it be sent . . . and so on. In a very short time we should have hundreds then thousands, then perhaps hundreds of thousands of posts circulating. It will be interesting to watch them try to ignore a social media campaign of that size. In your message please be sure to include all the other computer choices out there Lenovo, Microsoft, Velocity Micro, Acer, Asus, Samsung, Apple and any others you'd like to include.

Thank you for your help, this is truly one of those times that I could not do it without you.

Best,

Dr. Smith

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Don't Buy a Dell
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

AUSTIN, TEXAS -- This is just a fair warning to anyone considering buying a Dell product. Last year I purchased a laptop from Dell and within a few months had problems with it - spontaneously shutting off, not shutting down, but off like a light bulb, with no warning. Dell support, a whole issue in itself, walked me through a seemingly endless diagnostics routine. Everything checked out fine. We ended up just doing a system restore. They theorized that it was because the computer lid was closed prior to the shut down process completing. This was ridiculous, a total BS guess.

Within a week the computer was up to its same old tricks. If I held perfectly still it might stay on but if I placed the laptop on my lap, of all places, it would shut off at the slightest movement. Back on the phone with Dell CS. They didn't keep any notes from my previous call so I had to start all over again with them. Once I refused to do the diagnostics again they conceded to send me a box to ship it back in. 2 weeks later the box returned and within a few weeks it was back to the same old story. I suffered through this for about 6 months because I just can't afford to be without a computer for weeks. But after a while I can't take it anymore and call them again.

Back on the phone with CS and again, no history. Disconnected me a couple times just to make my experience complete. They resolve to send another box for me to ship it back in but I tell them that I am nearing the end of my warranty and am concerned that I will get it back and within days my warranty will expire leaving me no time to evaluate if it is indeed fixed this time. Here is where it gets important to get it in writing from Dell. The CS tech assures me (more than once as I made him repeat it) that if the same problem persists they will fix it free of charge outside of the warranty.

I send it back and, well, you know what happens next. A few weeks after getting it back it does the same thing but now I am outside the warranty period. But that's OK, right? Because the CS tech assured me they would stand by their product.

Today they told me that they cannot offer me a free repair, not that I even believe at this point that they can repair it or ever even made an honest attempt to in the past. What they can do is refer me to the out-of-warranty repair folks who I can pay to once again fail to repair my computer. If you are thinking about buying a Dell, please, keep shopping. They don't care about you. If your computer breaks while under warranty I seriously doubt that they will make any effort to honestly repair it.

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Should IT professionals blindly stick with Dell business laptops and service?
By -

I am a consultant in corporate IT. I prefer to use my own PC on the job, when possible, because I rely on a handful of unusual legacy applications in my work. In July 2011, when a new client indicated that they wanted deliverables in Word 2010 format, I ordered my first Windows7 PC, a "business-only" Latitude E6520 from Dell, with Dell Gold Support, to replace my aging but trusty D830. Because of my lengthy experience with Dell, and in particular with Gold Support, I decided to stick with that brand - even though Dell's model with the required features cost half again as much as similar models from some other makers.

I took care to specify to the salesperson at Dell Small Business that I required a 32-bit operating system because of the legacy applications I run. After a 6-week wait, Dell delivered the PC - unfortunately, with a 64-bit OS. This should have been a minor inconvenience, but Dell managed to turn it into a debacle. I asked Customer Service if they could simply ship me a replacement drive with the correct image - it's a simple matter to swap hard drives. I even offered to pay for the extra drive. No, this was against their policy; I was instructed to ship the PC back and wait another 6 weeks for a replacement - which was out of the question.

Despite escalating the issue to the manager of Customer Service, their best offer (after intense haggling!) was to send me some install disks for the 32-bit system (also against their policy) - and, no driver disk was available. Well, I'd installed dozens of pre-Windows7 OS's on Dells and was always able to download all the necessary drivers from their support site with no problem, so I decided to take them up on the offer.

I purchased a new hard drive identical to the one in the E6520, popped it in and started the setup. But, when I attempted to obtain drivers from the Dell Support site, the drivers it provided for the 32-bit version of my model and service tag were mostly incorrect. Some were for a 64-bit system, while others didn't match the existing hardware devices at all. I blundered through the driver installation as best I could, and then went to a commercial driver site and paid to get more satisfactory drivers. When I tried using the PC at work, a problem appeared that rendered it completely useless; Windows Explorer crashed every 2 minutes.

A Google search showed that this problem was widespread, but nobody had posted a remedy. Dell Gold Support knew nothing about it and could make no sense of the error message I was receiving. I called them repeatedly and spent hours running every possible diagnostic - without success. A high-level tech at Gold Support finally offered to do a fresh remote Windows7 installation, using my disks. The PC was otherwise useless, so I agreed and asked him to let me do the install under his supervision, and then to pull the drivers for me while I watched.

He guessed it would take 1/2 hour for the whole affair... but then he encountered the same driver problems that I had experienced. With his knowledge of the drivers used in similar models, he was eventually able to find serviceable drivers and complete the installation in about 3 hours. The following day I took my PC to the office and promptly discovered that the crashing Windows Explorer problem was STILL THERE.

While experimenting in the office, I discovered that Windows Explorer only crashed when the PC was connected to the Enterprise network. Otherwise, it was rock solid. I finally learned in a tech blog that Microsoft actually had posted a hot fix for this exact problem - **. It worked. Another problem solved.

Next issue: When typing, the insertion point jumped erratically every minute or two. I couldn't type a sentence without having to mouse the cursor back to the correct insertion point. I assumed that this was because I was inadvertently brushing the touch pad during typing. The PC had no touch pad control utility, and not really satisfactory. Utility to disable the touch pad could be found online, so I covered it with a piece of cardboard. This helped somewhat, but the cursor was still not completely stable. A search of the internet found numerous commiserating complaints, but no solutions.

I decided to call Gold Support yet again to see if they knew anything about the cursor issue. This time, the tech guy knew exactly what the problem was... Dell had omitted the touch pad management app and driver from their support site: Dell Touchpad Driver R315893. While we were talking, I searched the site for this driver, and still couldn't find it, so I got the tech support guy to email me a link to it. When I installed it, not only was the problem solved, but I now have the previously missing utility to configure or disable the touch pad.

One final issue - which paled in comparison to the above - was that the audio level on the E6530 was disappointingly subdued. I'm a former orchestral musician, so this really steamed me. My old D830 was great by comparison. Again, searching the Dell support groups showed that dissatisfaction with the E6530's audio was widespread, the IDT sound card's simple on/off toggle offered no solution, and Dell Gold Support claimed to know nothing about it.

Thank heavens, some charitable soul posted the solution; there is ANOTHER audio control simply entitled "Sound", inconspicuous and not mentioned in Dell's literature, that allows you to configure the playback properties of your speakers and headphones. The sound level is still rather weak, but at least I can hear it now. After the PC was finally serviceable - more than 2 months from the time I received it - a Dell Customer Service person started calling and emailing me to try to patch things up and close my service ticket. The lady who called me repeatedly was nice enough, but couldn't begin to understood the technical issues. Sad.

I have 4 questions which I believe are reasonable and salient: Why couldn't Dell have simply swapped the hard drive for me? They surely had one with the correct image on hand. It seems their "policy" was specifically to NOT provide urgently needed service. If I and the Gold Support tech had the same driver issues on two consecutive installs - more than 6 weeks apart - this was clearly a problem that other corporate Dell users were having. Why didn't Dell (or Dell Gold Support) escalate the problem when I first reported it, and correct their site? And why couldn't they provide a driver disk, like most other manufacturers?

BTW, the Customer Support lady who kept calling me after I was up and running adamantly denied that there was ever anything wrong with the driver site, right down to our last conversation, although I'd given her the Gold Support tech's name and location. If the crashing Windows Explorer problem is sufficiently widespread on Dell corporate model laptops to have required a Microsoft hotfix, why didn't Dell even know about it? Finally, what kind of manufacturer would deliver these high-end PCs configured so unsatisfactorily? What were they thinking?

At one point in my career, I oversaw tech support for a chain of PC stores, so I had the requisite technical background to eventually get this PC working. But what are Dell purchasers supposed to do who aren't technical - or can't afford to invest the countless hours I spent? In retrospect, my allegiance to Dell was ill-advised. When I purchase my next PC, I will base my choice on price, repair record and reported customer satisfaction, without regard to brand.

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Dell - Worst Customer Service in My Life
By -

I'm at the end of my rope. Let me give you an excellent example of why so many end-users are fed-up with Dell: 2 years ago, March 21, 2009, I bought an XPS M1330 for my son's high school graduation. From the first, every time he opened the laptop, we would see odd marks on the screen. By May, it was clear that the marks were an imprint of the keyboard, and this had gotten so bad that it was hard for him to decipher what was on the screen. We had purchased a 2 year warranty, so called tech support, and a very nice young man came out and replaced the screen.

Within a few months, the same thing happened again, and this time the tech replaced the bezel and the screen. My son went off to college, and the next year when he came home for the summer, he showed me that the screen was badly marked again. Again, the tech came, replaced the bezel, screen, and I believe the hinge that time as well.

Finally, on 2/14 of this year, when I knew that the warranty was about to run out, I called my son and asked how the screen was. "All marked-up again," he said. So I called tech support and told them it was clearly an unfixable problem and that we needed a replacement laptop, as this one would never work correctly.

After an hour-and-a-half on the phone with tech and customer support, all in India (and let me assure you, language was a problem, attitude was a problem, lack of knowledge was a bad, bad problem), I agreed to try to have it fixed once more, this time replacing screen, bezel, hinge and keyboard. I was told by at least 5 individuals, including the tech who did this last work, that even if the warranty ran out, as long as the ticket was open, Dell would fix the problem for free. So the tech went to my son's dorm and did the work. I called my son yesterday, and he mentioned that the screen was getting marked-up again, after only 6 weeks.

That day, March 29, 2011, I spent 3 hours on the phone, went to 12 different departments, spoke with 17 different customer “support” reps, was told again and again that though they “didn't replace this model” (I was given many different reasons for this, none of which made any sense. I'm sure Dell had already spent more on tech support with this issue than a replacement would have cost), since the ticket was still open, they would replace everything again. This, of course, was not an adequate response, as it had already been well proven that this would not fix the problem.

Today, I was the unlucky recipient of a call from **, a member of the Executive Customer Support Team, a unpleasant and arrogant man, who told me that, not only wouldn't they replace the computer, they wouldn't even repair it again since it was now 8 days out of warranty, despite the ticket still being open. Did the many Dell reps who'd told me an open ticket would assure the problem would be fixed, lie? **, not at all a sunny man, would have me believe so, and told me that the problems with the screen were nothing but normal wear-and-tear, not a design problem or anything that deserved Dell's attention.

By the way, I was told by 2 techs that this has been a common problem across the model. Obviously, this model should have been recalled, but I guess if Dell won't pay Americans (10 percent unemployment in the US, and they sent thousands of jobs overseas) to work for them, they'll be too cheap to properly support their products. He told me that Dell would do nothing to fix the problem. Nothing at all. My son now has an expensive laptop that will be good for nothing but a door stop within 6 months, and Dell has refused to support this product.

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Impossible to get an American to speak to for technical support
StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarEmpty StarBy -
Rating: 1/51

HOUSTON, TEXAS -- I have called number after number from the web for Dell and I always get someone in Manila. I did not know when I purchased a Dell product that it was not American. When I have a problem I don't want to compound the problem by meeting head-on with someone that barely speaks English and then I have to struggle to make myself understood.

I think before a product in the United States of America a person should be told that the product is not serviced by an English speaking and understanding and thinking American, bred and born. I will never in this life purchase another DELL PRODUCT. Where is your American loyalty? Americans need jobs but you take American dollars and pay wages to foreigners and this is not okay. Companies like yours should not be allowed to do business in the United States.

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Worst Service Ever
By -

I called Dell to report an issue with my laptop screen. I explained to the representative that the screen was cracked and he informed me that it was under warranty and would cost $40.00 to have a tech come to my house to repair it. So I agreed and paid the $40.00. Well once the tech got here he said that he had to call Dell because the screen was cracked which I explained that prior to Dell dispatching a technician. So I would never buy anything else with Dell's name attached to it because the extended warranty that you purchase is no good and a ripoff.

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Lousy Lap Top - Worthless Warranty
By -

Bought this laptop last year as a graduation present for my daughter. It's never worked right from the get go. My daughter and I have spent many hours on the phone with Dell trying to fix it and it still does not work right. I have a 4 year warranty and I just spent $240 for a virus protection which they don't cover in the standard service plan. Dell is unwilling to send a service tech to fix my problems. Despite the multiple issues we have had with this laptop. So if you're sending your kid away to school in Chicago and think you you're going to get good service from Dell while you're in St. Louis, don't believe it. They are making a lousy product. They have lousy service. Don't buy Dell.

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Computer is great, everything else, not so much
By -

In 2007, my husband custom ordered an XPS420 desktop for me for Christmas. It was on the expensive side but one plus was the 1 yr no interest. A couple months go by and we finally get a bill with the amount being almost double what he was told his bill would be. He called up about it and found out he was being charged interest. He questioned it and was told that since he didn't pay his first bill he was being charged the interest. His bill was only going to be interest free as long as he paid on time every time. How can you pay a bill if one never comes?

They refused any explanation on why we never got a bill before that one and now because of this, a $1400 computer has turned into $2800. After talking to others we have found this is a very common problem with Dell. They will make sure they get their money plus more. When I get my laptop, I am making darn sure it isn't a Dell. Probably going with Apple since their customer service rated highest in all computer companies. I'll pay the extra money for much much better service.

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Cannot Recommend Dell Products to Anyone.
By -

Service? What is that? Dell obviously does not have the word in their vocabulary! I have talked with customer service, technical support, and what was supposed to be a manager. After exactly three weeks and eight plus hours on the phone no solution is in sight. (The hours were from MY phone.) They have NOT returned phone calls as promised and you get to talk with someone in India or Salvador who is supposed to be able to help you. YA RIGHT! What a joke. It would be nice to talk with someone who can solve your problem. I went so far, after three weeks, to take my computer to a local shop. They tell me it is locked up and there is no way to get into it.

When I talk to Dell technical support they proceed to tell me to do the same steps over and over and over again. I am so upset! On top of everything I have a service contract with them. WHAT FOR? I pay my bills on line, therefore, no longer get paper bills. HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO PAY MY BILLS?? I am writing this from my work computer, which I am not to use for personal matters. (I received permission to write this.) I do not believe that Dell is even interested in correcting the problem. I will not buy another Dell product nor can I recommend their products to anyone else due to no service when needed.

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Dell Computer Support Deserves an F
By -

Less than a year ago, I bought a new Dell Studio Laptop, but it has been the worst computer that I ever bought. I have already had to replace the hard drive and the DVD drive, and the "warranty" evidently requires you to replace some of the parts yourself. I have had nothing but terrible customer service when trying to get my issues resolved, which are still not resolved after 2 months because Dell has come back to me now telling me that they want the bad hard drive back even though it still has my data on it.

I was told to take it somewhere to have it erased, which of course will cost me $60.00 that I don't have. Customer service told me that was my problem not theirs and refused to let me speak to a supervisor despite my calling back and talking to a second person. I am so disappointed with Dell's service, but clearly they don't care about their customers. I will never buy another Dell product, and I recommend that everyone else stay very FAR AWAY from Dell too!!!

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Dell Computer Corporation Laptops Rating:
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1.0 out of 5, based on 5 ratings and
13 reviews & complaints.
Contact Information:
Dell Computer Corporation
1 Dell Way
Round Rock, TX 78682-0001
800-289-3355 (ph)
512-728-4238 (fax)
www.dell.com
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