Hardware Analysis - Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

G. G. — 2007-10-01T01:17:21-05:00

Unfortunately this is just another statistic of wanting something done for "Free"

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

R James — 2007-08-20T12:44:50-05:00

I just bought a Fujitsu notebook and touch wood so far it's been reliable. I was kind of skeptical about buying a notebook but it's been going strong even in some cases where it's left on for 2 days straight.

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Gerritt — 2007-08-19T00:35:54-05:00

Change the emulated resolution.
If the line is still there and in the same PHYSICAL location on the LCD and the same # of pixels in height or width, then it is a HW issue. It could be something as simple as a crimped/broken mylar ribbon cable leading from the laptop to the screen (most common), or a failure of the integrated line drivers in the screen itself.

Gerritt

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

FordGT90Concept — 2007-08-17T18:37:27-05:00

Also if the lines appear in the BIOS (or any time prior to OS loading), there's a very good chance that it is hardware related.

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

dark41 — 2007-08-17T01:56:38-05:00

THOMAS STEWART VON DRASHEK said:

Almost always "line" on lcd is bug, not screen, due to fact that lcd do not use raster & scaning cathode, problem must be in assembly chip or 99% of time, in virus, where if you do new partition line disappears as bug isn't in that partition. Most people crave attention & knowing that your fault of problem thru poor security just intensifies desire to "blame" others, especially if monies involved.

I use computer for infiltrating internet bug a boos, so started with WEBTV as all virus mean little & evil doers had no luck in breaking equipment when it was covered by warrenty, went thru 5, when moved to new city again trick with cutting phone line at just right log on moment did indeed break LAST OF it, as others had had same fate for me, & there are lot of bad WEBTV boxes on auctions as result.

Many of weirdos are now in past, yet all computers are in state of attack at all times, just buying warrenty is not answer, getting rid of perpetrators is.

Signed: PHYSICIAN THOMAS STEWART VON DRASHEK M.D.

I've never seen horizontal or vertical lines on a laptop screen being caused by a virus/malware. I also see no references on google to any virus/malware that causes this condition on LCD screens.

I do see many references to the white/grey horizontal and vertical lines on LCD screens, and in every case that I've seen so far it's been determined to be hardware related. Specifically, either the inverter board (that one is questionable), cables, contacts, or display itself.

http://www.notebookforums.com/post2607107.html#post2607107

There's also quite a few posts about moving/twisting/applying pressure to the screen to change the effect, which also points directly to hardware:

http://www.laptoprepair101.com/laptop/2006/08/17/bad-video-on-...nt-page-3/

I hope the Dr. does a better job at diagnosing people's ailments than he does computers'.

Try doing a screen capture. If the image doesn't show the lines, the theory is that it's hardware related.

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

angryhippy — 2007-08-17T00:27:30-05:00

George King said:

-Just putting a thought out in the open but if manufacturers planned for something to "break" right after the warranty was over WHY WOULD THEY OFFER AND EXTENDED WARRANTY???

So I take it that you don't believe in planned obsolescense. Why do they offer extended warranties? Because that is clear and free profit. No manufacturing costs other than possibly a few pages of printed material. Why would they make something that will break? SO THEY CAN SELL EXTENDED WARRANTIES!. A great number of those warranties are never used. So the cost vs. profit ratio is very high for profit.

Now for everybody else. Since this is turning into a gripe thread about different brands, I have a Toshiba Satellite Pro 465CDX.It has a 166MHz MMX Pentium processor, a huge 2.2GB hard drive, and 160MBs of memory. It uses XP Pro and is reserved for exclusive use to do banking and bill paying. It originally came with Windows 95, and still works perfect, albeit a tad slow for gaming.

When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

THOMAS STEWART VON DRASHEK — 2007-08-16T19:04:28-05:00

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Sterghios Moschos — 2007-08-16T12:10:39-05:00

My worst experience was in 2002 with a Mitac notebook, on a 1 year international (i.e. surcharged) warranty, bought from Greece. Before the 1st year was over, it started having problems. MITAC UK failed to honour the warranty, but the Greek importer collected it (in person!) from the UK. After 3 MONTHS on repair (???), they said it was a faulty motherboard and replaced it. A week before the end of the warranty, it broke down again. Somehow, the response to my RMA request was delayed beyond the expiry of the warranty and the seller claimed that I had to make payments for any expenses.

I fumed at them about having lost 3 months of my warranty because of their delay in returning it to me, and the only way they budged was when I threatened to claim the full value from the UK credit card company I had made the purchase with. FYI, UK law says that a credit company has the onus if the retailer defaults on a contractual agreement. What this means is that the credit card company will sort you out, then go after the retailer.

2 months later I got my laptop back, and 3-4 weeks after that it broke down again. I took a scredriver to it, fixed it myself, and since then it chugs along, albeit very rickety and for nothing that requires reliability. Never again Mitac!

My next lappie was an Asus. The screen produced a vertical white line like Sander's within a year of purchase. At no expense to me they collected it and replaced the screen, albeit with one of lower resolution. I challenged that, they collected the laptop and returned it at their expense with a brand spanking new screen, and a new, higher capacity HDD as a form of apology. In both cases the turn around from collection to return was 3 days. Here's one for Asus!

As for other pieces of kit? I have a Roland TD-20 electronic drum brain, and that has failed twice within the warranty period. Turnaround of weeks . My Sony TV ceased to display within 1 year and three weeks of purcahse, that's three weeks after expiry of the warranty. My Sony monitor started developing issues (thankfully intermittent rather than permanent) roughly a month out of warranty. As for Apple's reliability? One word covers it all: iPod. My IHP-40 iRiver is still going strong, even after multiple drops and even use as a self-defence item once. My girlfriend's newer iRiver has never been knocked (it still looks new) but it stopped working some 2 weeks after warranty expiry. For Toshiba, a friend dropped a PII laptop in the sea once. After two days of drying it worked fine. Another friend used a P4 desktop replacement in the same place (i.e. same desk, never moved) for six months. One day the DVDRW died, and Toshiba would not honour the international warranty, so he had to pay for collection and repair costs (but not parts) in the UK. I had a gigabyte motherboard with a dual bios chip feature (i.e. backup chip in case of a problem) that never worked when a firmware upgrade went wrong. Gigabyte refused to own up to misadvertisement of product features when they claimed it was my fault that I had a powercut and should pay for repair within warranty, even thought the second chip was fully funcitonal, but the motherboard did not do what it said on the box.

On the other hand, I know of at least one electronic items manufacturer, HART Dynamics, who offer lifetime warranty on one of their electronic percussion instruments where competitors offer 1-3 year warranties. And these things get physically abused for crying out loud!

What this proves is that unless mishandled, misused, or otherwise physically damaged, any electronic item with adequate electric protection and built qualtiy should NEVER fail.
In conclusion, I dont believe on warranty death timers but at the same time, the urban myth of old and sturdy, new and flimsy, is based on experience by many, many people. IMHO, Price should reflect build quality just as Sander expects and manufacturers should make sure they respect the client's custom.

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Peter Lambert — 2007-08-16T09:07:34-05:00

A friend had a similar experience with a Toshiba laptop, just three weeks outside warranty, cost �300 for a new screen.
There are some pretty good companies out there though. After over 2 years my Brother printer gave up due to a failed print head. I phoned Brother who said that they were aware of a problem with these print heads and had extended their warranty to three years as a result.
Within three days they sent me a replacement printer, no charge and they arranged collection of the old one.
Guess who's printers I advise people to buy.
Pete

Whether you think you can or think you can't you are right.

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Stephan Oberholzer — 2007-08-16T05:48:16-05:00

Hello Sander,
Very glad that you mentioned this.
I bought a very expensive Toshiba Qosmio F10 Notebook. And it is a very nice notebook too - although it could not do everything which was told to me it could. Trying to contact the Toshiba people was a fruitless effort on why certain things were not so as mentioned in the manual.
If I can remember correctly, it was two weeks after the warranty expired, when the screen stayed black on switch on, and no video output was possible. I took it to a company called Retron in South Africa where I was told that I had to pay approximately five thousand rand to replace the motherboard (since the video section is part of the motherboard). I would not accept this, and told them so. I spoke to one of their managers, and he swore at me and put the telephone down whilst I was still speaking to him. After this episode, someone there called me and at last they said that they would repair it at their cost.
I am not saying that there is a general problem with Toshiba notebooks - I am just sharing my experience.
Sincerely,
Stephan Oberholzer
Pretoria
Transvaal
South Africa

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Stephan Oberholzer — 2007-08-16T05:43:41-05:00

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

George King — 2007-08-16T05:27:12-05:00

-Sander... i dont mean to pick on you but... you will NEVER buy a warranty eh? well what if you had bought that 150 dollar 3 year warranty? oh i guess ur computer would have been covered...
-Just putting a thought out in the open but if manufacturers planned for something to "break" right after the warranty was over WHY WOULD THEY OFFER AND EXTENDED WARRANTY??? i mean when the guy at the assembly line is putting together ur machine he doesn't put a stamp on the outside of the box that says how long the unit will last...and then sell the longer lasting units to the people who buy the extended plan... so im saying if YOU were a manufacturer and you decided to put a "time bomb" inside your product would u offer a 100 dollar protection plan that would fix 500-1000 dollars of problems? And companies like circuit city DO OFFER BATTERY COVERAGE ON LAPTOPS. food for thought
-ps i am a lead-technician for a big box retailer and i too agree that hp are usually the best "put together" machines as a matter of fact i currently own 3 hp laptops and i could not be happier with them... personally i have an extended service plan on all of them and on all my electronics and never regretted a single one of those plans
-thanks for reading

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Gerritt — 2007-08-16T02:39:23-05:00

I understand the reluctance in purchacing an extended warrantee.
If you DO purchace one, it should always be through the OEM, and not through the point of sales!
If you have an HP, then make sure that HP is the provider of the service, and not some outsourced vendor, as these are going bankrupt and leaving folks without paid for services.
READ the EXTENDED WARANTEE! Understand what it provides!
I travel extensively, so the Accidental Coverage works for me.
If you are moving across campus and have a good backpack/sachel for your laptop then you may be OK without it.
I've had two personal computers replaced, or had scaled updates over the last 5 years so it evens out.
AFTER THE PURCHASE COVERAGE.... If after you've recieved your laptop, if you think it may be more susceptible to damage, then call HP, Sony or whomever to get this coverage added....NEVER the Point of Sale.

Gerritt

When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

THOMAS STEWART VON DRASHEK — 2007-08-16T01:42:04-05:00

There are so many professional rip offs, citicorp, ebay, macies, list is endless. I would have installed another partition of windows or tried linux, or tried it again just from cleaning standpoint. yet it is good that you solved problem, do you know if old screen works correctly now, it may have been something else & replacement just got that done, when in fact both screens work properly? ebaysends in bugs for every product after just few weeks. So it may be you broke softwarebug with new screen, or maybe screen really was kapoot, yet you probably dropped it, frankly. it probably was video card out put to be few lines, & often bug at that. so now you can figure out how to use two screens. haha.

Portiblesare for moving around with, if computer is in one place, buy desktop macine, much easier to rip apart. & parts arn't so custom made plus much more recent in design.

SignedHYSICIAN THOMAS STEWART VON DRASHEK M.D.

Re: Re: When stuff breaks days after the warranty expires?

Chan Yong Hock Andy — 2007-08-15T23:28:41-05:00

I have a Dell LS 400 which I bought in 1999 and it lasted me till today. The only thing that I changed during the 3 years warranty period was my 20GB hard drive and Dell provide super services services and shipped the harddrive to me. This old notebook has been with me for nearly 8 years and now only work as a desktop as the battery is not working any more and furthermore thid model is EOF (end of life).

I guess it is a matter of luck in when you buy the hardware.As a safe precaution it is better to buy an extended warranty to relieve the stress of "what happen after one year of usage of the hardware" if the user is not so techo-savy or the parts are expensive to replace such as LCD.