Dell Laptop Fiasco

A week or so ago I was perusing the refurb section at Dell.com when I
came across a Latitude D800 advertised with a gig of memory, 60 gig
7200 rpm drive and a Quadro FX Go 700.

It was listed for $1,689 and that day Dell was offering a $200 off
coupon. I've been looking for a laptop to replace my ancient HP
pavilion, and while not a M70, this seemed like a good deal for my
casual SolidWorking activities.

I place the order. The thing shows up and no Quaddro. It has an
Nvidia GeForceFX GO 5650 (which is the core for the Quaddro).

Calling Dell (3+ hours, 11+ people spoken with) results in being told,
send it back and we will give you a a refund. We will not supply what
we accepted an order for! Also I lose the $200 discount. No offer of
a future discount, nothing. All I get is we can't do anything about
it.

I'm really hacked because it's not a bad machine. I've been reading
about the soft-Quaddro hack, and this seems plausible, but I paid for a
Quaddro, I shouldn't have to do this.

Whats the opinion out there, keep it or return it?

Thanks,

Chris

 

Find where Dell's main office is & file a BBB complaint
there <G>.

Meanwhile, don't return it or pay for it. Their error to fix
at their cost.

 

Chris,

I don't think Dell puts the Quadro in anything "but" the M70-60-50

Regards

Mark

 

My son recently ran into something similar with TigerDirect, but it
wasn't for a laptop. The whole deal was like bait and switch. He ended
up paying ten dollars more to get something that would run; this was
the pragmatic solution.

Hopefully you kept copies and notes of everything.

 

They did for a brief time put the FX GO700 in the D800. I did some
research and have seen a couple of people (gamers) who wanted to
"upgrade" them to a ATI radeon!

THX

 

I've got copious notes. Doing some research indicates Dell's consumer
care is woefully inadequate. I've sent multiple e-mails to the two
"managers" I got to speak with and have gotten no response.

I filled a complaint with the BBB in Texas, but I don't think that will
make a difference. All Dell has to do is say that they are willing to
refund my money and the compalint is marked as resolved. The BBB is a
joke.

I packaged it up and it's going back.

CD

 

I got action at AOL ..... briefly.

 

I would want to go with the Dell M70 anyway or a used M60.

I have used an M60 for the last year, and can say I love it, and figure
I am due to trade up to a M70 (or M80/next gen. if it comes out) this
year. Might even sell my M60 to make it less costly.

No matter what, be sure to get the extra for a 3 year "Complete Care"
warranty. A single glitch will pay you back the $300 you fork out for
extra coverage, and they have always done it in less than 24 hrs. I
was impressed.

Bo

 

The softquadro hack seems a bit tempermental with the Dell laptops - I
have a Latitude C840 with the Geforce 440go (basically a M50 witohut the
quadro card) and tried soft quadro'ing it (with a lot of help from
people on this site). The problem with the 440go card seemed to be the
number of windows opened and closed - basically I'd have to restart SW
every 3/4 hour or so on a medium complexity assembly, otherwise the
video refresh would go really slow and it would eventually crash, up
until then it worked fine. Soft quadro'ing it seemed to solve that
problem, but it would randomly freeze and crash without warning, with no
indication of what the problem was. Note that this was all about 18
months ago, with SW2004, but might be of use - the Dell video drivers
seem slightly different to the standard Nvidia drivers (I tried all sorts!)
Sorry to hear about the crap responce from DEll, but I think you did the
right thing - adding any ingredient that causes Solidworks to crash more
frequently will only result in stress!
Cheers
Deri

 

Thanks for the confirmation. I'll keep my eye out to see if I can
find a reasonably priced M60/70.


===========================================================================
Chris

 

Somehow I am not surprised. Although I have a Dell, and am happy with
it, the process of purchasing it was like playing a shell game. Each
offer they sent (dealing with their small business sales group) had a
different configuration that what I asked for. Each time I would call
or email, we would review each item, agree on it, and then they would
send me a new offer - each time something else would change. They
claimed this was because their order system did not allow them to
update the original offers, only create new ones... so basically they
they were sloppy. My opinion is that they were doing anything possible
to sneak and swap something out for each item they agreed to give me.
It really was an annoying process which went through about 9 offers
until I told them I was not giving them the order – at which point they
sent me the correct offer. I was not impressed.

 

What will you do if, when you receive the laptop it is different from
the order?

 

I have also contacted people @ Dell in the past regarding buying a
hi-end laptop (Inspiron was the last one via phone). What became very
apparent is that I was dealing with a salesman (located in god knows
where) who really knew less than I did.

Since then, I just order with their website ordering system, and
everything just hummms right along and I never had a problem. But I
was never trying to tweedle the price down. I was just trying to get a
terrific laptop quick.

Bo

 

The problem is "Customer Care" is now located in Bangladore, India. I
tried calling the Dell local number in Round Rock and I still got
transferred to India.

If you don't know a specific name in Round Rock, it's off to India you
go to "solve" your problem.

 

I normally do that, but I was told I might get better pricing if I
called - which I thought seemed strange - normally I would expect the
best price offer on the web (and I am not a large corporate customer).
Anyway, I probably saved about 600 USD on my Precision workstation and
got a better spec'd machine in the end. I was really shocked by the
price difference. OK, it was December and they may have been trying to
meet quota or something. Either way, I do not like that kind of price
flexibility - makes me nervous that they are trying to scam you any way
they can. That was why each time the right hand gave me the item I
wanted, the left hand was behind the back taking another item away or
downgrading it. Nasty little process.

Daniel

 

That is probably why specialty PC makers can make a good living.
Sager, Alienware, & Boxx seem to make hi-end laptops that are well
regarded.

Given that I spend more on SolidWorks "maintenance" fees on average
each year than I do on computer to run SolidWorks, I think it is time
for me to start negotiating with my VAR for an upgrade only once every
2 years.

I really do not know whether I will ever load up SWks 2005 for full
time use, so I paid near $2000 US in December 2004 for something that
is virtually vaporware for me. Now that p......s me off. I could have
taken a nice vacation on $2000, or bought a stand-alone add-on for
SolidWorks.

Bo

 

funny, I just read an article the other day on exactly that comparison:
http://www.cgnetworks.com/story_custom.php?story_id=2932&page=

Really? I have very good luck with it. But I am waiting to see if 2006
will be stable and improved.... you know the story.

Yes, I feel this pain too. In fact, I have two licences and wanted to
kill one, but was blocked because it was past the cancellation period -
hence i could of had 4000 for a very nice vacation (or new flatscreen!)
Doh!

Daniel