Did you know laptops are disposable?

[VJWilson27]

No seriously, that's what a tech supervisor from HP told DH.

I have a compaq presario V5305 that I got for my birthday (December) in 2006. In May of last year the screen (LCD) started getting horizontal lines through it and started going completely out. I mailed it off in June, got it back mid July. My original warranty lasted until December, but they added another 3 months due to the repair...

Well guess what....

About a month ago it started doing it AGAIN same frickin' thing. Horizontal lines and it just went out completely yesterday. DH was on the phone (mostly on hold of course) with HP for over 2 hours. They wanted to charge us almost $600 to repair it the second time. (Since it was out of warranty) DH wanted to know WHY the same exact thing happened in less than a year. And if it was going to go out again if we decided to get it repaired. (Keep in mind the laptop was only $400 to begin with) They couldn't answer that and said that we'd only be protected if we spent another $399 on an extended 2yr warranty after the repair.

At one point the technician actually admitted that it quite possibly couldn't have been repaired correctly, but even if it was their fault we had no recourse. SO DH wanted a higher up guy to call us back and find out why if there's a possibility that they screwed up WE have to pay for it. We had to wait for a call back within 24 hours.

Well the guy called back this afternoon and told DH that "Laptops are disposable, if they last one year it's great, if they last two years it's excellent but you can't expect them to last that long" Seriously, word for word, that's what the dude said. He made it a point to tell DH that "he's worked in the industry for 11 years, for every company all over the US" and he knows what he's talking about.

Can you believe that? Laptops are DISPOSABLE! I had no idea someone would spent hundreds on something that was disposable and only supposed to last a year or so. I guess you learn something new everyday.

[cuzisaidso]

Sheesh! What a thing to say.

[DavidKing]

yeah, video card probably went out. Good news is Laptops are small form factor, which means they do not depreciate as fast as desktops. I bet you can list it on ebay noting the problem and still recoup a few hundred. Somebody will be happy to rip apart and fix or separate for parts.

And while its not the response you want from a customer service rep, its not far from the truth. Anytime it costs more to fix than to buy a new one, they are considered disposable. But normally its just a hard drive or broken screen that needs replaced.

Reminds me of when Panasonic called me to try to get me to extend my warranty on my DVD player for a mear $90. I was like, um no, I'll just go buy another DVD player!

[derketchup]

This is why my next computer will be a mac.

[austinmomto2]

Der,
I totally agree with you! I sold my Dell a little while ago and DH has converted me to a Mac .

[MaryMary]

Well the guy called back this afternoon and told DH that "Laptops are disposable, if they last one year it's great, if they last two years it's excellent but you can't expect them to last that long" Seriously, word for word, that's what the dude said. He made it a point to tell DH that "he's worked in the industry for 11 years, for every company all over the US" and he knows what he's talking about.

Can you believe that? Laptops are DISPOSABLE! I had no idea someone would spent hundreds on something that was disposable and only supposed to last a year or so. I guess you learn something new everyday.

That dude probably came from a point that every year most of the employees of large computer/software related companies would receive a new laptops.
Yea, if you receive a new one every year for free, they are disposable, indeed. :shrug7:

[CraftTeaLady]

Mine is an HP and I would have to say HP is a bit more 'disposable' than others. :)

[phoenyxstarr]

That's not good news to me CraftTeaLady - we just bought an $850 HP laptop for my hubby to take with him while driving. We bought a case to help protect it from the jarring motion of the big rig.

[oscamaya]

I had a Gateway laptop that was 6 years old. I called my computer techy friend to come fix it once. He walked in the door and looked at it and just started laughing. Apparently if the laptop makes it to 6 years its a dinosaur.

[lensperson]

The upper end of the computer market is inhabited by Apple.
The low end is powered by small laptops running linux.
The middle area has suffered quite a squeeze from both ends.
When I find an old computer at Goodwill I load free software to run it and spend the savings on good old old fashioned food