Ugh, this stuff reminds of working the service desk at my old job. At least there i can show them how badly they mangle the power cords from improperly storing them.

She should just send it back in for repair, at least then its not a total loss. There's no way they'll replace it, especially if they think She abused the machine.

Although, I think HP's story rings hollow. Guess I'm just more likely to side with the customer.

Sigh. Seems like the dozens of people who have brought their computers in for warranty repair at my store only to deny any wrongdoing and furiously cry for a replacement instead of a repair.

I side with HP on this one. They replaced the adapter for a customer when requested (something the customer "forgot" to mention in the original complaint to the Consumerist) and when HP offered to repair the laptop for overheating issues she decided to go for a new laptop.

If the adapter was twisted (and again I've seen this many times and the customer just doesn't want to acknowlegdge it) then this situation is really not HP's fault.

Kudos to Consumerist for following up!

My Toshiba got insanely hot to the point that I would put icepacks under it. Turns out it was just incredible dusty on the inside. I definitely do not live in a dirty place or a cobweb filled attic or pirate dungeon, so I don't know how it manages to suck in so much dust, but regularly using compressed air has pretty much solved the problem. I still wouldn't recommend resting it on a small infant with sensitive skin, but it doesn't burn to keep it on my lap anymore.

I'm curious what model of laptop Jillian has? My husband and his brother both had HP laptops that they bought a little over a year ago, both used nearly every single day, and both of them would usually get too hot to the touch after a short period of time. My husband ran his on cooling mat day in and day out and it helped, we rarely, if ever, moved it, and then a couple of months out of it's 1 year warranty, the video card overheated enough that it actually caused the plastic to bubble up. My brother-in-law, who has a fairly similar model, had the same thing happen just a couple of days out of warranty - hence, we couldn't get anything done about it. So, we ended up having $4,000 worth of paperweights after all that. Consumerist did have a story June of last year, linking to the Class Action Lawsuit about overheating HP notebooks ([consumerist.com]) but sadly, the website for the class action lawsuit no longer exists, so we weren't able to get in on it, considering this came up before both laptops died.

@calquist:

same here, i run a turion based laptop, small fans, small heat sink clog up with dust real fast. And that is one hot little chip.

to be fair...

they did send her a replacement.
they did offer to look at it and diagnose a problem.

asking for a new laptop is a little ridiculous. that's like saying my car is overheating, can i get a new one? uh, no. but the service center can look at it and fix the defective parts.

Yeah... pics or it didn't happen. If I was in the middle of something like this, I'd be taking pictures of things to document my case.

I'm trying to figure out how the power adapter could have burned her leg, on my laptop, the brick is in the middle of about 8 feet of cord, usually a ways away from me. Was there part of the story I missed?

im with HP on this one. She is clearly trying to milk this for everything she can get, and it is a laptop, it isn't meant to be abused. HP did everything a reasonable company would have/should have done. There is no reason for them to give her a new one or buy back her old one. I would be curious to know how clean/dirty her laptop is and how old it is, because that might give some insight into several of my questions

@alastria: Make sure that there is no dust blocking the vents. I've seen that on many laptops that start overheating. ;)

@lotussix: Exactly. Seems like she wants a new laptop for a minor overheating issue and a frayed adapter.

correction, i now notice that the age of the laptop was 11 months, which is young, but still covered under almost every warranty. It seems stupid that she wouldn't get a warranty repair. Furthermore, I think consumerist should post some documentation of this alledged "welt", not that I am calling her a liar by any means, but I do have my doubts...

You know, given that she kind of forgot to mention she had already received the replacement part, her credibility is kind of shot with me at this point. Is there anything else she forgot to mention in her complaint?

This one lady tried to get a new one through me, saying she took care of it and wanted a new one (it has spy ware on it...) anyway, it had a big fat cigarette burn ABOVE the screen, and crap in the keys.

@Prole: Well consider this:

1) The laptop is within the 1 YR warranty.
2) HP sent her a new adapter. She did not relay this fact in her original email and only changed her story when HP said that she did indeed get a new adapter.
3) I've seen many cases of frayed and bent AC/DC adapter endings where the customer is surprised at the damage when I point it out to them.
4) She does not seem to want to work with HP. They request that she send in her laptop for repair and she fires back that she want a "buyout".

So far it seems like HPs doing everything right and she's just trying to fight for undeserved perks.

@jcostantino:
She said sparks came from where the cord plugs into the laptop and that's what burned her leg.

@visualbowler: Notice that she doesn't want a warranty repair instead she wants a buyout. Seems like shes being difficult with whoevers on the phone.

Oh, please. I kind of sided with the OP at the beginning, but now this seems to have escalated into a "give me free stuff!!11" grab.

They replaced the adapter, and are willing to do a repair on your laptop. Wanting a new laptop out of the deal is completely ridiculous.

@Rollo Tony: I'm an IT guy, and I see the same thing a lot. HP support handles so many thousands of laptops a day, and for every success story, there's always a few like this. Unfortunately, sometimes due to a bad tech (or one having an off day). It's hard to troubleshoot these things remotely, unfortunately.

Although it does seem suspicious that HP contacted her the first day, at least the company offered to make right. A computer shouldn't spark or burn holes unless it's exploding, but even then... you have much bigger problems to worry about.

@jcostantino: I suspect that the power connector that enters the laptop is what sparged and burned her. The output of a power supply laptop is deemed by safety standards to be low voltage and limited energy, i.e. not enough to cause an electric shock, and not enough to cause a fire. You might feel a tingle if you touch the bare wires to your tongue or wet skin, but you won't die! The available energy is not enough to cause a fire, but it is enough to cause low temperature plastic to soften and melt if there was a break in the cable that caused high resistance. It is also possible that you could get some sparking.

With regards to the damage on the power supply, didn't she say that she got it used? While she may not have been using it roughly, the previous owner may have. At this point, without pictures from either party, we can only speculate.

For the overheating, it is possible that there are simply some dust bunnies or animal fur inside and/or the cooling fan may not be working 100%. A quick shot of compressed air and verification that the fan is working properly may resolve this issue. Additonally, you need to verify that if you are ising this onyour lap, that you are not blocking the vent openings which will cause overheating.

@calquist: Yep. Laptops should get regular maintenance with a quick burst of canned air to the fan intakes once every two months or so. At least, that's what I recommend. A dusty environment can kill a laptop dead.

When I was in Kyrgyzstan, I had to dust out my laptop every two weeks due to the sheer amount of crap in the air there. Depending on your environment, you'd be surprised how much gunk can get in there.

@calquist: Just why in the world would anyone non-evil want to put a laptop on a small infant in the first place?

I mean, have you seen those things? The keep on moving and shifting and flipping and regularly squirt out bodily fluids. Do you _really_ want your laptop to go through such abuse?

So she won't use a replacement power cable but wants a replacement laptop? How does she know that the next laptop won't have the same issue as she fears the power cable will have? Seriously?

"were bent and abused "

HAH! Power cords never hold up.

--

I have sent laptops to HP before and they never seem to fix what I originally asked for. I sent it in for a loose power jack once and they returned it with a new processor.

Maybe the rep didn't understand me?

@wcnghj: I send probably a dozen HP laptops off for repair each week (work at busy retail store) and HP repairs the problems (and others it finds) 99% of the time.

I would love to see pics of the cord; the pics in the 'dusty playstation' piece were, uh... you know, helpful in deciding whose side I was on!

In mild defense of HP..."adapter abuse" is the most common of issues. People close doors on the cable, or twist the cable enough that the wire inside stretches and breaks, or frays. I've even had a couple where the plug itself was 'crushed' in a door...looked perfectly fine, but had been internally bent to uselessness.

Still, as someone who services HP and is not an HP employee, DO NOT BUY PAVILION OR PRESARIO. Get the HP Compaq Business line, desktop or notebook. If you get the notebook, be sure to buy the ADP coverage for three years directly from HP, not the Best Buy cheap insurance special.

I really hate these stories where there's not enough evidence to tell who's really at fault. Plenty of consumers will abuse the product and blame the manufacturer. Plenty of manufacturers will blame design flaws and shoddy manufacturing on the consumer. Without any evidence, we can't conclude much of anything.

I will say this however, based on my experience, I'm more inclined to side with the consumer. A guy who works for me has a pavilion that had video issues. It was a known problem with the nVidia graphics chip and there was something about it on HP's website, including a promise by HP to repair affected laptops for free. However, when he called about it and described the problem, they told him the machine was out of warranty and he'd have to pay to get it fixed, and did not acknowledge the free repair program (it covered only this defect on out-of-warranty laptops) until he repeatedly insisted that the promise was on HP's website. Only after being persistent that HP make good on their promise to repair this defect did customer service admit the problem and agree to repair it for free.

@HPCommando:
I bought a Compaq Business line and the hard drive crapped out 3 times before the motherboard crapped out in a year. They replaced it with an HP Pavilion and that has worked fine the last 3 years.

Wait....not to be cynical but...
Let me get this straight...even after she knew the laptop got 'scalding' hot she still CONTINUED to use it?
AND refused to send it in?
AND was SURPRISED when it's accessories burst into flames?!

Sounds like she should be pissed at HERSELF.
(And everyone else should be pissed at Darwin.)

On first instance of failure (heating up excessively), common sense should have had her IMMEDIATELY stop using it until it was fixed or gotten a new laptop.
Anything beyond that is imo her own fault.

IMO, Me thinks she dost protest too much.

@chris_d: But you see that's only one experience. I've handled hundreds of HP repairs (as a retail store technician) and 99% are quick and courtious repairs.

@dave_coder: especially since she continued to use it after complaining to HP that it would get 'scalding hot' after 10 minutes of use.

1. Get new laptop
2. Repair old laptop
3. Sell old laptop with brand new power cord on eBay/Craigslist.

See? Not so hard.

@dave_coder: That's a good point if in fact she did damage the adapter. It's impossible for us to know whether she did or didn't.

I don't think it's beyond the realm of possibility that she was just fed up with working with the CS reps and that's why she doesn't want to pursue this further.

However, it is weird that she didn't just opt for the repair as it's under warranty. How easy is it to damage one of those adapters anyway? I've never had a problem with my laptop adapter.

Just to throw my two cents into the fire regarding HP. As an owner of a DV9000 series laptop, I like many other users have had their share of problems with their products. The over heating of the laptop is due to a couple of design issues HP refuses to acknowledge. Base cause to the over heating is the direction the fan takes in fresh air to cool the heatsinks. It pulls the air from under the unit and forces it through the heatsinks for the CPU and the GPU. After time dust and other crud that looks like belly button lint build up on the inside of the heat sinks restricting air flow and causing extreme heat. This lead to a Graphics Card (GPU) failure in my unit. A year out of warranty HP told me to bad we'll replace it for parts and labor equaling over $500.00 for a laptop I paid $1600 for. To clean these heatsinks, it requires you to fully disassemble your laptop completely to get to them. Because of this mess and HP unwillingness to work with and resolve the issue I refuse to and urge others to refuse to buy any HP products. I found a motherboard on ebay for $200.00 and the old one is going to be gift wrapped and sent to HP's corporate HQ.

@wcnghj: This is why I always stick a piece of paper to the lid of the lappy with details on what's wrong in clear hebrew (that makes more sense when you realize I live in Jerusalem.

@HPCommando: We bought our son an HP laptop and fortunately bought the three year warranty. Three hard drives later (at least HP did the replacement without charge) he finally gave up and bought a Mac.

@ShadowWizard38: In additon, I use a laptop cooler, it keeps my laptop about 10 degrees cooler now that it's been cleaned out. Another helpful tool is a piece of software called Speedfan. It reads the core temperature of the CPU and GPU and reports back how hot they are. There are similar types of software but Speedfan is simple to use.

"The customer is always correct"
Says who, exactly? So many people who have never worked a service job just don't get it. It's so easy to be selfish and think the world is deserved to you, without trying to figure out where blame really rests.
Quit being a b!tch and assume some responsibility.
Omitting truth is lying just as much as giving the wrong information is. She lied about receiving a replacement adapter so I say her story holds no water. I'm with HP on this one.

It does sound, however, like it could be the receptor for the power plug in the laptop - I've seen those come loose from the mobo and have the potential for shorting, even with no apparent damage to the adapter.

If it's overheating, send it in for repair. Let them at least attempt to fix it. If you do not allow them to try and fix it, you have little cause to complain about shoddy repair service.

@Suulia: Seriously overheating is the simplest repair you can do on a laptop.

Hot laptop often means a dead fan, which is a relatively easy repair.

I've seen plenty HP laptops get hot, but only because the user was watching a movie in bed or had it in a place where it couldnt get proper airflow.

@Cocotte: Actually it almost never means a dead fan. Usually it's dust clogging the fan.

@calquist:

My Apple G5 has been overheating since I got it. Apple refused to acknowledge that it was an issue, but the reason they didn't acknowledge it is because I took it into them and the first thing they did was clean the inside thoroughly. I got it back and it worked flawlessly for a few months before starting to lock up again. So, now I have to go into it every month or so and blow it out. Doesn't work very well in the summer when it's really hot though. I think it also just gets worse and worse as it keeps overheating, because now I can rarely get a couple of weeks after blowing without a freeze.

Thanks Apple, it just works! Sometimes, under the right conditions.

This is Jillian Madison. I'm the one who wrote this complaint, and I wanted to respond to some of the comments in this thread.

The laptop is an HP 2845se - purchased at Best Buy (brand new, not refurbished).

1) I do have photos of the welt on my leg, the burn in my pants, and of the frayed adapter. No one at Consumerist or HP asked to see them.

I did receive a replacement power adapter, but with no explanation as to WHY this happened to begin with. Harry simply mailed another power adapter out to me without even seeing the original adapter, or asking to inspect the laptop to see what caused the adapter to catch fire. I didn't feel comfortable using the replacement power adapter, not knowing how/why the original one malfunctioned. If a power adapter catches on fire and burns a customer's leg, why on Earth would you just send them another power adapter without asking to study the laptop or even examine the original adapter first?

2) To Coop, I didn't "refuse to send" anything in. Of course I wanted to send my notebook in for repair, but NO ONE asked me to do so until after Consumerist posted the original story. No one would return my calls or emails after they sent the replacement adapter. They just sent it, and ignored me without following up or requesting to see the notebook.

3) Where does it say anywhere that I used the laptop after receiving a replacement? I turned it on briefly to see if the new adapter worked, and if there was damage to the laptop, and that's it.

4) There is no dust build up in the fan, and I never abused the power adapter or connector at all. The sparking and flaming issue I experienced was unprovoked and happened out of the blue.

5) I'm not some greedy consumer just looking for free stuff. I'm looking for a product that isn't a safety hazard. I'm asking for an EQUIVALENT that will not malfunction or overheat (and no, I wasn't "watching movies in bed" - I only use the laptop for the internet). I don't think that is such a ridiculous request.

HP didn't care about me, or this issue, until Consumerist stepped in. For that, I'm grateful. However, of course HP is going suggest my adapter was bent, because the alternative means they acknowledges selling adapters that randomly burst into flames for unprovoked reasons.

@alastria: In hopes that you read my response, you should call HP and tell them that the product could have possibly burned you, and if they are anything like the company I work for (Apple) they will immediately assist you and help as much as possible. They should stand behind their product no matter the cause or what not if you are possibly injured.

@nagumi: That does make more sense. Here I was about to teach myself Hebrew to assist with my stateside repairs. :)

@Preyfar: "A computer shouldn't spark or burn holes unless it's exploding..."

Now a standard feature!