I'm not dead

But my computer was.

Published on April 7, 2004 By dharmagrl In Gadgets & Electronics

After reading Brad's blog about how his Dell died on him the other day, I went to bed thinking that I was superior because MY Dell was just fine...

..then the motherboard died on the less than 12 hours later. I had tried to restart and kept getting the proverbial 'blue sceen of death' with a weird error message on it. So I took the tower down to the local repair place to have them look at it.

First they said it was the hard drive. So I told them to put in a new, bigger one. They did that, and kept getting an error message. They worked on it for over 3 hours...and finally came to the conclusion that it was the motherboard, and being as I had a Dell and Dell are so secular when it comes to replacing stuff they wouldn'd be able to fix it for anything near a reasonable price - it's cost me less to purchase a whole new system.

To say i was upset ia a huge understatement. This PC was just over a year old...and the warranty had expired 11 days - count them, 11 FUCKING DAYS - prior to this happening. When I called Dell Tech Support to see what I/they could do, the response I got was "well, you shoulda got the extended warranty, shouldn't ya?". I cannot print my response to that statement. Some of you have seen me go off on certain people around here....let's just say it was much, much worse than that. They then offered to finance me a while new system (it was going to cost just as much to get a new tower as a complete system) I said that it would be a cold day in Hades when I purchased another Dell PC and hung up.

The thing thata really gets me about it is that we have a Gateway Astro, our first computer, that Dave's using up in Greenland - we've had that thing for 5 years and have never had a problem with it. This Dell was supposed to be 10 times better than the Astro...but it fucking dies, and dies in a dramatic way, after a little over a year.

As luck would have it, I found a new company in town who had a used tower they could rebuild for me, for a little over $200. It's Windows 98, yes, but at this point I really don't care. I could have gone and got a HP or Compaq, but we're leaving the country this fall and I really didn't want to touch the savings account if I could help it. This new (to me anyway) tower works, gets the job done, and cost me a relatively small amount of money. As far as I'm concerned, it's sufficient. It's actually a lot quicker than I thought it would be - I went back and was hanging with the techies while they tested it and even they were surprised at how quick it was. (I leant some stuff whilst I was back there...I want to go back and hang with them again actually, it was kinda fun to see towers with their guts hanging out...hard drives and modems laying around, pretty damn cool)

So, for all of you who though I was dead because I was missing for a couple of days, I'm sorry to disappoint you. Brad's article jinxed me (hey, I have to blame it on SOMEONE and he's the convienint choice!

) I am alive and well, recovering nicely from my withdrawl symptoms because I couldn't get on the 'net for a couple of days..and I intend to make up for lost time by blogging my ass off for the next couple of days.

Comments

GemCityJoe

on Apr 07, 2004

Pity! GCJ

dharmagrl

on Apr 07, 2004

Pity I'm not dead? Or pity my computer died?

InfoGeek

on Apr 07, 2004

Your computer's not dead. It's resting. It's pineing for the Fjords!

IG

dharmagrl

on Apr 07, 2004

Either way, it doesn't work anymore, and either way I'm still pissed off and will NEVER buy another Dell.

I still want to know what GCJ meant...

Redshirt #3

on Apr 07, 2004

I'd be warry of Compaq too. I've had some... issues with their tech-support. And, if I remember correctly, they always come in near or at the bottom of Consumer Reports tech support ratings (unless they've improved lately).

dharmagrl

on Apr 08, 2004

Cool, thanks for the advice. like I said, we have a gateway and have never really had too many problems with it...so I think that we may go for them again. Having said that, this new tower is amazingly quick and has a LOT of memory (256) so I may just stick with what works and not get another one for a while. I can always add on to this one, right?

MadPoet41

on Apr 09, 2004

Hey Dharma~I got Windows 98. Been having lots of trouble with my computer too. But mine was bought second hand for $110 (even came w/printer..). So I'm satisfied so far. Had it for 6 months. It crashes lots. But I just defrag, and do a virus scan~and everything seems to be back to normal for awhile. I am amazed by how you can write and write and everything is so thoughtful and well-written. A real gift! I'm not prolific like that. Writing (especially poems) is like pulling teeth for me. But I guess I must be a masochist.

. So thanks for this. It was really nice to read. GOOD LUCK WITH THE COMPUTER!!

~MadPoet

P.S. I did manage to come up with a new blog (all about Sir Peter), and it was one of the easiest things I ever wrote! I mean, it took me like maybe an hour? Normally I can work on a blog for 2-3 hours, and still wanna work on it some more. But humorous writing is so easy for me to write! That's so weird~given all the clinical depression stuff, blah, blah, blah...(Oh, I missed you A LOT when you vanished for those 2 days you mentioned...)

dharmagrl

on Apr 09, 2004

Mad-
I was running windows XP, and to be honest I like windows 98 better.

Writing for has always come easy...but writing poerty can be like pulling teeth too. I get blocked a LOT. I have dry spells of days, maybe weeks, then all of a sudden it's like some turned the faucet on and I can churn stuff out left right and center..then it dries up again. I'm pondering what to write poerty about at the moment...the burst of activity is coming, I can feel it. I just don't know if I'm going to be brave enough to post any of what I write....I'll email it to you beforehand so you can critique me first, k?

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