What Should I Do With My Laptop?

Brownsfan02

Brownsfan02

WWII Buff
Joined
Jan 5, 2009
Messages
242
Location
Cincinnati
I bought this Dell laptop and got it in June, but after about a few weeks of it working great it has started to have problems with viruses and after we got that ironed out the motherboard crashed on me. I sent it back and then got it back and it was just freezing up for no reason. After talking with Dell for an hour on the phone we did a whole system restore to the factory state. After that it was still freezing up and after it freezing up in the middle of a restore we have sent it back again. I am just totally lost on what to do with it, we have a Squaretrade warranty on it so I don't know if I should get my money back or what. What do you guys think, because I can't play any civ without it! :(
 
It's pretty unlikely you have a BIOS virus. When you first powerup, spam the F# key that takes you into setup. See if there's a factory restore setting in there. If that doesn't change anything, I'd replace the laptop.
 
Does it just lock-up with screen frozen? Might be overheating/ram/video card issues. It might be the motherboard, but I'd rule that out first. If it's under warranty, I'd doublecheck that the model isn't uniformly bad, else ask for an exchange of the same model (could just be an unlucky factory defect).


Do you get a Blue Screen of Death? If you do try to figure out what the problem is from there. If the laptop reboots before you see the BSOD to read it, turn off the auto-reboot on lock-up feature and write down the BSOD info.
 
Life's too short for that kind of frustration - get your money back and buy a different laptop.
 
Dude, stay away from Dell.
 
CivGeneral said:
Dude, stay away from Dell.
Click to expand...
Yup, pretty much.

On topic, first do what GoodGame said: see if you aren't having overheating issues or the computer hiting the limits of the hardware you have ( might be by extreme demands or faulty drivers ) and then, if it is not that, do a factory restore to the BIOS ( I also doubt you have a BIOS virus, since there should not be much of people still around that have both the ability and the motivation to do those :D , but you have to go through elimination )

After that ... well, IMHO you should buy from a better manufacturer. Dell is not exactly know by it's good computers or by it's competent and friendly costumer support ...
 
The one thing Dell does have, at least by my experience setting up laptops in my internship, is the least amount of crapware. Is there a manufacturer that doesn't put a ton of junk on their computers? Even Lenovo is now doing this with their Windows 7 "Enhanced Experience" (translation: wasted hard drive space with Office 2010 and Norton trials and who knows what else).
 
eBay it.
 
r_rolo1 said:
After that ... well, IMHO you should buy from a better manufacturer. Dell is not exactly know by it's good computers or by it's competent and friendly costumer support ...
Click to expand...

Every time I see someone misspell this word, I think of a call center full of costumed employees having a Halloween party.
 
get your money back, get a desktop .... :D
 
If I ever get another laptop, it will be a Panasonic Toughbook, probably a TB-74 or TB-31.

Fullscreen forever!
 
Moderator Action: Moved to Computer tech forum.
 
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