Dell Inspiron 5160 Blues

diarmuidmac

Hi All,

I've ran into major problems with my Dell Inspiron 5160 which many other people seem to have encountered also

I've created a Blog to document my problems and interactions with Dell Customer Support/ Service

http://inspironblues.blogspot.com/

Unfortunately I have 2 Big problems with this Laptop which has made me create this Blog.


1. It doesn't work . It's dead, deceased, a goner, kaput , asleep , fried

2. Dell Hardware support won't give me an extended warranty to fix what are Dell "Inspired" problems i.e.


The Dell Hardware Support technician I spoke with informed me that he had not heard of these problems before and that I would have to pay for the repair of my Laptop which I refuse to do as they are Dell manufacturing and design problems

The Solder seems to have melted or broken connecting the Power Jack to the Motherboard so that my Laptop cannot run off A/C power and the Battery cannot be recharged.


The Solder on the Network Jack to the Motherboard also seems to have melted / broke so that I cannot use a RJ45 network cable but I previously worked around this by installing a PCMCIA Network card.
But because My Laptop won't power anymore its gathering dust whilst I have important work and research which I need to use the Laptop for.




Class Action cases have been taken in the US ( the http://www.lundellsettlement.com/ ) , Canada with the US class action been successful whilst the other 2 are ongoing


http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/01/12/dell-suit.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dell_Inspiron


Dell in the Netherlands has agreed to repair Dutch computers following criticism in a consumer programme.

What I want from Dell is an extended warranty similar to that provided to US, and Dutch customers and which will shortly be provided to Canadian customers too no doubt.

Not much to ask for considering the good money I paid for this Laptop in '04 and Dell's capacity to deal with these issues.


I'm sure there are many more Irish customers and customers of other nationalities experiencing similar problems

Hopefully this page will document progress or lack of in finding a successful resolution ( i.e. a working laptop )

Regards,

Diarmuid

Calhoun

All Dell systems come with an option to upgrade warranty they nearly always try to push it on people buying. If you declined this offer and the 90 day standard one was all you got why do you think you deserver an extended warranty. Its not like the option wasnt there at point of sale?

diarmuidmac

Hi Darkener,

not sure if you read my blog properly but the problem is a badly designed motherboard which overheats and melts the connection....

Dell have admitted as much by offering extended warranties to US customers amongst others

We shouldn't expect any less just because we are in Ireland

Diarmuid

wheresthebeef

i had an inspiron 9100 (aka XPS Mark I) that constantly overheated and had "thermal events". it had a desktop P4 processor and a hybrid cooling system that wasn't worth a ****e.

the system temperature damaged my DVD/CDRW drive early in the laptops life, the drive would refuse to read discs. and there was no mechanical damage to it. at that stage the design flaws in the 9100 had become clear to me, and i tried to get dell to take the whole laptop back and give me a different model, but they would only replace the DVD/CDRW Drive.

Gurgle

diarmuidmac wrote:

Not much to ask for considering the good money I paid for this Laptop in '04 and Dell's capacity to deal with these issues.

You bought it in July(?) 2004.
You didn't take the overpriced extended warranty option.
You are left with your statutory rights, which I think are covered by the fact that it lasted 2.5 years. Not very impressive but not a total surprise for a Dell laptop.

Learn from your mistakes: buy a Toshiba and move on.

(Or, if you really want this one fixed, it shouldn't be too hard to find someone to repair the solder joints. I doubt if you'd get too long out of it before other components start giving trouble)

eamon234

I seriously doubt if the motherboard overheated badly enough to melt solder if it did the whole motherboard would have fried. Usually this problem occurs due to people using too much force when pushing the plug in over a long period of time. It's a bit late to be looking for an extended warranty now you have no proof that this is a design fault (Wikipedia isn't always the most reliable source of information either!). This is a problem with most laptops not just Dell I know several people with different brands who have had this problem and I have an Acer that had a similar issue (mind you my 3 year old dropped in on the ground!) but they fixed it under warranty. I know a few people (with very little electronics know-how) who did the repair themselves quite successfully it's a pretty basic soldering job. You're wasting your time chasing Dell on this unless the unit is under warranty.

Darth Maul

if you push them enough and mention the class action lawsuit in America relating to this model they will replace the motherboard, they replaced the mobo in my brothers last month outside the warranty,

Saruman

Statutory right as has been mentioned in hundreds of threads like this protect you for up to 6 years. So technically you are entitled to have it sorted by Dell regardless of what warranty you got. Hence the reason when you get a warranty it always at the bottom says "this does not affect your statutory rights".
No i do not have a link... do a search on boards and look up statuory rights or something.
Just ask for a manager or something, tell them you are taking them to the small claims court as this is covered by statutory rights. It only costs €15 to log it online so its nothing to you. He will probably not care nor even be aware of consumer rights though.

Either way, small claims court!

Oh and eamon234 you obviously have little experience with computers No offense! Plenty of laptops have problems like these. One that springs to mind is the Gateway Solo 5300 when it came out would overheat and melt the entire keyboard.. yes.. melted keys on your keyboard. Laptop still worked fine too other than that. A bios upgrade in that case sorted it.

Voipjunkie

Ring Dell customer support yourself don't just use the chat client

Voipjunkie

Darkener wrote:

All Dell systems come with an option to upgrade warranty they nearly always try to push it on people buying. If you declined this offer and the 90 day standard one was all you got why do you think you deserver an extended warranty. Its not like the option wasnt there at point of sale?

The laptop or any product is supposed to be fit for its intended purpose if it is a design flaw then the laptop was not fit for its intended purpose and as such the warranty is largely irrelevant

diarmuidmac

Result People - just received this email today ...

- See what happens when you push them enough and don't just accept their first couple of attempts to fob you off !

---

Dear Diarmuid ,

Thank you for your reply.

In that case, I will go ahead and replace the heat sink and fan for you. To proceed with the dispatch, please provide us with the following information:

1. Contact Name:
2. Address: (from your original order/ invoice)
3. Current Shipping Address:
Street Address:
City:
County:
Post Code:
4. Daytime Phone Number:
5. Alternate contact name:
6. Alternate Phone:
7. Also confirm your availability for the next two business days.

And let me know if you are facing any another issue or any other part is not working properly. So, I can replace the part at one time.

After I verify the information sent by you, I will arrange for the appropriate warranty service

Voipjunkie

Why are they just offering to replace the heatsink and fan??

Tom Dunne

I'm sorry, but I'm not convinced.

Firstly, I see from your blog you have worked in IT support. How much of that involved a soldering iron?

Secondly, as others have pointed out, the only mention of solder is in the Wikipedia article. Do you have any other links that prove it is the solder melting? I am finding this very difficult to believe.

Thirdly, what is the history of the laptop? When did it stop working? Have you visually inspected the motherboard for signs of over heating? Have you confirmed it is that the solder has melted?

Voipjunkie

tom dunne wrote:

I'm sorry, but I'm not convinced.

Firstly, I see from your blog you have worked in IT support. How much of that involved a soldering iron?

Secondly, as others have pointed out, the only mention of solder is in the Wikipedia article. Do you have any other links that prove it is the solder melting? I am finding this very difficult to believe.

Thirdly, what is the history of the laptop? When did it stop working? Have you visually inspected the motherboard for signs of over heating? Have you confirmed it is that the solder has melted?

http://www.lundellsettlement.com/casedoc/NoticeLetterSize.pdf

d. Motherboard replacements that are necessary to resolve “no power”
or “shutdown” situations.

That is from the 5150 settlement

Tom Dunne

Still no mention of the solder melting.

Voipjunkie

tom dunne wrote:

Still no mention of the solder melting.

No mention of the solder not melting either

It does mention a no power situation which is what the OP has and it does mention replacing motherboards in the case of such situations. It is not specific as to what exactly has to be causing the no power situation. As the problem is caused by heat it could manifest itself in different ways for example solder loosening.

Tom Dunne

Voipjunkie wrote:

It is not specific as to what exactly has to be causing the no power situation.

Exactly.

Voipjunkie wrote:

As the problem is caused by heat it could manifest itself in different ways for example solder loosening.

So we are moving from solder melting to solder loosening?

Vague and speculative conjecture is being presented as fact on this thread. The OP has registered for the sole purpose of gain publicity for his plight, for which I have some sympathy, but I am still waiting to be convinced the problem is as described.

If I am proved wrong, I will be the first to hold up my hand and admit it.

Voipjunkie

tom dunne wrote:

Exactly.



So we are moving from solder melting to solder loosening?

Vague and speculative conjecture is being presented as fact on this thread. The OP has registered for the sole purpose of gain publicity for his plight, for which I have some sympathy, but I am still waiting to be convinced the problem is as described.

If I am proved wrong, I will be the first to hold up my hand and admit it.

I have no idea what you are attempting to argue here

The settlement in the 5150 case does not specify a particular power problem this suggests that the problems are various and dell will repair if you have a power problem irrespective of whether it is a chip or a solder joint or anything else.

And I am not moving from anything solder loosening or solder melting or solder loosening because it is melting. It seems that you are looking for an argument. why?

Of course it is entirely possible that the OP has misdiagnosed the cause of the problem and perhaps the solder is in perfect condition but that is kind of irrelevant as Dell has admitted a fault with at least one type of laptop in that particular range of Inspirons and agreed to repair them.


While you may not be convinced the OP seems to have convinced Dell who have agreed to carry out repairs to the laptop even though it is out of warranty. I presume the OP is more concerned with convincing dell than yourself or anyone else and was trying to highlight his plight and see if anyone else had similar problems with those particular dell laptops.

diarmuidmac

Guys,

It's definitely the solder points melted / broken. Dell say they will replace heatsink etc. but also any other problem that it's having ( a warranty extension ) .

The history of the laptop is that it was treated with utmost care and attention and also with anti virus, bios updates, Xp service packs etc.

I'm the type of guy who hates getting a scratch on a Cd and laptop was the same.

It started when the laptop started to continuosly lose it's IP address which drove me nuts trying to diagnose.

Tried everything re. software troubleshooting and finally found that if i held the network cable upwards or wiggled it the IP address would renew / come back again.

Spoke with a hardware colleague who mentioned the solder joints so I got around this by installing a USB ethernet adapter.

That was about 6 months ago and then last week the battery icon started to appear in the system tray whilst I had the A/C adapter plugged in. I also found that by holding the cable upwards for a second or two it would start charging again but this finally stopped last week and my laptop battery died a slow painful death

Now this Laptop was always on a desk and was never on my lap because anyone who knows the 5160 which is a desktop replacement knows it's a heavy bugger and also the heat from the underside ( which i thought was normal ) so i can't accept that anything other than overheating and /or gravity caused these problems ...

diarmuidmac

Hi Folks,

the Dell hardware guy just left my house and my Laptop is alive again

He swapped out the motherboard for a new one. Must be cheaper than replacing heatsink and fan and in the process this cleared up the network and a/c jack connection problems.

He even ordered me a new dvd drive becuase the original one was missing it's centre spindle.

Have to give credit where it's due - i was extremely pee'd off with Dell support but after a bit of verbal and email sparring they've come up with the goods

JohnMc1

Same thing just happened to my Inspiron 5100. I can't use the AC adapter and the battery died. They quoted me €382 to repair it. I felt like telling them i could nearly get a new one for that amount.

mrsdoylesteapot

I appear to have the same problem with an 1150. Looks like the jack has become loose over time. Laptop is a few years old. I'll see how I get on with support. Not paticularly hopeful.

JohnMc1

mrsdoylesteapot wrote:

I appear to have the same problem with an 1150. Looks like the jack has become loose over time. Laptop is a few years old. I'll see how I get on with support. Not paticularly hopeful.

I was told it could be a problem with the Motherboard. They called me again to try and schedule a service with that €382 quote. I told them I am not interested in repairing it because I could nearly get a new one for that amount. I am trying to retrieve my files [photos, vidoes, favorite links, etc] off my hard drive atm at Quinn Direct in Kilkenny.

BostonB

Cracking of connections, solder etc, from external ports like ethernet, AC etc if very common on lots of laptop not just dell. It happens over time, on some model.

IMO you should have a warranty for the economic life of the machine. IE if its >600 warranty for a year, >1000 warranty for 2yrs >1400 warranty for 3 yrs etc.