Hey people... i am ex Dell 6400 user.. would love to share my experience regarding Dell 6400..hehe..

I bought my Dell 6400 last year May, was a good laptop.. the usual spec.. then my motherboard spoiled for unknown reason after 6 month of usage.. so it's still under warranty and so it's free..

But one bad day, which is one week ago.. my warranty for one year is gone.. and my dell 6400 can't start.. When to the workshop and dell boy told me it's the motherboard and processor spoiled!!!

He said i would either buy extended warranty which gonna cost me about RM$2300 or i pay the part which gonna cost me RM$2600... my eyes grow big big hearing that news...

Eventually i throw the whole machine into the dustbin! Going for Dell 9400 with 3 Complete Warranty!!!!!

Just my experience la.. For general purposes!

"motherboard spoiled for unknown reason after 6 month of usage" + "the motherboard and processor spoiled!!!" + "throw the whole machine into the dustbin" + "Going for Dell 9400 with 3 Complete Warranty!!!!!"
feel sorry for u but with such hiccup u still get dell ah?

sotong168, the reason why i am still getting dell is because of their customer service.. i have introduce few of my relative to buy dell... and everyone is happy about their after sale service.. like my case.. when i sent my laptop to the workshop.. they guarantee it will be ready for me within 3 days.. which i like a lot.. because i can't do my office work or university work without a laptop..

Dell is still out perform any brand in term of price & after sale service.. This is what i have seen and experience.. unless someone tell me other brand is cheaper and better service than dell..

hehe... any recommendation from you sotong168?

@mel9338, as for me, if mobo or any critical parts "kong" out of the blue like your case sure will pissed me off, unless the hiccup is due to user negligence.

@sotong168, not so sure about user negligence.. but i did do some googling in the internet and found out that dell do have some sort of heat problem that might cause overheat to the motherboard... i bet it also can overheat the processor... Yea.. i was pissed off till the point that i throw that dell in to the dustbin.. it's so pissed off that need to replace a new laptop which i only bough like a year n a month ago...

Actually..most of the notebooks pc also has overheating isue.Its depend how the owner use it.Maybe the owner use it in cool enviroment like air con room.Not like under the sun heated room or put the lappy on a place like paper..or cotton that cannot let the air flow de.

want to ask something. I bought my 6400 around May last year when there was no option to upgrade the graphic card. So my question is whether my pci-e slot will be sealed like the pics on the first page? I'm seriously thinking of upgrading my graphic card. I cant play any new games!!

just curious...if my warranty is just limited warranty...would they replace my motherboard like what they did for mel9338?...or does that require completecover?

btw the extended warranty so expensive?...i checked out the website and its about 500 for another year of completecover

This post has been edited by AzeL: Jun 25 2007, 11:31 PM

yes....if urs come with GMA950...u dont hv pcie slot...if u seriusly thinking to upgrade ur gc, u hv to buy mobo + gc....better buy new notebook...

yes...as long as the hardware spoilt not bcos of accident....they wont charge u any cents...

complete cover = accidental damage...hope u get wat i meant...

oooh okay...too bad im on the 1 year limited n completecover...might need to extend when the 1 year almost up

still havent answer my other question though...how come mel9338 say need RM2300 to extend his warranty?...is thats another 2 years completecover?

bcos mel9338 warranty already expired...dats y dell want him to pay sm money...

@Azel.. dead_nite is correct.. the reason why my extended warranty is so expensive because my original warranty had expired.. that's why it cost a bomb to buy extended warranty..

After this nightmare happen.. i really recommended to buy any laptop to come with at least 2 yrs warranty.. better spend like rm400 for 2 yrs than suffer later!

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Added on June 26, 2007, 12:22 am@death_nite.. i think it worth more to spend to buy a 9400 with 3 yrs complete warranty... going to spend like rm5200 .

Good idea.. i try to sell my part for 6400.. anyone interested can let me know.. i might as well donate it for free.. just pay the postage! ahahaha... gonna upgrade the ram for my new lappy with 2 x 1024mb ram... so i got 2 x 512mb ram from my new 9400 and existing 1 x 512mb ram from my 6400...

This post has been edited by mel9338: Jun 26 2007, 12:22 AM

why not u extend when u buy it ....
almost 1 year up then u only wanna extend .....
that gonna cost u

I guess that's because of Dell's recertification fee... When a Dell finishes its warranty period, if I'm not mistaken, you have a limited period of time to upgrade to another year (or two)... Beyond that, you'll have to pay a recertification fee (I forgot how much) so that Dell can check your laptop, and estimate what they have to cover...

Even more so for CC... I'm not sure, so freely correct me if I'm wrong...

Why don't you send to Dell refurbish center or shop , they'll charge cheaper for fixing and if you really don't want , you can still sell back the parts to Dell ...you can get around few hundred.

extending my warranty during purchase would bust make me way underbudget...and my parents (being the dinosaurs that they are) won't understand the need to spend another RM700 for 3 years warranty if im very very careful with the lap...but they don't understand that there's a chance of things just simply not working like mel9338 case that even paranoid laptop usage wont help deter.

as for extending last minute...my reason is simple...rather then present them with a huge bill at one go which will prolly result in scoldings and stuff and MOST likely bein cancelled...better to let them know gradually...yea i know it's exp if wanna extend outside of purchase...rm500 for 1 year cc as compared to rm700 3 years cc when purchasing

anyone manage to grab a refurbished unit frm dell? i tried many times but end-up all the units are sold, normally they post up the listing @ 8.30am, called my SA at 9am then called me back an hour later mentioned all the units sold. i believe those units are 'sapu' by businessman connected with insider, unfair-ler to innocent consumer like us

this morning got 10-units of 640m pricing frm rm1.2K(T2300E) to rm1.8K (T7200) and now no more liao

@sotong168... wah.. so kiasu one? so fast all gone? you from kuching? i am heading there next week monday.. hehe.. i am from brunei actually..

I did went and ask about selling the spare parts of my dell 6400.. suprisingly they not taking it.. the only option they gave me is to leave me lappy there and hope someone whose dell 6400 have expired warranty and wanna fix their laptop then can use mine in return of some cash

want to get a used unit as no budget for a new one. some refurbished units are really good price (as mentioned in my earlier post) but somehow i never manage to get them, already tried for 2-mth actually so i speculate someone already "pre-ordered" those units and those listing on the site are just for formality sake. btw, u can "leave" your broken unit to me too when u come to kuching

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Added on June 26, 2007, 12:05 pmnew bios released (A17):

Fixes/Enhancements
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1. Added support for newer Intel processors.
2. Fixed issue that some 1394b Express cards will cause an intermittent no post.

http://ftp.us.dell.com/bios/MM061A17.exe

This post has been edited by sotong168: Jun 26 2007, 12:05 PM