[Alex Ethridge]

I have a customer who purchased an HP computer about three years ago. I was with them when they got it. It was not something that had been on the shelf for some time; it was late stuff at the time, a P4 2800 with WinXP, 200-Gig drive and 500 Megs of RAM. I called HP today to replace the main board and they said it is no longer available.

There used to be a federal regulation that required companies to stock repair parts on major appliances sold in the US for a period of ten years. I know that regulation has been changed for computers; but, it seems HP has cut this one way shorter than reasonable.

We could replace it with another brand of board; but, our system recovery would no longer work and we would have to purchase another copy of Windows XP.

I think HP is hanging their customers out to dry.

[hewee]

Wow that does not sound right doing things like that.
I see from looking at there web site that you pay for the added Warranty and service options from 3 to 5 years so how do they fix things under a Warranty?

[Alex Ethridge]

Well, in this case, with no warranty parts, they would be forced to give a new or refurbished computer of equal or superior grade--if they had bought such a warranty. Frankly, I advise against such warranties. The payout for dollar intake on those warranties is very low.

In their case, they have owned about ten computers so far and this is the first one that has failed before replacement so if they had bought a warranty on all ten they would have so far spent far more than the cost of replacement of the one.

Besides, this is a business and they need broken computers running either the same or next day do those kinds of warranties are useless to them as they usually take about a week or more.

[tdi_veedub]

Typical big box practices. I'm not surprised. This is why I never recommend proprietary formats unless replacement warranty is purchased. What one would save in cost buying from big box is spent in warranty, so what do you really save? Nothing. Instead you get spyware crammed down your throat, hardware not necessarily designed for your needs, and bundled software that most people never use.

Much better to spend the warranty money on more specific hardware/software that suits you individually. Hardware-wise, if it's going to break, it will already be broken in which case, it's an easy return.

[hewee]

It still sinks because it sounds like they have the parts but are just say no to you.

[Alex Ethridge]

I found the part on their web site last night and it was priced at $173. Even if it were available, I would not pay $173 for a seriously outdated board. They can stuff it.

I'll either get another Gigabyte board or use the machine for parts; I haven't decided yet.

[hewee]

Wow that is good and bad because of the price.
Good luck on getting the PC going again.

[Alex Ethridge]

I've decided to part it out.

[hewee]

And I bet there is no Warranty on the parts.

[Alex Ethridge]

Really? You think so?

[hewee]

He hee just having fun with yea.