NEVER BUY A DELL COMPUTER!!!

I've had Dell all my life and never had a problem with them

I'm ordering a new case and everything, only thing from dell anymore is HD, and RAM

The thing about dell's service is you need to go through their emails first, get a list of things to diagnose for yourself....then when they call and start through that same list you can say "yep, tried that and it didn't work."

Or, simply ask to speak to a manager. They're usually very open to self-diagnosis (because after all, it's your computer!). When my HD went bad 2 years ago, I had some technician on the phone clearly not understanding the problem, having me type things in off his list. So I was disconnected, called back and immideatly was switched to a manager, and within less than a minute of describing the problem to him he simply sent me a new harddrive over night! Same thing happened when my CD drive went, and something else which I can't remember.

I think though the key phrase is when describing the problem is "temperamental" or "intermittent" (even if it's slightly more permanent). Usually that's indicative of something that needs to be replaced due to wear and tear, and they'll replace it for you on the spot.

We are going to get a secondary hard drive and keep in the computer incase something like this happens again, we can use it to start the computer and fix the master.

If you don't want to deal with this kind of thing then buy your parts from newegg.com and build your own. The support is similar.

I don't find Dell to be terrible when compared to the rest of the pack, though Gateway has made a commitment to provide service without outsourcing outside of the US, so I applaud that (no, I dont' have a Gateway, I just applaud them lol).

Microsoft is one of the biggest offenders in terms of outsourcing techincal support, and that is just sad, as they should be setting the example.

As to the OP issue, hey, they did take care of the problem so think yourself lucky mate.

Yeah, I've heard how gateway does their's. 🙂 Most of Panasonnics technicians are also inside the U.S. 🙂

I used Gateways tech support almost ten years ago and it was superb. They knew about computers and 90% were very friendly.
I also went through h*** with them after they outsource to India, rude and worse than amateur tech's.
Now that they have gone back to the US and Canadian tech's they'll keep and pick up new customers.

I've had mixed with MS, mostly better than excellent hardware and rebate service. I've never had to use them for software support.

My next computer will be a homebuilt (newegg and Fry's) and I'll have hardware support from the manufactures (I hope) and tech support from my (cyber) friends on line, some here and some that I've known for years. A few in IT.

RadarMan wrote:

I've had mixed with MS, mostly better than excellent hardware and rebate service.

Same here.

I've never had to use them for software support.

Well, for $35 you get to speak with someone in India who is generally friendly, but not expert by any means. Some techs are difficult to understand because of a thick accent, while others are not so bad. One thing that is consistent in my experience is that they are following a flowchart in their endeavor to solve an issue. Thus, if you've tried following a troubleshooting guide to fix the problem yourself, it will be quite frustrating having to repeat the process when someone you've paid is telling you to do the very thing that hasn't worked.

Remember the good old days when Dell and Gateway computers were owned by those "in the know" and the rest had Packard-Bell, Acer, etc? If you called Dell or Gateway for tech support or sales, the tech was generally a guru who could answer your question before it was out of your mouth.