Delltastic

So Dell is off my good list for the moment. From what I hear about the Dell company as a whole, it's really kind of hit or miss. For example, I had a Dell that never gave me problems for 4 years. However, several of my friends had brand new Dells that died while we were in law school.

Also for example, both of my parents have refurbished Dells that work great. I, on the other hand, picked up my refurbished Dell at the UPS station, brought it home, and noticed something odd happening with the screen. I changed the background several times, but there were still these weird, darker than the background color, flashing squiggles in various locations. And the squiggles moved depending on what background I put on the desktop.

This morning I tried Dell online tech support. I got the feeling that some sketchiness was going on when I told Sandeep the tech guy what the problem was and he said, "I see you have contacted us about this before." To which I replied, "Actually this is the first time I've contacted Dell about this since I just picked the computer up yesterday evening." Then the synapses began firing and I said, "Maybe the previous owner called about it and the problem was never fixed when it was "refurbished" and sent out to me."

No concrete reply. He just said he would have to replace a part to fix the problem. To which I said, "Wasn't that supposed to have happened when it was refurbished?" He said he could understand why I was annoyed.

Then I tried to nail him down on this issue and asked if the prior owner had called and he said that he wasn't sure. So then I asked him if anyone had called about this problem before and he said, "No, that was a different problem." To which I replied, "But you said before that it was the same problem...?"

No answer for a few minutes. Then he just asked if I wanted to take care of it and send it back to them to fix. I said not really, since I JUST got what was supposed to be a perfectly fine machine. So he referred me to Customer Care and the returns department.

Mendha in Customer Care was great. After I explained the situation, and threw in how the tech guy basically told me that the problem was there before it was even "refurbished," she offered to exchange it post-haste. I told her at this point I'd probably just like to return it. So she arranged for UPS to come to my work tomorrow and pick it up and there's no restocking fee or anything.

I think I may be taking advantage of Jason's school discount and getting a Mac.

******

On the job front, apparently someone talked sense to the client because now we can work up to 50 hours. Not as good as 60, but much better than 40.