Ibuypower Laptop Repair and Driver Problems
Friday, November 11, 2005
An "Ibuypower" laptop came in for repair here last week. This computer was shutting off and misbehaving in general.
The laptop had a couple of problems. One, the hard drive was bad. Two, it was shutting off due to overheating. Cleaning the exhaust out and applying new heat transfer paste to the processor cured the overheating issue. Replacing the hard drive cured the bad hard drive problem. Then the FUN began!
Well, trying to find drivers was just a blast. ATI's drivers would not work on the Ibuypower laptop. We had to find some aftermarket video driver made by a gaming site. Taking apart the laptop revealed the wireless card was an Intel 2200BG card and we obtained the driver from Intel's website. The modem, sound and Ethernet were not identifiable. So here we have this almost new Pentium M 1.5Ghz laptop w/ Centrino sitting here with no sound and no way to get on a network.
We looked up and called Ibuypower. They actually refused to give us the driver. We told them we were a repair center and then called again pretendign to be a home user. They absolutely refused to give us drivers or even tell us the name of the products used in the laptop. That forced us to dig deeper. You see, we will figure out every problem but when companies like that make us work a little harder it just takes the fun out of it all.
Anyways, we dug. It turns out that the ibuypower laptop is an ACER laptop with their sticker on it. That is correct, the ibuypower laptop is an acer laptop. So, we just went to Acer's website and downloaded the drivers for their laptop. They even had the same model #.
posted by AbsoluteRaleigh @ 7:00 AM,
1 Comments:
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At 7:59 PM,
razorback said...
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I have had massive compliance issues with IBuyPower in regard to their RMA department and the initial order, below I have included an excerpt from the last letter I have sent them demanding compliance.
"To start out, I’m going to describe my experience with your company so far. Initially in June of 2005 I became excited about your line of notebooks and their capabilities. I decided to purchase one to test the capabilities and offer my recommendation to the president of my company in terms of an upcoming technology purchase. I ordered a colored notebook with the 5 business day shipping option and the shipping took over a month due to the color (this was never disclosed during the order confirmation or credit card entry). After it was not shipped in 5 business days I became somewhat agitated and called your company to find out that the shipping date was expected to take 2-3 business weeks. The mystery with this is why your company did not immediately refund the 5 business day rush shipping option. To be totally honest, by the time I received the notebook, I was very angry with your company. Even with the inconvenience that your company had caused, your company still declined to offer any sort of resolution to expedite the shipping and provided no form of compensation for the major inconvenience.
Within 2 weeks the notebook ceased to function and I had to send it back to your RMA department. This really snapped with me and I filed a BBB complaint against your company about your product quality and misleading advertising. The BBB complaint went through without a resolution as your company still has the misleading product information on your site. Eventually after another month or so I received the notebook and it worked for several months with minor issues. Near January 23, 2006 your company received the notebook for a second RMA service request since the notebook ceased to function off of the AC power cord. So far I have sent the RMA department several emails regarding the status of the notebook, but in both cases they have failed to respond in a timely manner (within 3 business days). Although the first time may have been my fault since there was a typo on the RMA number, the second time has not been my fault. Since it seems that your systems go back to the manufacturer when they go through your RMA department, it seems that the RMA department should have all day to answer emails."
I have found their business practices to be fraudulant and I intend to pursue action through the Federal Trade Commission (www.ftc.gov) as the BBB does not have the authority neccesary. I think it is part of the social responsibility for people like us involved in the technology industry to out the bad corporate practices like those of IBuyPower. With this, I am starting an internet campaign that anybody that has had compliance issues or fraud from IBuyPower should file complaints with both the BBB and Federal Trade Commission. It is the nature of both of these organizations not to take action without a number of complaints being filed.
