I purchased an Acer Travelmate 8100 my freshman year of college, and with it the 3 year extended warranty. The first two years I had it, it worked decently, but there were issues with the screen sometimes taking on a green hue. I tried twice to get it repaired, but nothing permanently fixed it. Given that the problem did not occur frequently I gave up trying to get it fixed, since doing so involved almost a month without a computer (a week each way for shipping and a little over a week in the shop). Also, on two separate occasions, I was told I did not have a warranty, and had to fax in all of the applicable paperwork. The first time this happened, I chalked it up to some sort of error in activating my warranty, but when my trying to set up my next repair three months later, I was told the exact same thing and there was mysteriously no record of anyone in the company having spoken to me ever.

Going into its third year, however, the laptop started to fail miserably. Innumerable problems started occurring, including my hard drive dying, my wireless card refusing to work, and of course my screen was getting worse. After sending it in two or three more times, and getting every part I know of in it replaced (according to the memos sent back by Acer), halfway through the school year my screen died completely and would only project an image for about five minutes a day if I was lucky. I once again started the process of calling Acer, setting up a repair, shipping it, waiting for it to be repaired, waiting for it to ship back.

The day my computer arrived, I opened it, turned it on, and before it could even finish booting, the screen died. Nothing I could do would bring the image back, and so I, fairly irritated at this point, have to call Acer again to set up a new repair. Despite the fact that I had just gotten the laptop back from its "repair," and five minutes later it was unusable again, they refused to help me out with faster shipping, or faster repair, or anything other than a standard repair. After this repair, I get the laptop back, again the screen does not work, again I have to send it back in. This time I was told it would be sent to a "senior repair technician" and red flagged to move through the system faster.

Two weeks later, I get my laptop back from its second repair, and discover upon taking it out of the box that it will not even turn on, making it less functional than when I sent it to them. I call Acer back and at this point tell them that since they are clearly unable to repair my laptop, I would like a refund for it. I was not hopeful that they would agree, and they did not, but I had to try. They try to tell me that I need to send it in for repair again, and when I refuse and tell them that some other action needs to be taken, they start bouncing me between various levels of CSRs to try to get someone who would deal with me. The first higher level person I was assigned to gave me a direct number to reach him at in order to avoid the wait when calling them (which has never been under half an hour in the 15+ times I have called).

The next day, I discover this is not a valid number when I try to call. I work my way through the calling system again and am finally assigned to a helpful person. They tell me they will try to find a replacement computer, but since they no longer manufacture the model I have, it might take some time. A week later, I call back and am told that they still have no computer for me. When I ask how long this could take, I was told there was no way to tell. I suggest that they send me a different model computer, but they refuse saying any other model would be a downgrade from my laptop and they cannot do that (despite my willingness to).

At this point it had been more than three months since I had a working laptop, and being an engineering student this was wreaking havoc on my life, so I finally simply had to buy a new laptop. The last time I talked to an Acer representative was about five months ago, and they said they would call me when they have a replacement computer. I had given up on this, but recently started reading the Consumerist and figured if there was any last hope of resolving this situation, it was with you.

If it makes you feel any better, Alex, you're not the first person to run into trouble getting Acer to repair their laptop. It took this guy 7 months.

We're not sure what the terms of your warranty are, but you have several options. First, you can launch an EECB (Executive Email Carpet Bomb) on Acer and see if that shakes a laptop loose. If you bought this laptop with a credit card, contact your credit card company and tell them that Acer is not abiding by the terms of your warranty and has refused to replace or (competently) repair your computer. If your credit card has decent warranty protection they should be able to help you.

As a last resort, consider filing a small claims lawsuit against Acer. It sounds hard and scary, but it really isn't. Here's some information about what small claims court is and how it can help you. For more information about launching an EECB, click here.

The station's IT guy changed one settling in the BIOS.

"This is definitely something you can find out while you're doing your diagnostics or troubleshooting," 10TV's IT guy, Josh Waibel said.

Here's a summary of the results:

Circuit City FireDog
Consultation: $64.04
Diagnosis: "The hard drive is working correctly. Your operating system is fried on it, though," said the technician. "The operating system is essentially dead."
Additional Cost: $130 to reinstall the operating system.
Total Estimated Cost to Repair: $194.04

Best Buy Geek Squad:
Consultation: $62.98
Diagnosis: "It just clicked and that's usually an indicator that the hard drive's bad." "It's clicking - making some weird sounds - which is not a good thing."
Additional Cost: $80 hard drive, $39 hard drive installation, $129 operating system installation
Total Estimated Cost to Repair: $310.98

Micro Center:
Consultation: $74.67
Diagnosis: Repaired

Computer Technicians Put To Test [10TV](Thanks, M!)
Video [10TV]

The following letter from reader James shows that they're still out there selling "recovery discs."

Don't buy 'em! They are a ripoff.

Hi Folks, Just thought I'd give you some info on my recent experience at Best Buy. The wiring in my apartment is horrible, so as I was running the vacuum in the room I use as an office, I blew a fuse and had to go downstairs and reset the breaker. Everything in the office had obviously gone out, including the computer, which was on at the time of the power outage. But, when I tried to turn the computer on, it wouldn't start up. Monitor worked, printer worked, everything but the tower. After doing some research on my laptop, I figured it was a bad power supply and I took the tower over to Best Buy to have the Geek Squad take a look at it and replace the power supply. The guys took a quick look and agreed that it was probably the power supply, which was going to cost me around $150, which seemed reasonable to me. But before I left they wanted to test it on a power supply they had, just to make sure it wasn't something more serious. Well, they said that after hooking up a "store" power supply, the tower powered up, but nothing would appear on their monitors. Their assumption was that it was the motherboard, and it would be cheaper to just go ahead and buy a new tower. I said I needed to think it over and left with my tower. The next day I came in and purchased a new tower for $524.99, a "data transfer" to get all my info from the old tower to the new tower for $99, and a restoration CD for $29. I had purchased a floor model, so they said they needed some time to replace the software on the new tower, so I told them I'd be in later with the old tower to let them transfer the data. But something didn't seem right. So I took the old tower to a local computer repair shop. They hooked up a new power supply and whadaya know, it worked. They installed a new power supply for about $100 and sent me home with my tower working again. So, I went back to Best Buy since I didn't need this new tower anymore. I had nothing physical to bring back since the tower I was purchasing was still at the store, but I brought my receipt and told them I didn't need any of this since my computer was working. But, while they gave me back the money on the tower and the data transfer (after double checking to make sure the work hadn't been done, even though I never gave them the old tower), they wouldn't give me the $29 for the restoration CD because they had "already done the service." I didn't need it anymore since I wasn't buying that computer, and in my opinion it was their problem since they basically told me the computer was beyond repair (which it wasn't). So, after some calls to Best Buy's customer service it looks like they're going to refund the money (although 2 weeks later when I got the bill it's still on there). But just wanted to let people know that maybe they shouldn't put too much faith in Geek Squad, and don't put it past Best Buy to charge you $29 for a "service" you don't need.

Oh, and sorry for the long e-mail.

-James

(Photo:epicharmus)

Sep 6 2007

I bought a Dell laptop in 2004, and in 2006 was told my warranty was going to expire. I responded to the notice, which said that for $248 my new warranty expiration date would be June of 2008. I paid the amount and have the credit card statement proving this.

Unfortunately, no one at Dell seems aware of this agreement, and it seems Dell has arbitrarily decided that my warranty ended in June of 2007. This comes into play now because it appears I need a new motherboard (again). I placed calls to the warranty department, then to customer service. I faxed them copies of the relevant documents (the notice, the credit card statement) and have been dealing with this for a month, but to no avail.

I was told my case was forwarded to the appropriate department. That was over a week ago, and I've yet to hear anything back. I sent another complaint e-mail to the manager I was dealing with, but have yet to hear back.

For Dell's part, the 2008 may have been a typo, but that doesn't change the fact that 2008 is the agreement.

So I'm thinking small claims court, but first, I was wondering if you might be able to help me find out executive customer services numbers that might be more expedient, or if you happen to know of a better route I might take.

Saundra Sorenson

Sep 18

Hi Ben,

just wanted to give you an update on my Dell issue. I finally heard from Dell's customer service department today, telling me that they've decided my warranty is expired. (I've attached the invoice I mentioned, which promised me that if I paid $229, the warranty would expire in 2008).

When I brought up this invoice (which I had faxed to Dell twice) nobody had a good answer for me, and said simply that my case had been "escalated" and that my warranty was expired. I called the corporate line to get some contact info for the legal department and dropped the term "small claims court' several times. They gave me an address and fax number for the offices in Round Rock, Texas, but I think I may do as it was recommended on your site— deliver small claims papers to the Dell kiosk at my local mall.

Any advice on further steps to take before I go the small claims route? Any advice about taking a corporation to small claims?

Thanks,
Saundra

Did you fax them the relevant documents? I would do that before taking the small claims route. This post, ""How To Take Your Case To Small Claims Court," is also a good primer for how to go about going to small claims court:

Ben,

I did — and then I e-mailed them to another representative. And then I asked the representative who told me my warranty had expired if they had received these documents, and the rep said yes. So I told them to make a note in my case file that I was unhappy with this decision, was not satisfied, and would be pursuing a legal route (in small claims).

Any advice about small claims or another next step?

Thanks!
Saundra

Dell can avoid losing their ass in small clams court by emailing tips@consumerist.com and we will be happy to put someone with a working brain cell in touch with Saundra.

(Photo: fallenposters)

Really though, people should use a suite of firewall, anti-viral, and anti-spyware solutions. We recently added NOD32 to our arsenal, supplanting ZoneAlarm's anti-viral.

Mainly, though, we talk about computer repair, and how often times big box retailers outsource to local tech places, so why not cut out the middleman? — BEN POPKEN

The Geek Squad Inside Scoop [Mario's Digital Cafe]