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While drooling over American’s enormous choices of Dell notebook and configurations, I have encountered this error on Dell website.

We are sorry: XML Error: A start-tag was not matched with an end-tag

Match your tag Dell! People need your PC urgently, nah… just kidding 😉

*Same XML error happens on both Firefox and IE, can’t blame the browsers this time.

Dell Home Systems Inspiron E1505:

I sent my HP notebook to Harvey Norman on Monday, up to now (Friday), still no calls from those guys, ya… another “good” service from such a big company.

Anyway, after the incident on Tuesday (read Call from HP Service Center Regarding My Notebook » Internet Technology Blog|Gadgets|Reviews|Hypes|News), I still haven’t any calls from both Harvey Norman and HP service center regarding my “suspected mishandled” notebook, I decided to call Harvey Norman to find out the outcome.

1.25pm – no one pickup

1.40pm – no one pickup too

2.10pm – finally someone pickup, after giving my service form number, still no news from HP service center. I told the guy on the Tuesday incident, they promised to call HP center to find out (I can’t deal with HP directly, my extended warranty was bought from Harvey Norman)

3.00 pm – No calls yet.

Well, seems like I will have to make more calls next week, well done for the ‘good’ customer service, making the customers chasing after you is a surely a smart move in improving your business in the future, keep it going…

I was using my friend’s Acer Aspire 5540 notebook (mine went to service center). One strange thing that happened was his notebook making a long one second beep like every ten minutes.

I am pretty sure the beep was coming from pc speaker because the main volume has been set to lowest setting.

At first I thought it was from the battery full indicator, but after using ac adaptor directly, same beep still coming out randomly.

CPU usage is not high and so as the temperature , so ruled out overheat problem.

Searching in the Net for similar problem I found the following:

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Anyone facing this strange beep problem on your Acer notebook?

One thing: Acer notebook keyboards flex! The keys went down too much when I typed, nothing to complain… begger can’t be chooser..

Random Beeping… [Archive] – Notebook Forums and Laptop Discussion:

The true story is about an old man who sent his pc for repair and was told the service center has exchanged his old defective hard disk with a new one. What happened to the old hard disk with sensitive information inside (social security number, credit card info, bank statement, where you live, your phone number)?

The service center said they will drill a hole on the old hard drive. Few months later, some stranger called the old man saying he just bought the old man hard disk from a junk yard sale. He has got the phone number from the hard disk itself.

No body knows how the hard disk which was support to be drilled a hole went to a junk yard sale.

‘I just bought your hard drive’ – The Red Tape Chronicles – MSNBC.com3

Note to myself: Try not storing any sensitive information of a hard drive, encrypt it, password protect it, or do what I did with my old hard disk: dissemble it, take out the two super powerful magnets and use the platters as cup cover (the thing you put under your hot cup of tea, forgot the name 😉 )

Continue from my previous post, i found also the pricing for intel processors

Intel Price List

From the price list above, we can see the price for both core duo and core 2 duo processors.

T2300 (1.66G) same price as T2400 (1.83G) also same for T5600 (1.83G) = USD241

T2500 (2G) same price for T7200 (2G, but with extra 2MB L2 cache) = usd 294

The rest see for yourself… My point is, why is it so? Why dell, compaq and acer selling core 2 duo notebook much higher than core duo notebook, while the prices are the same for processors with same speed but different generation? Is this a normal practice in pc industry?

Gimme my core 2 duo, suckers!

Search Results:

While looking for the definition of ‘mishandling’ from hp website, i found the Maintenance and service guide document for my notebook.

My notebook being a tiny-winy celeron m 1.5GHz processor is a sucker for battery juice. It do not have speed-step technology not like its big brothers, such as pentium m, core duo and core 2 duo.

From the service guide, I found that the processor is upgradeable with the following processors

Intel Pentium M 745 (1.8-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 373053-001
Intel Pentium M 735 (1.7-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 373052-001
Intel Pentium M 725 (1.6-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 367771-001
Intel Pentium M 715 (1.5-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 383431-001
Intel Pentium M 715A (1.5-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 380690-001
Intel Celeron M 370 (1.5-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 383876-001
Intel Celeron M 360 (1.4-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 380033-001
Intel Celeron M 350 (1.3-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB
380032-001
Intel Celeron M 320 (1.3-GHz) with 400-MHz FSB 394734-001

Feeling itchy handed, I thought why dont I upgrade to a Pentium M processor, if the price is reasonable.

Guess what I found on HP Partsurfer site?

Pentium M 715 for USD 600
725 for USD 700
745 for USD 1150|?!?!

Hello, crazy ar? for USD  1150 I can buy a nice entry level core 2 duo notebook already..better go find 1 in pasar malam (night market)

siao eh..

http://partsurfer.hp.com/cgi-bin/spi/main?sel_flg=partinfo&template=main&cpric=&psrchmode=&partsrch=373053-001&submit.x=1&submit.y=7

Awaken by a phone call this morning around 10am. Call from HP service center. First asking for my gf’s address (the notebook is bought under her name,as well as the warranty).

What’s the problem, you afraid I stole the notebook, then got problem and I send back to HP for repair? What kind of stupid thief you think would do that? Use some brain.

Ok, back to the story, after telling the girl that my gf is outstation now, she then start to ask me whats wrong with the notebook. C’mon, it was written clearly on the repair report. You cannot read ar? duh!

Anyway, after telling her that the notebook cannot be on, by battery or by ac adaptor, she straight away proceed to tell me that they suspect its motherboard spoilt.

Wait a minute..something fishy here, how come suddenly you become so smart, 1 second after hearing the problem, can straight away got the brain suspecting the motherboard ar, why not the Internal DC-DC converter, Internal AC adapter, Processor board or System board*.

*The parts name are taken from HP M2000 series notebook maintenance and Service Guide.

What makes me really blur and angry is she said if they believe it was my fault (the exact word she used is “mishandling”), then the 2 years extended warranty that I bought along with the notebook will not cover for the cost of the problem.

Come on! I get it now, first she acted dumb saying don’t know what is the problem with the notebook (which was written cleary of the service form), hoping that I was not technically sound enough to know the cause, then she can acted dumb on me giving all kind of shitty excuses.

Then after hearing me stated cleary whats wrong with the notebook, using BIG words like ‘power supply’, ‘ac adaptor’ and ‘power indicator’ (alright, not exactly big words here ;), she then threatening me saying ‘we suspect its your fault, you purposely ‘mishandling’ the notebook, we ain’t going to repair for you for free, muah hahhahah! (last part added by me, of course).

Excuse ME?! ‘Mishandling’? I was using the notebook one minute before,afterwards I close the lid when I went to a meeting, which lasts for half an hour, when I came back, it was totally unable to on,you call that mishandling? BTW, I totally cannot find the definition of ‘mishandling’ on HP website, it was not in their “Limited Warranty and Technical Support” in file c00318165.pdf and “Compaq Hardwre and Software Guide Compaq Notebook Series Document Part Number 383110-001 383111-001″  in file c00563764.pdfC00400869.pdf (previous number was meant for M2000 series, mine is M2200 series)

Which bring to my conclusion that their motto is “customer always wrong”, if the cost of repair is beyond their profit, they will use any excuse to blame the users, to avoid the repair cost at all cost (no pun intented)

Really frust!