I sent my HP laptop to the shop to get the keyboard and battery issue fixed. I asked about reformatting the hard drive, since I know that the knee-jerk reaction of all techs when faced with a laptop that doesn’t work right is to reformat—sorry, re-image—the hard drive. Last time, my problem was the laptop screen, which had developed half a dozen pixel-wide vertical lines in the display. This time, random keys were not responding to being depressed, and my battery died. Cool note on the extended warranty: Apparently, when you purchase the HP extended warranty, it also covers the battery (and woo-hoo! for that).
Before I sent in the laptop, I did a full HD backup. And then I wrote a note and taped it to my computer. It said, roughly, “The keyboard is not working properly and the battery is dead. Do not reformat the hard drive without calling me first!!” and then listed my phone number.
I checked on my computer repair online today, and found this under “Current status:”
Hewlett-Packard is currently trying to get in touch with you regarding the current status of your order. If we have been unable to reach you, please call us at the customer service phone number listed in the Contact HP section at your earliest convenience.
I called. The nice gentleman at HP asked what he could do for me. I told him that HP had told me to call them about my laptop repair, and that if they wanted to reformat my HD, the answer was absolutely not.
Guess what they wanted to do?
Yep. Reformat the hard drive.
I knew it. I asked if I could take the HD out this time, but the person I spoke to said they might not repair it without the HD available. I knew I was right to tape that note to my laptop.
I’m not a tech, but I can do a hell of a lot of work on my own computer. I’ve added RAM and various hardware to my laptops and desktops in the past. I can troubleshoot my own system with the aids provided by the manufacturer, and sometimes with a little help from my friend (hi, Jay from NJ). I think the problem here is that the computer repair system is utterly skewed toward those who don’t know anything about computers. While I think that’s the right thing to do, I think computer repair departments also need to have a little box on the form you can check that says, “Yes, I know what I’m doing, so leave my HD alone.”
What is it with techs and their insistence on destroying your data to “fix” your computer?
Feh. It’s not a virus. It’s a hardware issue. Hands off my HD, tech boys.
Ah, the joys of using the Windows OS; apparently, everything can be fixed with a fresh install…even hardware problems.
I think it’s since they bought Compaq. Back when my parents had one, every single tech phone call I made included the advice to reinstall the OS. I think they’re just lazy.
But to be fair, Windows is so byzantine and bug-ridden, that lots of software bugs can end up looking just like hardware failures.
That being said, this is one more reason why I prefer to do my own tech support. Replacing a keyboard on a laptop is usually pretty simple. Replacing an LCD panel (and/or the cable that connects it to the motherboard) is also usually not too difficult. You have to do some Googling to find a store that will sell the part, but that’s usually not too big a deal.
… And all that having been said, this is another thing I love about my Mac. Macs have a feature known as “firewire target disk mode”. You hold down “T” while powering-on the computer and it enters a mode where the whole thing becomes a FireWire hard drive. You can then use a simple FW cable to attach it to another computer, and access the drive to make a backup or perform other maintenance. So you can usually get your data out even when the system won’t boot, as long as the drive hasn’t actually died.
I’m not about to do it myself when I bought an extended warranty. Considering the warranty was a few hundred dollars, and they already replaced my laptop monitor, I think it was a great investment.
Plus, it covers lightning damage and accidental damage. Can’t beat it.
They had to destroy the village…er HD in order to save it.
Sounds like you got a pretty good warranty, although this stuff is why I usually advocate storing any data on a different drive/partition than the OS/Applications. I’ve had Dell support refuse to do anything about a hardware issue my grandmothers PC had until they could try re-imaging the HDD. If all the data is separate, its a lot less painful.
So basically, you hit a key on the keyboard, and it doesn’t work, and the battery is dead. They want to reformat the hard drive to fix the problem. Makes sense to me. [/sarcasm]
I wonder if all Dell needed to do to fix those flaming batteries was to reformat the hard drives.