My Acer Lasted Barely a Year

by Denise
(San Francisco, CA)

Too many problems for a laptop which I used for emailing and text editing only.

In May 2006 I bought an el cheapo Acer Aspire 5100. Although I have never used this laptop for any of the graphically demanding programs, its LCD died in April 2007, exactly seven days before the end of the one-year factory warranty.

I emailed the Acer manufacturer and got their response instantly, repair ticket opened, and the laptop shipped for repair. It came back fairly quickly, with a new video card installed, and I was impressed by the quick and highly professional response.

But alas, right out of the box, the laptop didn't work again. I could hear it rebooting, but there was no picture on the screen. So again I had to open a new service ticket and ship it back for additional repair.

This time, because my manufacturer warranty expired in the meanwhile, I had to present my case to every CSR (and there were a few) since the repair was now supposed to be covered by the 6 weeks service warranty.

When I finally got that straightened out, and this time it took a while, the laptop performed without any problems for maybe a couple of weeks. At that time I noticed that my battery was not charging.

I assumed the problem was with the AC adapter - I couldn't tell since it didn't have a control light. So I went to the factory website once again and bought a new adapter. But that didn't help.

I called the Acer tech support and they walked me through the troubleshooting procedure, but that didn't help and they suggested I send it back, this time for a service which wasn't covered by any warranty.

I took the laptop to the Circuit City repair kiosk, as that's where I bought it from at the time, and they suggested I buy a new battery and start from there.

At this point I had enough. Went on line a found myself a new el cheapo Dell.

To be continued...