4 ms·

Also consider warranty, repair, and accidental damage protection: My Surface Pro 3 had extended warranty, and there used to be stores to drop into. I had many

by dade_ 5y ago

Also consider warranty, repair, and accidental damage protection: My Surface Pro 3 had extended warranty, and there used to be stores to drop into. I had many problems with the machine, but the horrible part was that they could only be swapped out, so I had to restore my data (easy) and setup windows all over again (kill me now). This has been addressed with their ‘for business’ series with removable SSD. My mother, never drops her laptop, works in dusty environments, uses the same computer for years. No ADP, no extended warranty, I just replaced her Asus laptop she has been using since 2013 without any hardware issues. Remarkable. My friend, who is careless, has endless problems with his HP, and requires ADP. His last machine lasted barely 3 years and has been into the depot at least twice. He wants on-site this time as he was without a machine for a week at a time. I had a Lenovo with full extended on-site warranty. Machine was a damned nightmare for problems, but I was never without a working machine. I am careful with it, it hasn’t been abused, and I believe it was a product design problem. Lenovo sent out many parts and technicians and finally contacted me to apologize and address the obvious satisfaction issue. They replaced it with a completely different model that I am happy with. My Gigabyte gaming laptop is an older beast. 4 years old, no extended warranty. From a computing perspective and hack ability, I generally love it, but there have been problems and not one of them is resolved. Their support is through a terrible web portal that takes days to respond, and after weeks of back and forth, they will offer to let you ship the device to them for a repair estimate.

analog31 5y ago
I admit that I'm probably kind of a contrarian here. I tend to buy cheap refurbished laptops from NewEgg, something reasonably recent but not utterly leading-edge. I've told people: My warranty consists of being able to throw it away and buy another one with the money I've saved over the years from following this strategy. I'm also fortunate that for me, a lot of "development" time is spent sitting and scratching my head, so my laptop doesn't really need awesome computing power. My computer is more or less a half-smart terminal. That's just related to the kind of work I do of course. These days, same strategy for desktops and cellphones. An amusing story: I was checking out of Best Buy one time, and the cashier offered me an extended warranty. I told her: "I have a plan through my bank that covers everything I own." Of course she took the bait and asked me what the plan consisted of, and I told her: "The contents of my bank account." Fortunately she had a sense of humor about it.

by dade_ 5y ago

analog31 5y ago

I admit that I'm probably kind of a contrarian here. I tend to buy cheap refurbished laptops from NewEgg, something reasonably recent but not utterly leading-edge. I've told people: My warranty consists of being able to throw it away and buy another one with the money I've saved over the years from following this strategy. I'm also fortunate that for me, a lot of "development" time is spent sitting and scratching my head, so my laptop doesn't really need awesome computing power. My computer is more or less a half-smart terminal. That's just related to the kind of work I do of course. These days, same strategy for desktops and cellphones. An amusing story: I was checking out of Best Buy one time, and the cashier offered me an extended warranty. I told her: "I have a plan through my bank that covers everything I own." Of course she took the bait and asked me what the plan consisted of, and I told her: "The contents of my bank account." Fortunately she had a sense of humor about it.