Well, I just ordered a Dell Studio 16 XPS laptop, and it arrived yesterday (yay!). After turning it on, setting it up, and making my recovery discs I noticed that the F3 key on the keyboard was on a slight angle from the rest of the keys. From gently putting pressure on one side of it, the whole key slid off, and you can see from the inside of the key that the plastic that is used to help clip it to the board is totally mangled beyond repair.

I'm gonna try and take it to a Dell repair depot because I want the issue solved ASAP. I wanna actually use this computer and make it mine before school starts. I'm assuming there won't be any cost to me since it came out of the box this way and I emailed customer support within a day of the delivery.

Anyone else had similar experiences with Dell? Or any other company? My sister's laptop had a key fall off two years ago (it was an HP), but that was 'cause a textbook fell on it. My girlfriend had the same issue within a week of owning a Gateway.

Share your bad computer experiences, so I don't feel quite as shitty. :p

I've had nothing but good experiences with Dell support.

One time my laptop was in my backpack and the strap of the bag came undone and the laptop hit the floor pretty hard. Later I turned on the laptop to see if anything was wrong and the disk drive was shot. So I called up Dell and they sent me a box to ship it out to the repair center. I recieved it back 4 days later!

The second incident is actually kinda funny. I was on a packed HSR bus and was just about to get off but didn't quite make it cause my backpack got caught in the doors lol. Turned on the laptop later and the screen was kinda messed up. So I called up Dell and they said they would fix it. I also asked if they could replace the keyboard and touchpad cause the button was kind of loose and they said they would do that too. This was all within the 1-year warranty so it was all free of charge.

I suggest before you send it in to just go over the entire laptop looking for any other problems with it (scratches, dead pixels etc...) and let them know so they can fix it when they receive it.

I've never been a dell fan.

But, I would call them right away to get this resolved.

Originally Posted by blackdragon

I've never been a dell fan.

But, I would call them right away to get this resolved.

Calling would probably be your fastest way to take care of this.

Originally Posted by Theashe

Share your bad computer experiences, so I don't feel quite as shitty. :p

My laptop had some messed up problem with it's USB ports where the whole computer would lock up anytime I plugged in a USB anything (regardless of operating system).

One day in January, I was in a big rush to put an assignment on a USB key. I plugged it in, and the thing locked up. I got so mad that I punched the lower right hand side of the computer, which completely killed the integrated video processor.

$200 later I got a new motherboard and keyboard off of ebay from Hong Kong (the keyboard had an epic dent and the third part ones just looked generally better), a few hours of soldering and trying to figure out why I had extra screws left over - and my laptop worked again (no longer with the USB lockup problem ).

Moral of the story: Don't punch things when you get mad. Yell at them instead.

Oh, and it was an HP computer with no warranty left :p.

I've dealt with them quite often on these types of things. They're usually pretty good but I'm fighting with them over the LCD screen on my 6 month old laptop that just suddently cracked for no reason. Apparently, if anything goes wrong within the first 30 days of purchase, regardless of warranty, they will repair it as a goodwill gesture. Call Dell Support at 1-800-847-4096 and explain the problem. Have your express service code ready - it is located on the bottom of the computer. They will give you Purolator's number and Dell's billing code so you can call and have the computer sent to Flextronics in Newmarket who do Dell's repairs. They will usually have it back to you in less than a week. If for some reason they tell you it isn't covered, just keep asking to speak to that person's supervisor and eventually they will usually have you send it in for inspection. It seems the squeaky wheel really does get the grease. Good luck.

I spilled water on my first laptop after 6 months of usage ... but I won't tell what I did afterwards :p

The right arrow key on my HP laptop came off randomly one day, and all the impossibly-small plastic bracket pieces holding it to the computer's casing were propelled into every conceivable space in my room. One hour and 3236 f-bombs later, I managed to get the key back on - I subsequently concluded that Hell must consist of an eternity of fixing miscellaneous plastic parts that are too small to be held in your fingers.

I spilled water on my laptop.
Fried the mobo.
400$ repair bill.
:(
but got my warranty extended a year
at least HP customer service was quick and efficient. but costly :(

dell has gone cheap on parts same as toshiba/hp. if u can dont get a dell , go for an asus