I swear, there is a conspiracy with Dell. I bought a computer back in April 2005. I actually spent the over $300 fee in order to have an in-house warranty where they'll come to me to fix any issues I have. Did I ever need the warranty? Of course not... not until my warranty expired! My warranty expired a couple of months ago, and my computer (hard drive) crashed this weekend.
When was the last time I backed anything up, you say?? Hmmm, that would be about a year ago. Things were going so well and I had made the comment a few times to my husband about how well this computer was working and I hadn't had any problems with it like I had the others...
It must be because I actually paid for a long warranty. However, I really and truly believe they put some kind of code into the hard drives that make them crash after the warranty period. I know this is possible. I know it's probably not ethical or legal, but I know it's possible to write some type of crash code.
I went to bed Saturday evening and my computer was acting funny, but I was tied, so I went to bed. Sunday morning, black screen. Not unusaly as my computer goes to sleep after non-use... touch the mouse pad, nothing. Press the enter button, nothing. Move the mouse around, nothing... I noticed the 
green lights were on which means it's "thinking".
I couldn't get the screen on, so I did a reboot, just turning it off. I turned it back on to a grinding noise and a screen that tells me to control alt delete, so I do, and it rewards me with more grinding noises...
Did you know that if your Dell computer crashes, but it's the hard drive that is ruined, you cannot recreate your computer until after you contact Dell and they send you a reinstall disk? See, if something else on the computer goes wrong, the reinstall is already on the hard drive. However, if you need a completely new hard drive, no reinstall disk with the computer. So, I get a call from Dell making sure I was the original owner. They are mailing the reinstall disk, but that will take up to 3 business days...
I'm without a computer for most of the week! The only good thing is that I'll be out of town for most of the week, and won't "need" the computer that much, so I'll just be borrowing my husband's desktop while he's on his laptop until then...
If I once had your email address, I now don't, so you might want to go ahead and send me an email so I can get your email address into Outlook once I get set back up...
Makes you wanna scream! Lesson learned is that no matter how silly you feel backing up every night or once a week, DO IT!! We will be setting me up to where I can just copy my important things to our Shared drive and my husband will do the backing up for me, which is the way it should have been done in the first place when I kept asking for easier and more efficient ways to back things up... but I won't blame him... wanna know how many pictures of Alyssa weren't backed up?? *ARG*
My Dell computer crashed in January of 2006 while I was in the middle of doing 1099's for my agents. That was seriously not a fun time. I feel your pain.
We have all had this happen by now and backing up into an external hard drive is so simple these days. It's cheap too! You need all your docs, pics, videos and music, favorites and email.
Donna, your right backup often. Every holiday regardles which one I backup manual. Just like voting, vote early and often.
Donna - I don't want to be the bearer of more bad news, but I had to order a reinstall disk a couple of years ago (never, never, never operate without virus protection software) and they sent me one that exactly mimiced the condition that my computer was shipped in. I'm sure that this is for legal reasons, but after spending a couple hours with the reinstall program, I spent DAYS reinstalling Microsoft service packs and dozens of other programs that I had added since I purchased the computer.
Donna -
Try Mozy.com for online back up - $50/year for Mozy Home - backed up offline, peace of mind!
Regarding the hard drive - these things DO fail after a while, just the nature of the beast. I'm going to replace my hard drive with a larger one, so hopefully, I can buy more time.
DEAN & DEAN'S TEAM CHICAGO
Donna,
I hate dealing with DELL...
I hate speaking to someone in India who sounds like they`re speaking DOWN to me!H/P for me next year...
We`re with you 100%...
I have a new Dell with Vista. After two months I experienced trouble printing to our Toshiba network printer here in the office. Long story short: Toshiba said it wasn't their problem, Dell wanted $249 to fix it, Microsoft wanted $249 to fix it. So, I reloaded Vista (since I didn't have that much on it yet) but experienced a couple problems with that, then Dell helped me fix that without charging me. That part makes absolutely no sense to me; you won't help me fix a little problem, but you'll help me reinstall the whole OS!!! Meanwhile our 3rd party tech support here in the office figured it out. A day late and a $500 color printer too late............Turns out it was a problem with a Vista patch download update. Boy that has to make a guy feel good!!!
Donna-I was thinking about buying a dell notebook from my broker. You have got me thinking. So sorry for your troubles, and you got me to start backing up more often.
"Not Your Average Joe"
Joe Federico
Cindy, Yikes, I can't imagine doing those from scratch!
Randall, It's not that easy when one backup takes up a couple of discs and you have to sit there during it so you can swap out to the second disk. To me, that's a pain in the arse...
Frank, Every holiday, not just Federal Holidays? There's a holiday every week if you count all the countries! LOL!
Erik, Sounds like loads of fun... Good thing Hubby will have to do it or he'll listen to me complain all week!! I'll reload all my real estate stuff and "playing" stuff, but he'll have to load all the important, standard stuff, including virus protection.
Dean, I'll have to check into that and see if it's something my husband wants to do. He's all techy like that, but still couldn't prevent a crash.
Scott, I know!! I could barely understand the lady, but I just kept repeating myself about sending it right away. I truly think it's a comspiracy, especially since my other computers were so bad with no warranty, and this one was great WITH the warranty, but then crashes right after it expires...
Donna, We all get caught with the warranty dellema and I always say I am not going to pay for this crap again. I also say I will back up my data daily, no weekly, I meant monthly. Sorry I also hate paying ransom for a product...
Used to have a Dell, now I have an HP. Waiting to see if I have any problems with it. I bought a warranty for two years.
I had that happen to me with a Dell, seems like they are designed to work for 3-4yrs and thats it anymore.
Lewis, That's crazy how much they wanted to charge... but I assume that was because you didn't have a warranty?
Joe, I'm glad something positive could come out of this misery!
Paul, No joke! I know that if I don't buy the warranty next time, there will be a crash code for every quarter, if not at least once a year... those warranties are expensive, and a billion dollar business for them.
Angelia, I had HP, but then went to Dell... Not sure who I would buy next time. My brother in law works for Dell, but no family discount...
Jamie, They know people will buy a new computer when theirs doesn't run fast enough or store enough. There is no need to "force" people to need to buy something new when what they have is fine. THey should work harder at making them last longer! 3 years is still "new" to me!
THAT sucks! Sorry to hear the bad news. We have been there before. My suggestion... Apple Products. Very easy to use and the Apple people are very helpful.
Knowing I never backup enough... I started using Carbonite - the online servce. They were WONDERFUL when one of my computers crashed!
raise your eyebrows and call me crazy if you want to, but I have no spyware or virus scanners as I think these slow your computer down, attract new viruses and cause more problems.
I don't "surf" the web wiht my work computers whatsoever. I only use my website, the mls, active rain and 2 or 3 others. I never download a dang thing unless it's a contract or inspection report.
My last computer lasted over 6 years before crashing & burning. The one I'm typing on now I've had since 2005 & it runs just fine. I refuse to by "newer bs versions" for the "latest viruses" ever year! IN five years you can spend several hundreds of dollars "PROTECTING" your 500 investment. That's how I see it.
Sorry to hear of your problems.
I never buy extended warranties on any product. The warranty is sheer profit for the company and generally not worth the paper it is written. I have know people who try to call in claims only to be given a run around.
Your data (your copy of windows) is probably stored on a 2nd partition on the drive. Was it c: with a large percent of the drive and then a d: with a 10gb or less partition?
Most likely this is how it was done. HP does this and the old compaq did as well.
You can replace a hard drive for under $100. You will need a copy of windows. You can ask for a copy of windows be sent to you since you own the license for it. You could borrow a copy from someone else and ask for your serial number from dell and install it like that. You should have that right.
Your data on your drive could be recovered. Most companies charge an arm and a leg. You could try to do it yourself but it would be harder if you dont know how.
It is probably coincidence that your drive died when it did. It very well might not have even died. Your windows might be corrupt and unbootable but the drive itself might be perfectly fine. I doubt Dell has a kill switch.. way too many people would have talked about it by now. The people in the know would know for sure.
If you need more help I can see what I can do but without physically being there it would be tough. You could send me the disc and I could recover the data for you if you like. But it wont help you in the short term. There is no way to know for sure what is recoverable or what is wrong at this point.
It's not just Dell. I had a different brand do the same thing last year. It's amazing how those computers know the warranty date, maybe it IS programmed in. Good luck with it.
I will never never never never never buy a Dell again. I have the industrail Dell and it makes no difference it is miserable
Donna, Having a major computer failure is not a place any of us want to be. At some point they're all going to fail, it's just a matter of time. Backing up critical data should be a religion for people who are so dependent on our emails, contact info and more.
John, yes, we've had the apple conversation... I like that they come in different colors!
Susan, Thanks. I think we'll look into an online system.
Greg, Just another thing to complain about today!! This computer was from 2005 also. Were you blogging while we were talking??
Kathy, Yes, I agree it's sheer profit, but from my previous luck, I also knew it would blow up on me within 6 months and then I would be out of even more luck...
Shane, I did call to order the reinstall CD. We tried loading from another disk, and it wouldn't work. We know it's the hard drive because we took the drive out and tried it on another computer and it made the grinding noise... it was definitely the hard drive and not Windows. We'll see if I have more questions/complaints when I actually receive the disk from Dell, which is ridiculous that you have to order one.
Leslie, Thank you for believe in the conspiracy!!
Charlie, What would you buy next time?
I have had that to happen as well... and yes it was a Dell. I did replace it with a Dell too, and we did have the in-home warranty and have the in-home warranty with the newer one too. We just like the idea of being able to create our own computer. Thinking back ours was out of warranty by a year. Yes, the India thing bothers me too.
I have been hearing the same stuff about appliances too. Only lasting about 7-8 years
So I feel your pain... but CONGRATULATIONS of the feature!!! Take care!
Thos warranties are a rip off. Save money and backup your data regularly.
Donna if you know the disc is bad then thats a tough one. Really expensive to recover that data.
They dont give you the full disc when you buy them because as you can see now why.. it sucks though. I personally wont buy Dell and I also wont buy a desktop from any company like that. They just are in it to rip off the consumer in one way or another. First thing I do with a new pc like Dell is format the drive and reinstall windows to get rid of the crap it comes with. The crap leads to inevitable failure and is purposely done so imo.
Congrats on your featured post, Fantastic job Donna...
Richard, I'm not a very religious person, but maybe backing up files should be a religion to believe in!
Teresa, I didn't even know it was a feature, thanks!! And yes, I liked building it and not having the junk that I didn't need.
Mike, Yes Sir!
Shane, Yes, way too much crap that just takes up memory that you don't need.
Paul, Thanks!
It would take too long to express my extreme dislike for Dell. They have terrible service. The technical support is like playing the Lotto-maybe you will get lucky and talk to the one person that knows how to fix your problem.
Almost always now computers come without the disk. Dell gives you the option of paying extra to get one (of course it is extra $) but you can create one when you get your PC, I think Windows asks you if you want to create one on its first boot now if I remember correctly.
Dell actually makes pretty good computers. I especially like their laptops. I used to recommend Toshiba very highly but lately they have had a TON of battery and HD problems. IBM used to make the best laptop, I don't know if that is still the case. HPs (and therefore compaq as they are the same company) are OK. Sony is overpriced and their quality isn't up to par. Apple laptops are great but very expensive for what you get and generally it is harder to find software and periphs for them.
I highly recommend Windows Live OneCare for the avg user as well a external HD. You can set Onecare up to automatically do backups for you, it will do automatic tuneups for you, it has built in virus protection (although I think all antivirus programs are overrated...), its very easy to use, and it doesn't slow your computer the way some others do *cough, cough, Norton, cough*
Best of luck getting up and going again! Feel free to let me know if you have any questions!
Mark, I understand your frustrations.
Mike S., That must be a new feature Dell has added because I wasn't asked if I wanted to make a copy, but that was over 3 years ago.
I NEVER buy the warranty for any productm let alone computers. THen again, I get a new laptoip at least every two years.
I NEVER buy the warranty for any productm let alone computers. THen again, I get a new laptoip at least every two years.
Donna - I hate to break this to you, but it's not some conspiracy from Dell. As an I.T. technician who has been doing PC support for the better part of his life, I know right now you are just frustrated and looking for someone to blame (I know, I'm usually the guy who gets the finger pointed at him) but believe me, you could have still been UNDER WARRANTY, and it wouldn't have saved you anything other than getting it fixed for free....
...while still losing EVERYTHING.
I've worked on PC's less than 6 months old that have toasted their hard drives. I've had at least 4 or 5 personal experiences with losing everything on my own pc due to such crashes. I've seen a big storm come through and zap an entire system...and I've seen people who treat their computers like gold, and the PC stills blows up in ways you cannot imagine.
So many people fail to realize that the a hard drive is a moving part...a CONSTANTLY moving part spinning at astronomical speeds. Also, the hard drive has a part called a head, think of a record player needle, which is literally an ATOMIC measurement from the disk plates. As with all things that have moving parts, they FAIL, eventually. And if there is any conspiracy, it's the fact that no one makes hardware to last anymore. If they did, they'd go out of business. Hard drives "should" last 5-10 years, but believe me, they rarely do anymore.
I highly recommend you check out my blog about exactly what just happened to you:
CLICK CLICK CLICK....
It's quite an enlightening post for most people and I think you'll appreciate the lesson learned...and what is that lesson? BACKUP, BACKUP, BACKUP. If I could recommend anything, it's CARBONITE.COM
Donna, I hate to admit it, but my prior life was selling technology. Guess what brand we sold? Sorry - yes, Dell. I've seen a trend in their equipment. And not a good one. Do I think they deliberately include software that self destructs the minute after the warranty is up - no. But curiously my company started a campaign to contact prior users just before their equipment reached 3 years of age and the end of the on-site warranty period. My recommendation - backup your valuable files. Don't burn CD's. CD's have a shelf life and your next pc may not read them (learned the hard way on that). Copy them to an external hard drive or an external USB drive.
Next time go to HP small business solutions. They are the best. They replaced my laptop.
Oscar Morante
www.bestshortsales.com
www.rapidforeclosuredata.com
Sounds like I may the only person happy with their Dell & their extended warranty. Mine certainly paid off.
Bought the computer in 2001, was on the phone with the Rep when the planes hit the towers. I got the 3 yr. in house warranty since my office is in my house. Extended it for another 2 years. Had a major problem before the 3 yr. warranty ran out. We had a huge problem figuring out what was wrong, and would up replacing everthing one part at a time.
I've had to reload the hard drive 3 times in all those years, once just recently. Never had a problem with Dell. Never had to talk to anyone over seas either. Dell service has been superior in my opinion. They will help you reload an operating system for no charge, even out of warranty.
My registry got hit, causing a crash. We re-installed an operating system on the hard drive in parallel to allow me to access the drive, I saved everything, we reinstalled the next day. It didn't work righ, we reinstalled again the next day. Each day was a half day episode...all without cost.
We also purchased a Dell in April 2005. We had the extended warranty and one of the drives died. They sent a person out and replaced it within a day or so. We re-extended the warranty, just in case.
I'm embarrassed to say that while I back up my Quicken's checkbook, mostly because it asks me to, I have no idea how to back up my entire system. I know I should, I'm 49 freaking years old. I'm old enough to know better.
What I don't understand is we paid for the operating system. So why don't we receive a copy of the disc for re-boot? I had the same problem happen to a computer and when I called Dell they said they would need me to send them the computer and then they would re-install windows xp. I told them with a few well placed words that I wanted my copy of windows xp. Because I purchased it. Low and behold I received my discs from them. All of them. I don't know if it was the few choice words or not. Stand your ground. It took me a while but I was talking with someone in America and they solved the problem for me. As for backing up. I consider the online solution as the best alternative. In case your out of town. Thanks for the post.
Jeff - You paid for the license not the operating system. If you were to pay for the operating system your laptop would be considerably more expensive. Almost all of the manufacturers have switched to doing this because it is cheaper for them (honestly it astounds me that they can make any money on these things...), it is really simple to create your own disk if you want to.
Donna - it may be fairly new that they have started asking (at least on their website) if you would like a copy of the disk at time of purchase.
Donna, this happened to me too last December. Not a fun time. I feel for you.
I've been a Dell customer since 2004...bought my last computer from them that fried, as expected, about half way through year three in service...as most do. These gadgets are only designed to last up to about 5 years for the average consumer. Assuming you put as much stress on yours as I do on mine, Realtors should feel lucky to get a full 3 years of service.
For that reason, BACKUP EVERY WEEK (as I see you've learned the hard was, as most of us do). I keep a laptop ready to spring into action full time in a pinch (which also makes a good tool for taking the office on the road) and I also have an external hard drive with every file, fax and figure saved as a backup, just as it sits on my PC.
I do still experience minimal down time when a problem arises but it's usually caused by interruption in internet service, which rarely occurs anymore and only briefly when it does (unless, of course, a 200mile wide hurricane blows through and knocks down every tree in it's path!).
OH NO!! I feel your pain. My husband's computer crashed a while back. It had ALL of our vacation pictures for years on it...no other place. It broke my heart. Have I learned my lesson? Mostly. BTW...I bought a Dell also...and it keeps having all kinds of weird issues. I'm nervous. Thanks for the reminder! GBU!
Donna I too believe they set the crash timer to go off the day after the warranty expires. I too got frustrated at Dell because of some issues so I decided to go back to Gateway. I want to warn all of you DO NOT BUY A GATEWAY. The Gateway had issues straight out of the box and the service is horrible and the people are rude. Since the computer didn't work with the flat screen moniter that came with it straight out of the box and I needed it to use for work NOW I called for a replacement computer. They told me to send it to their factory and I should have it in 3 weeks. I couldn't wait for that so I took it to a local repair place who got it to work for a $100 repair fee. Gateway is not owned by the same people that originally owned it and they are rude. I will go back to Dell any day problems and all. BTW, there is a company that will back up your computer stuff but I can't recall the name. You can find it on www.kimkomando.com
I actually think through their updates they send something that makes it go awry. Because it always happens right as the warranty ends.
Donna - I know how you feel. The warranty is up and BOOM! the computer crashes. I now use carbonite.com. It's something you might want to look into... :)
Donna... I can fully sympathize with your plight. This happened to me too, a few years back in 2006. The warranty expired, so I called in the Geek Squad to help. There was nothing they could do at my home, but if I let them take my tower (desktop model), they were should they would be able to get it back up and running. Only 2% of the people they ever worked with they were not able to get any information back. Do you want to guess what category I fell into? Probably do need to. Yup.. the 2%. I NEVER backed up either.. why? Nothing ever happened.. until then. I know back up on a regular basis.. for that just in case incident. Thanks for a great blog.. I enjoyed the read.
I've also learned the hard lesson of backing things up... Not once, but twice. Now I back up weekly onto an external hard drive.
Oh my... I lost 2 hard drives last year in a 6 month period. Loosing all the information is horible. Now I have a exteranal HD and attempt to back up my documents ever 30-60 days.. this is still to far apart. Just last week during a update.. My pc went nuts on me and I was fortunate to be able to save my data as I had to crash back to factory settings !
Donna - a little. You mentioned this so I wanted to see what it was all about! Nice little start btw.
Donna, I'm so sorry to hear about your experience. How frustrating! Just wanted to let you know that we've helped launch a company (we were trying to help our clients save money during these economic times) that will give you a discount on things you buy everyday - like Dell, HP, Office Max, Home Depot, Target, etc. This free account will give you a discount plus cash back. And, if you shop during happy hour, you get double cash back. Ping me if you're interested. It could be a little salve for your Dell disaster. ;)
Exterior Hard Drives are fabulous. Back-up is quick and programs on the Exterior Hard Drives are built in to help make backing up easy. They are also great when you are try to sync your lap top with your desktop computer. They are so portable and make sharing your information with others fast and easy. Just make sure that you always keep your back-up exterior hard drive in a separate location from your main computer source. If both of your sources get destroyed in a fire or some act of nature you are in big trouble!
Check out Carbonite.com
I have to say I feel your pain, and there are always strange coincidences where technology is involved. I purchased a Gateway laptop at Best Buy a couple years ago. I also paid the $300 for the 3 year warranty. Worked fine for a couple years and because I was developing a lot of data and contacts and could not afford to lose them I looked for a reasonable means of backup.
Carbonite only costs $50 for a year, and there is no limit to the size of your backup.
Strange thing though. I signed up for the service, everything was installed and working fine, and then my laptop failed a week later. I took advantage of my warranty and was without my laptop for 2 weeks. When I got it back, I reformatted and installed my OS, set everything else up and downloaded everything I had backed up through Carbonite.
If I let the conspiracy theorist in me get the best of me I think Carbonite caused the crash, but I know better. It was a coincidence. I got lucky because I learned about Carbonite in time.
Donna - thank you your post. Because of it, I am reminded that I do not back up nearly as often as I should and I will be doing so tonight.
Tina in Virginia
You should contact a local 'puter guy. They may be able to get that data off there for you. My husband does this for people a LOT. But it only works if you don't ship it off or overwrite it.
William I too have the comspiracy syndrome. Like the HP printer I had before this one, I also thought it was the updates they keep sending you which somehow cause the thing to quit working so you will have to buy a new one. Carbonite was the back up company I was thinking of but now I am suspicious of them. There are no coincidences. LOL
The feeling of a crashing hard drive equals the pain of having my wisdom teeth removed. Now I back up every friday automatically and hope the whirling little drive never crashes on a thursday
Did you read my post about a year ago, I was so upset with Dell and their support. I actually had a Dell ex comment and offer support. He was very gracious and I'm sure they found the support person.
No matter I swore I'd never buy another Dell and I haven't. I got a new Sony Vaio two months ago and I back up every night to an external drive called Acronis. Works great and I sleep good.
Donna - I've heard about your Dell issues in the past and I am sorry that you still have problems. I am a Dell customer and I love my experience. I also paid for a 4-year warranty and in the time, I do plan to upgrade my computer every four years (or so). My last one has been good to me and now, this one has been great too.
My husband just sets up a time and the guy just comes on over like he should. So, I havent had problems.
I feel for you though!
Donna, a good reminder to all of us to back up what we have today!
Having your computer bite the dust is an awful thing. I had mine hit by lightning. Now I unplug it if there's a cloud in the sky. Good luck with the new one.
I had it worse with a Compaq I bought from Fry's Electronics. It went down in the first 30 days and they wouldn't cover it because I didn't buy a warranty. Go figure! One would think the purchase warranty would be for at least 60 or 90 days.
Oh my - this sounds sad. No matter how much any of us think we back-up it is never enough. All the best in getting through this.
I cannot stand Dell. I have to say my laptop finally bit the dust after six years. After I did not re new my warranty of course. The motherboard just went about one month ago. Now I will have to spend about $300 dollars to get it fixed. I will have to say that this will be my last Dell computer. I am thinking of going with Sony or HP next time.
Thank you, everyone, for your comments and support. Dell sent my install disk to the wrong address, imagine that, so I'm just now up and running... kinda... There have been so many comments to catch up on that I'm going to just give a very BIG, blanket thank you.
We'll see how long this hard drive lasts. Now, I have to switch to Outlook instead of Outlook Express as my husband is "demanding" me use the Calendar feature and sink with my phone... blah blah blah... This Outlook better be as easy if not easier than Express!
Hi Donna, Why does it seem like things like this always happen after the warranty expires or at the worst times. It's enough to dirve you crazy. Hang in there!
Sandy, That's why it's a conspiracy!! LOL