Major Problem: MSI, XOTICPC, and Warranty

[RockTheHouse]

Hello! I'm relatively new to the LTT forums but have been a fan for years. I'm unsure as to whether this is the appropriate place to ask for help on this subject, and if this is the wrong forum please let me know and I'll do as I need to fix the issue.

February of 2019 I bought an MSI GP63 (GTX 1060 6GB, i7-8750h) from a third party seller, XOTICPC, for $1,205 USD. I purchased it through XOTICPC as they had it for cheaper and even provided some free peripherals. Bought on Amazon, had the laptop for right at 30 days when I discovered a severe issue. The keys were becoming so hot it was nearly unbearable to use. I began monitoring the CPU and GPU utilization and temperatures, and I discovered while my GPU was never spiking over 78c, my CPU was CONSTANTLY sitting above 90c. Did not matter what game I played (Dying Light, SWBF2, CSGO, LoL, and more) or what app I had running (Office Products, Steam, Chrome, etc.), I would either have consistent 90c or above temps, or I would fluctuate above 90c for a short period of time. 
1) I contacted XOTICPC asking for a return label and a refund, however I was told that because I was beyond the 30 days (day 32 of 30), I would not be able to receive a refund, and that I would have to pay for shipping to them for "warranty repair", who would then forward the laptop to MSI. I argued with them and Amazon about the issue, but they both were extremely firm on the 30 day return policy despite my issue coming up before the deadline. I paid for shipping to XOTICPC via UPS and was without the laptop for about a month.

2) Received it back and within the first 5 minutes I was able to replicate the same symptoms as before and immediately contacted XOTICPC. They refused to service me and insisted I speak to an MSI rep. Upon speaking to said rep and XOTICPC rep, I was nearly forced to pay shipping a second time, but I insisted since MSI and/or XOTICPC did not fix the issue as they promised, they should pay. MSI thankfully stepped up and paid for the shipping a second time, and I went just under a month without the laptop. 

3) Received the laptop the second time and again was able to replicate the issues. I made sure that this problem was not due to my room's temperatures or poor ventilation, and after several tests varying from resting the laptop straight on the desk, to two different laptop stands, to propping the rear end off the table, to even using the cooling pad provided in the original purchase as a peripheral, the problem remained. I attempted to undervolt to no avail, I reconfigured fan curves, adjusted Windows power settings, etc. 90c or higher temps were still the norm, even at idle sometimes. I contacted MSI yet again, and had two different reps insist that they were not held liable for this product anymore, and that whatever was going on was either a user-error, or "is something you're purposely causing to get a free laptop or something". XOTICPC at this point refused to take any calls or emails from me, and thus I contacted the BBB. 
4) I first contacted the BBB concerning MSI, then shortly after concerning XOTICPC. Was paired with a manager at MSI and I had a couple videos, pictures, detailed instructions on how to replicate every issue, etc. He insisted nothing was wrong with the laptop, but to humor me and to have this case ended as quickly (and as painlessly for MSI) as possible, he allowed me to send the laptop and evidence in to him personally. Upon him receiving the laptop, the issue persisted and he was able to replicate every issue. He ultimately replaced the GP63 with a GE63 Raider RGB edition. Upon receiving it, the issue persisted yet again, however MSI and my contact ignored all followup emails (including one where they failed to return an aftermarket SSD that XOTICPC installed despite insuring me they would include it in the packaging). The BBB was given no comment by MSI and they closed their side of the case, forcing me to close mine as "unsatisfactory/problem not solved". I also received the laptop with its "Factory Void" seal purposely broken. I have no way of proving this as I didn't take a video or picture of the unboxing, so I have no idea what this means for me.
5) Shortly after this, XOTICPC responded to BBB and insisted I was flat-out lying about this entire situation, and that I was malicious in causing laptops to overheat, on purpose, and that them forcing me to pay shipping originally was an error on MY part, that I REFUSED any sort of shipping label that was (not) provided by MSI or XOTICPC. I replied with a screenshot of both XOTICPC's warranty service and multiple emails stating that I was required to pay shipping the first time. Upon receiving this, XOTICPC refused to continue contact with the BBB and again the case was closed.
6) As I am a college student working part time, this laptop was a huge deal for me, a massive purchase. I want my investments to last, and to not have such insane issues such as this. Today playing R6S in a cold room by a ventilated window, vent, fan, I was consistently hitting 99-101c temps. This is what's prompted this post, as no computer should run in the 90c ever, not to mention over prolonged periods of time. While I had the GE63, a co worker of mine tested his HP Omen laptop with a 1050ti and the same i7-8750h on the same games/benchmarks I did and his CPU never went above 80c.

I'm sorry for such a long story. If I need to rephrase anything or break it down more (adding more details, dates, etc.) please let me know. 

My question in relation to all this is: What are my options for this laptop? Do I attempt communication with XOTICPC and/or MSI, BBB again? Do I forget about them and try to fix this myself?

I'm willing to try anything the community can suggest, as I must have a laptop for college, and due to my current IRL situation this laptop is my only way of playing video games. 

It also angers me so much to know that shady companies like XOTICPC, and even MSI, can get away with ripping off their customers, so I'd also like some advice on how to handle situations like this in the future.
Needless to say I will never again purchase a product from MSI or XOTICPC, and will think twice before purchasing something as significant as a laptop from Amazon, especially not knowing the return and warranty process/steps by heart.

[Shimejii]

High end Laptops Tend to be real shitty when it comes to gaming loads and high work loads. It may be just the laptop is poorly designed thermally and honestly thats generally what happens. Anything below 90c Is generally acceptable for laptop thermals with high end CPU's, and the beefier the cooling setup the heavier the laptops will get so its a battle between Weight savings, design, and thermals.

 

Based on some quick looking on the laptop it doesnt look like a super thin laptop, and im not sure what is wrong with the laptop. It very well could be a Bad thermal contact with the heatsink/ bad thermal pasting. Or Fan speeds may not be ramping up high enough to counter it etc. Could just be bunch of idiots who dont know what they are doing but are being paid minimum wage to look at a computer and say yeh its fine and not do anything about it.

 

 

Also BBB is a useless org and you shouldnt waste your time with them, they are completely powerless and do absolutely nothing, stop wasting your time with them

[RecoveringAnalyst]

Unfortunately I’m also going through bad times with an MSI laptop so I can commiserate. Mine doesn’t have thermal issues, but the build quality is terrible for a high end laptop. The conclusion I’m coming to accept is that MSI just doesn’t know how to make laptops. 
 

In my case, I purchased it from MicroCenter and in theory have plenty of warranty recourse, but that doesn’t help when I don’t have a laptop for weeks while it’s being RMA’d since that’s the obvious outcome for mine. The bad re-seller just sucks, I’m sorry to hear that happened to you. It would be better to contact Amazon about them than the BBB though - you can actually email jeff@amazon.com for Jeff Bezos their CEO and get a reply from their executive support team within 1-2 days (that sounds fake but it’s real, supposedly 20 years ago he replied himself). It might be more effective to let Amazon know that they have a seller that’s treating customers poorly, that’s more likely to motivate change from the seller than BBB. 

[Roswell]

This would have been a good example of when to call your bank or credit card company and submit a chargeback.

[Donut417]

22 hours ago, RockTheHouse said:

purchasing something as significant as a laptop from Amazon

To be clear, 30 days is pretty standard for a return period. You were 2 days past, no offence thats YOUR problem. US Federal Law only states the company has to offer a warranty, nothing about having to be refunded OR free shipping. Paying for Shipping is standard as well. I had to do that with my Acer Monitor and with my UPS. 

 

 

22 hours ago, RockTheHouse said:

Do I forget about them and try to fix this myself?

You can try to repate the CPU and GPU and see if that sovles the issue. Use some high quality paste, most OEM's use what ever cheap shit they have laying around. 

 

12 hours ago, Vitamanic said:

This would have been a good example of when to call your bank or credit card company and submit a chargeback.

Most compnaies have a limit to how long before you cant do that. So I think its like 30 days as well. So the OP would have been SOL. Also, doing this could get the OP's Amazon account banned. I have heard of retailers doing that before. SHIT a Guy in a diffrent thread had his Steam Account locked due to this. Valve pretty much telling them to fuck off and now he doesnt have access to any of his games. 

[Roswell]

15 hours ago, Donut417 said:

Most compnaies have a limit to how long before you cant do that. So I think its like 30 days as well. So the OP would have been SOL. Also, doing this could get the OP's Amazon account banned. I have heard of retailers doing that before. SHIT a Guy in a diffrent thread had his Steam Account locked due to this. Valve pretty much telling them to fuck off and now he doesnt have access to any of his games. 

That's incorrect, it's 120 days dictated by federal law. Amazon isn't going to ban you unless it's malicious, the chargeback cost is passed on to the third party seller.

[Donut417]

45 minutes ago, Vitamanic said:

That's incorrect, it's 120 days dictated by federal law. Amazon isn't going to ban you unless it's malicious, the chargeback cost is passed on to the third party seller.

Simple fact the OP was outside the return period as laid out by the retailer. And yes a retailer can and will ban a persons account if they feel the charge back was fraud. Valve has done it to steam users. Amazon has the right to refuse service to any one for any reason. Third party seller or not this does fall back on Amazon as it’s their site. This looks bad on them. Further more I’ve seen Amazon ban an account because they thought the reviews were fraudulent, but they weren’t. That person had to get prime refunded and had to make a new Amazon account as a result. 

[Roswell]

16 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

Simple fact the OP was outside the return period as laid out by the retailer. And yes a retailer can and will ban a persons account if they feel the charge back was fraud. Valve has done it to steam users. Amazon has the right to refuse service to any one for any reason. Third party seller or not this does fall back on Amazon as it’s their site. This looks bad on them. Further more I’ve seen Amazon ban an account because they thought the reviews were fraudulent, but they weren’t. That person had to get prime refunded and had to make a new Amazon account as a result. 

Return periods have nothing whatsoever to do with chargebacks. Further, no, Amazon passes chargebacks to the third party seller: https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/help.html?itemID=48781&

 

Amazon can ban you if it's malicious, though it's glaringly obvious that they don't do blanket bans for most people. You're acting as if submitting a chargeback is some immoral sin, it's not. It's an essential consumer protection written into law for situations like OP describes. Stop demonizing it. 

[Donut417]

35 minutes ago, Vitamanic said:

You're acting as if submitting a chargeback is some immoral sin,

No, but the OP has the product. Charge backs are for when you don’t get the product. Not for your not happy with the product. 

[RockTheHouse]

I originally was going to mail the product back to XOTICPC, leaving a note explaining that by the time this product reached their hands I would have already charged back, and proceed to charge back after a week or so. Nobody loses except XOTICPC for trying to sell me a crappy laptop.  My refund review date was 2 days late, yes, and that is my fault. However I provided ample evidence of a broken product and my warranty from XOTICPC being refused, they said themselves they were gonna just send it off to MSI at my expense. This isn't a used product, this is a brand new, un-used product that we're talking about here. A rather costly one at that. 

Also, my "happiness" has nothing to do with this, the fact is this laptop is literally a ticking time bomb that WILL fail at any time from its intended use. They failed to fix it, at my expense, upon sending it in twice, and sent me a "replacement" that gets just as hot as the first, under intended use. I bought this laptop because of the articles/blogs/videos I saw on this laptop, and that it would stay cooler under heavy load than it's competitor, the ACER Predator 300 that is similarly spec'd. It was also advertised to run cooler than what it actually does, so if you want to get technical this laptop does not meet its advertised performance. 

But as I figured there's nothing really to be done. I did email Jeff Bezos' executive team and I have received a response and am in communication, however even they said themselves I am now out of range of help. They advised me to next time make an A-Z claim and give as much information as I can, and am communicating with them about my issue with that. I made 3 of those, giving ample information, and all three were rejected because XOTIPC insisted they would eventually uphold their warranty, which was to receive the laptop, reapply thermal paste, check the fans, etc. and ensure this didn't happen again. All three times I did RMA they refused to have anything to do with it, even when asked by MSI. 

The take-away here is to avoid third-party sellers like XOTICPC, know return/refund policies by heart, and take what small companies like MSI say with a grain of salt, as they can be just as bad as XOTICPC as indicated by my OP. Thanks for the advice everybody and I appreciate it. I'll probably void the warranty (as the factory seal was already broken when I got the laptop) and just try to reapply thermal paste. Any suggestions on brand/spec of thermal paste to use? I don't need a ton of it, I'd like to have enough to at least do the CPU, and maybe even GPU. 

[Roswell]

39 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

No, but the OP has the product. Charge backs are for when you don’t get the product. Not for your not happy with the product. 

Again, incorrect: https://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/chargeback-dispute-charge-purchase.php

 

Look, I've worked in the industry before. If you don't understand a concept or law, you probably shouldn't be arguing about it. Chargebacks exist to protect against fraud OR faulty goods that the seller or manufacturer refuse to address after good faith attempts on the consumer's end have been made, which this is a perfect example of.