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familychoice
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« on: April 20, 2011, 02:38:12 PM » |
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Just had an email from Dell telling me the Processor they supplied with my PC is dodgy and will 'degrade' over time. They're offering to replace it for free but it's a PITA.
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Just another shite talking, unemployable Walter Mitty character living in a blinkered brassed-off, ITV-drama-esque world...
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Dom
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« Reply #1 on: April 20, 2011, 02:52:18 PM » |
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familychoice
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« Reply #2 on: April 20, 2011, 03:30:09 PM » |
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Yeah that's it, what's the score? Yep, if there's poo on the market then you can be sure I'll end up buying it. TBH I haven't noticed any problems yet. |
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Just another shite talking, unemployable Walter Mitty character living in a blinkered brassed-off, ITV-drama-esque world...
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robwhizz
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« Reply #3 on: April 20, 2011, 07:00:01 PM » |
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Yeah that's it, what's the score? Yep, if there's poo on the market then you can be sure I'll end up buying it. TBH I haven't noticed any problems yet. It's not the CPU, it's the chipset on the board. It's down to a SATA controller that may degrade over time. Probably around 5% degradation over a couple of years meaning increased error rates over time and possibly failure. It's nothing to really worry about, to be honest. It won't bugger your hard drives up and it only affects the 3Gbs ports. There are 2 6Gbps ports and they are totally unaffected. You can either get it fixed, or simply put your hard drives on the 6Gbps ports where there are no problems (they may already be running on them anyway). If you run three or more drives then it's probably best to get it fixed, but you can also just buy a sata card and run them off that. Depends how much you are bothered by losing your PC for a bit against running more than two drives and having to buy an add in card (which aren't very expensive). |
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« Last Edit: April 20, 2011, 07:02:02 PM by robwhizz »
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Great post Jon! I have been following the effort since you started it, and although I have understood its purpose this post does a really great job solidifying the full rationale.
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familychoice
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« Reply #4 on: April 20, 2011, 07:37:34 PM » |
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Yeah that's it, what's the score? Yep, if there's poo on the market then you can be sure I'll end up buying it. TBH I haven't noticed any problems yet. It's not the CPU, it's the chipset on the board. It's down to a SATA controller that may degrade over time. Probably around 5% degradation over a couple of years meaning increased error rates over time and possibly failure. It's nothing to really worry about, to be honest. It won't bugger your hard drives up and it only affects the 3Gbs ports. There are 2 6Gbps ports and they are totally unaffected. You can either get it fixed, or simply put your hard drives on the 6Gbps ports where there are no problems (they may already be running on them anyway). If you run three or more drives then it's probably best to get it fixed, but you can also just buy a sata card and run them off that. Depends how much you are bothered by losing your PC for a bit against running more than two drives and having to buy an add in card (which aren't very expensive). Thanks for the info Rob. I only have a single drive in this one, though I use an external drive via an eSATA connection - not sure if that'd be affected but I do use that on a daily basis. The mail from Dell said it could affect the DVD drive as well. It sounds like they come out and fix the board on-site: "Alternatively you can reply to this email with date when you would like the service to take place (Mo – Fri between 9 am and 5 pm). Please allow at least 3 working days from the date of sending the email before the service can be performed." in which case I'm more than happy to have it swapped. Sending it off would be a bit of a pain, though I have got a couple of back up machines now. I think I'd prefer to have it fixed if possible. To give credit to Dell at least they're being proactive by contacting customers and offering to put it right, though for some reason they sent the email to my wife's account and spelt my name wrong. |
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« Last Edit: April 20, 2011, 07:39:17 PM by familychoice »
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Just another shite talking, unemployable Walter Mitty character living in a blinkered brassed-off, ITV-drama-esque world...
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familychoice
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« Reply #5 on: May 03, 2011, 10:34:33 AM » |
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Engineer's coming here in a bit to change the motherboard.
I'm impressed with their service, but there's the usual Dell chaos going on. When I bought the PC I wasn't able to use my old account as that seemed to have been closed, but couldn't set up a new one as my wife had already bought a laptop from this address, so I was forced to use that. She used a 'temporary' email address as a contact for the account with has a fake name (you'll have to ask her why she did this) so now all communications I have with Dell are for Doris Biggins, or whatever name it was she used, even though she registered and paid for her laptop in her real name. I wish they'd use the name she registered with as I can't stand the name Doris.
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Just another shite talking, unemployable Walter Mitty character living in a blinkered brassed-off, ITV-drama-esque world...
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robwhizz
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« Reply #6 on: May 03, 2011, 10:57:49 AM » |
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Engineer's coming here in a bit to change the motherboard.
As it will probably be a new revision he may need to update the chipset drivers, but it should be fairly quick and painless with no loss of data. Hope it goes well. |
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Great post Jon! I have been following the effort since you started it, and although I have understood its purpose this post does a really great job solidifying the full rationale.
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familychoice
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« Reply #7 on: May 03, 2011, 11:07:58 AM » |
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Engineer's coming here in a bit to change the motherboard.
As it will probably be a new revision he may need to update the chipset drivers, but it should be fairly quick and painless with no loss of data. Hope it goes well. Thanks Rob - I hope there's no loss of data too...time to back up! More Dell chaos: they called to ring to say an engineer couldn't make it today after all, but as he'd called me earlier to arrange a time I'm guessing head office have made a cock up. |
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Just another shite talking, unemployable Walter Mitty character living in a blinkered brassed-off, ITV-drama-esque world...
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Dom
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« Reply #8 on: May 03, 2011, 12:27:42 PM » |
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Call me stooopid, but I didn't realise companies actually sent out engineers to your house to fix laptops etc. I thought the best you'd get would be sending it off for repair.
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Mr Anderson
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« Reply #9 on: May 03, 2011, 01:06:21 PM » |
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Call me stooopid, but I didn't realise companies actually sent out engineers to your house to fix laptops etc. I thought the best you'd get would be sending it off for repair.
Your home or office is the site referred to in on-site warranties  |
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Dom
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« Reply #10 on: May 03, 2011, 01:31:49 PM » |
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Ah. I've never actually bought a pre-built PC so mine have never come with any warranties.
Well, tell a lie, I did buy a bare-bones system that was pre-built and fully working once, but I also bought extra bits at the same time, and shoved them in the instant they got delivered. So I knew I'd be screwing up whatever warranty it came with and so I didn't even bother to check if it had one.
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familychoice
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« Reply #11 on: May 03, 2011, 01:56:42 PM » |
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The on-site support is extra usually, I've just got the standard 1 year Collect & Return warranty but it seems Dell are keeping customers happy by sending someone out.
Bloke's just been and all working now, though there was a bit of a kerfuffle with a couple of drivers.
Overall it's a definite gold star for Dell though.
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Just another shite talking, unemployable Walter Mitty character living in a blinkered brassed-off, ITV-drama-esque world...
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robwhizz
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« Reply #12 on: May 03, 2011, 07:37:31 PM » |
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This in Intel's recall, so I imagine Dell will be profitting from sending an engineer out.  |
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Great post Jon! I have been following the effort since you started it, and although I have understood its purpose this post does a really great job solidifying the full rationale.
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familychoice
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« Reply #13 on: May 03, 2011, 07:39:23 PM » |
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This in Intel's recall, so I imagine Dell will be profitting from sending an engineer out. Ah right...yes that wouldn't surprise me! The engineer thought it a pretty essential fix so glad I had it done. He was also impressed with the specs of my PC for the price I paid for it which was nice. |
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Just another shite talking, unemployable Walter Mitty character living in a blinkered brassed-off, ITV-drama-esque world...
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