Dell complaints

JP Wickert · Discovering Dellhate Joined: 17 Feb 2009 Posts: 1

I just purchased an Inspiron 1525 which came with a myriad of problems. Several days of "tech support" from Dell led nowhere except beyond their return policy timeframe. I have been a good customer for 15 years and they blatantly refuse to work with me.

The sound on the 1525 is totally unacceptable. They jerked me around to the point where they insisted on sending me external speakers (which are also bad). It is obvious that their intention was to progress tech support beyond their 21 day return policy (which no-one made me aware of) and then just said "TOUGH!"

I think that a class action law suit might be in order here. I have found many unhappy owners of this piece of crap. If you would like to join please let me know. This lack of customer service has to cease. I believe that Dell may be in breach of the "implied warranty of merchantibility".

Thank you for reading. We do have more power in numbers.

Any attorney willing to take this on would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Rocke_T_Sinetist · Posted: Tue Feb 17, 2009 9:48 pm Post subject:

DELLapidated · Graduate Dellhater Joined: 02 Apr 2008 Posts: 62

Sorry to be a damper here, but can u please explain how "unacceptable" the sound is to you and in what way?

Notebook speakers are tiny and are placed in the chassis somewhere that is not a good place to start with - they are not supposed to sound like a big Sony sound system and that's why external speakers are needed. One will most likely hear the vibration of the plastic chassis on low bass sounds, too. Also I presume that the audio can be a Realtek and this worsens the problem. Sound Blaster is still king to this day.

Other than that I agree, Dell Customer Service/Tech support sucks.
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di·lap·i·dat·ed
Function: adjective
- decayed, deteriorated, or fallen into ruin especially through neglect or misuse or mismanagement

drawmada · Graduate Dellhater Joined: 27 Aug 2008 Posts: 47

I concur with DELLapidated, the sound on that laptop is not the greatest, and that is the case of any laptop for that matter. I have a 1525 here, and to have it belt out great sound means plugging external speakers or putting on headphones. I also have an old Inspiron 1150 lying around, and it too has shabby sound coming out of it's speakers. Speakers installed on laptops are not one of their better points!

The Tech support is laughable for sure, but got to hand it to them at least they tried something lol ... Idea

Cheers
Adam

jasonwentcrazy · Posted: Fri May 22, 2009 9:50 am Post subject: Re: Inspiron 1525 - DO NOT BUY!

I am too late and I'm one of the suckers that bought a 1525. This thing is just comically falling apart. Keys pop off, replacement keyboard too, there are solar flares shooting out of the back of the thing, when I type sometimes it takes 10 minutes for the cursor to catch up to the period.

It sucks. There are other people with the same issues and the same machine and we do need to figure a way to help each other and take some legal action. I'm ready for sure.

If you want to compare notes send me an email and we can set up a quick time to chat. I'm jasonwentcrazy at gmail dot com. Thanks.

And my giant story/email to them is posted over at
http://smartwentcrazy.com/jason/dell.html

It's a long one for sure.

PatrickKay · Discovering Dellhate Joined: 27 Jun 2009 Posts: 1

Yes, the sound is very weak on the 1525. However, if you right click on the volume icon in the tray and select playback devices -> highlight Speakers/Headphones -> click on Properties -> click on Enhancements tab, you can find settings that may help get better volume. Check Loudness Equalization in particular.

When you set up MediaDirect you will notice that the volume on movies etc is much better than default sound.

Another option to improve volume during media playback is to pick applications that "Normalize' sound. Media Player Classic, VLC, and others allow you to do this.

Good luck.

dennisl59 · MDh--Master of Dellhateology Joined: 17 Dec 2008 Posts: 86

Did you buy NEW or a Refurb?

XWiseOneX · Journeyman Dellhater Joined: 16 Jun 2009 Posts: 38

I bought a Inspirion 518 from Costco. The computer isn't that bad however it had a very cheap case fan and the heatsink isn't so good. I had to replace the case fan due to the fact it couldn't blow a paper away. Air ventilation is a must =P. I should probably blame the heatsink on Intel, meh

frank sinatra · Discovering Dellhate Joined: 26 Jul 2009 Posts: 1

I have a 1525 and my wife made the mistake of pressing the media direct button, which put the system into a blue screen loop. Reinstalling Vista won't work because the active drive partition is D:, associated with teh crappy media direct OS. Tech support was worthless after 3 1/2 hours, 2 of which were spent while the technician referred to manuals that he could otherwsie not read. Their recommendation was to replace the HD, even though there is nothing wrong with it. What a catastrophe Dell has become. I will never buy another one of their products, ever.

update: - I fixed this by running chkdsk on the partition and dismounting it. something that dell support didn't know or suggest after 4 hours.

zappa1999 · Discovering Dellhate Joined: 18 Aug 2009 Posts: 3

I too felt the wrath of dell returns. I got the mini for my daughter and the screen is just too tiny even for a 7 yr old. I called on day 23, two freaken days over! The rep was rude, heartless as I explained I just got laid off and really needed the refund. She even sounded like she took a little bit of joy F-ing me over. Count me in!

incident_man · Posted: Tue Aug 18, 2009 10:22 pm Post subject: Re: Got screwed on 21 day policy