Dell support does LITERALLY nothing.

[DripplessNewt]

I had the wonderful opportunity of dealing with Dell support today over what I think is a modern standby issue. The first redflag was when the person introduced themselves as part of the "Dell Social Media team". We talked about my issue and they asked to be let into remotely control it so they could try and fix the issue. I said sure because I was stumped. So they did that and proceeded to run a test (i forget the exact command but it looked like it was verifying system 32 files). Next they looked into the power settings (just looked, opened some microsoft support pages but didnt actually scroll to read?), viewed the CPU performance, and then called it good.

Anyone else experienced this kind of BS from Dell? 

[Hellowpplz]

18 minutes ago, DripplessNewt said:

I had the wonderful opportunity of dealing with Dell support today over what I think is a modern standby issue. The first redflag was when the person introduced themselves as part of the "Dell Social Media team". We talked about my issue and they asked to be let into remotely control it so they could try and fix the issue. I said sure because I was stumped. So they did that and proceeded to run a test (i forget the exact command but it looked like it was verifying system 32 files). Next they looked into the power settings (just looked, opened some microsoft support pages but didnt actually scroll to read?), viewed the CPU performance, and then called it good.

Anyone else experienced this kind of BS from Dell? 

I never contact dell over software issues because even if they do fix it, there is always a million loops to jump through, mostly them repeating tons of steps and being slow in general, as well as ignoring information that I have given about steps I have already done as well as details of the issue. Unless a piece of their tech has PHYSICALLY broken in some way I don't contact them. Same thing goes for most other companies. If I have a software issue, i go here, a discord techhelp server, or reddit (last resort)

[DripplessNewt]

Probably what I am going to start doing.

[Ha-Satan]

Dell consumer-level customer support: I would literally rather buy a new computer than deal with them.

 

Dell business customer support: A+, some of the best customer support I've ever had the pleasure of dealing with.

 

Unless you're buying computers in bulk and have a service contract with them, Dell doesn't care about you at all.

 

I still buy a bunch of Dell stuff for myself since it's so easy to find cheap used business-class Dell PCs on ebay and they usually still work great.

[ARandomPerson]

Why am I not surprised? I remember having to Karen my way through just to get a replacement display assembly to repair my sister’s laptop. I was able to buy it but I would not want anyone to go through that song and dance. Tech support just sucks in general.

[David A. Tatum]

The CPU fan in my Dell laptop (an Inspiron 16) started seriously malfunctioning about two months after "purchase" (I was given one, outright, as a work benefit; this was not my first bad experience with Dell, and I would not have bought one by choice).  I could diagnose it instantly, just from hearing it.  It came with a year of "Premium Support."  I spent over a month playing e-mail and phone tag with Dell's tech support, trying to get them to fix it.  They kept trying to fix the obviously malfunctioning fan (that even the tech on the phone could hear was performing badly; damn thing was causing the whole laptop to vibrate and rattle) by updating the BIOS and various drivers.  Finally, I was told that no, I couldn't get a local tech to fix it -- the local tech could replace the fan, but couldn't do the "extensive testing" to ensure that the fan was the actual problem (which of course it was, but they weren't even giving me the option). 

 

I had to mail it in using "prepaid" shipping (which included tracking, but was the slowest shipping possible).   Took them a week to send the special "box" they required I use to ship it to them in.  Took it another week for the package to get to Dell.  They fixed it in practically no time, and obviously didn't test to see if it was fixed (according to the FedEx shipping tracker, the time between when the package arrived at Dell's office and the time they sent it back was about twenty minutes.  Curiously, it was enough time for them to unnecessarily wipe the drive and re-install Windows... but they didn't re-install their bloatware, so... win? If it weren't for some distinguishing decorations on the laptop case they couldn't have replicated, I'd think they just swapped my laptop for a different, identical laptop).

 

All told, it took them two months to replace my fairly new laptop's CPU fan.  If it hadn't been a laptop with proprietary parts (I later learned were available on Amazon), and still under warranty, I could have fixed it in five minutes.  No real apology given for the delay.  If I'd known it would take that long, to heck with the warranty -- I'd have spent $20 to buy the fan off Amazon and replaced it, myself.  Next time, even if it's available for "free" from my work, I'm not getting a Dell.

[seanondemand]

FWIW my partner’s xps had the premium care, and one of the keys stopped working. We had a tech to our house in three business days (part had to be shipped, that was one day). 

[starsmine]

4 hours ago, Hellowpplz said:

I never contact dell over software issues because even if they do fix it, there is always a million loops to jump through, mostly them repeating tons of steps and being slow in general, as well as ignoring information that I have given about steps I have already done as well as details of the issue. Unless a piece of their tech has PHYSICALLY broken in some way I don't contact them. Same thing goes for most other companies. If I have a software issue, i go here, a discord techhelp server, or reddit (last resort)

look, you should ignore anything a user tells you about what steps they have already done. That's troubleshooting a PC not yours 101. 

The chance PC owner is being correct or truthful with you is less then 50%. People will often either misunderstand what is being asked of them, OR will just lie and say they did a step because they think it does not mater (and they may be right, but you don't know them or the issue yet). 

[Hellowpplz]

8 hours ago, starsmine said:

look, you should ignore anything a user tells you about what steps they have already done. That's troubleshooting a PC not yours 101. 

The chance PC owner is being correct or truthful with you is less then 50%. People will often either misunderstand what is being asked of them, OR will just lie and say they did a step because they think it does not mater (and they may be right, but you don't know them or the issue yet). 

Well I do not have all day, because this is ignoring how slow they are to do each. The first and last time I gave them access to my computer, they sat afk for about 10-15 minutes before typing in the chat "can you restart your computer".... I don't have all day for this. They literally did not even move their mouse, nothing opened on my computer. And after I restarted it they sat there for another 10 minutes before going into device manager and deleting something and restarting my computer themselves. Then after that I reconnected, they sat for another 10 minutes, and then they closed the connection and said I need to bring my laptop in.

Then I had no laptop for a week. Cool. And when i got it back all my files were gone. To clarify, my trackpad had stopped moving the cursor (still could click).