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jstevens44
n00b
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2004
- Messages
- 53
I just put it on the counter and opened with "There's a crack in the hinge." That seemed to work fine for me.
jstevens44 said:
Not for me. I just returned from BestBuy with my original laptop. They told me that since I didnt have a service policy I would have to return it to Emachines. I told them about memo and they still said It would have to go back to Emachines.
They even went so far as to have me call corporate on the phone at the store. Still no dice.
I asked to see the memo/toolbox... and they said "There is no memo" And he said i wasnt the first to come in with one.
Customer (dis)service doesn't know anything about any thing, especially the 6805 hinges. Once I went to the Geek Squad / Computer Repairs counter they seemed all to happy to exchange my 6805 for a 6811. I think the technician and I enjoyed the beauty of the situation equally.
Re. the memo, when I put the 6805 on the Geek Squad counter they immediately punched "6805" into their memo system and proceeded with the swap.
Re. the memo, when I put the 6805 on the Geek Squad counter they immediately punched "6805" into their memo system and proceeded with the swap.
Hate to burst your bubble... but it was teh Geek Squad that sent me home. I went immediately to them.
I walked in, showed them the crack and they asked "Do you have a service policy"
"No. But there is a recall on the laptop. There should be a memo about it in your system. A toolbox?"
"You still have to send it back to the manufacturer. Its older than 14 days and you dont have the service policy"
"I spoke to corporate already, there is an memo. They told me to bring it in"
"Do you have a case number? No, well lets see. Here call them..."
3 calls later and 35 minutes.. No dice.
And before i left i asked to see the memo. And he said "There is none." If I could have jumped the counter to search his system I would have.. And the guy from Corporate on the phone couldnt access any memo on it from his system.
FYI - East Hanover NJ store.
I may drive 20 minutes to another Best Buy....
I walked in, showed them the crack and they asked "Do you have a service policy"
"No. But there is a recall on the laptop. There should be a memo about it in your system. A toolbox?"
"You still have to send it back to the manufacturer. Its older than 14 days and you dont have the service policy"
"I spoke to corporate already, there is an memo. They told me to bring it in"
"Do you have a case number? No, well lets see. Here call them..."
3 calls later and 35 minutes.. No dice.
And before i left i asked to see the memo. And he said "There is none." If I could have jumped the counter to search his system I would have.. And the guy from Corporate on the phone couldnt access any memo on it from his system.
FYI - East Hanover NJ store.
I may drive 20 minutes to another Best Buy....
Blasterboy460
[H]ard|Gawd
- Joined
- Aug 2, 2002
- Messages
- 1,610
i have a 6811 with a crack how would i got about swapping mine? just tell them that all the m68xx series have them and to look for a memo? because i dont have the extended warranty
I've seen the "memo" and it's not really clear. It's a simple blurp on ETK saying that there are defective emachines batch and swap something. I'll post word for word later on but let me say how it goes.
Basically, it's a double edged sword. A) Either a Best Buy will refuse the exchange "probably because you didnt get the service plan".B) Or they will exchange to encourage customer loyalty.. If you're getting a m6811 out of the swap then you've found a B store. If you get a swap, you are incredibly lucky that the techs or there are retarded or the management is very accomodating(spineless). If you are refused, you found A. If you want there to look for the memo, tell them it's in (Employee Tool Kit) ETK, in the news, about 1-2 months back.
From a business standpoint, I would put myself in A. Anyone exchanging a 6805 should be getting a 6810 because you match spec for spec UNLESS the customer wants to pay the difference to get the 6811. No rebates are supposed to be offered but if you get some, the emachine rebate probably wont work after you send it in.
It's amazing how a lot of people say they wont shop at Best Buy again but you see them 2-3 weeks later.. If you go to my store, I'll make sure to send you to emachines to get the hinge fixed.
EDIT
--------------------------------------
Oh unless if you're from the HF, then I'll let it slide.
Basically, it's a double edged sword. A) Either a Best Buy will refuse the exchange "probably because you didnt get the service plan".B) Or they will exchange to encourage customer loyalty.. If you're getting a m6811 out of the swap then you've found a B store. If you get a swap, you are incredibly lucky that the techs or there are retarded or the management is very accomodating(spineless). If you are refused, you found A. If you want there to look for the memo, tell them it's in (Employee Tool Kit) ETK, in the news, about 1-2 months back.
From a business standpoint, I would put myself in A. Anyone exchanging a 6805 should be getting a 6810 because you match spec for spec UNLESS the customer wants to pay the difference to get the 6811. No rebates are supposed to be offered but if you get some, the emachine rebate probably wont work after you send it in.
It's amazing how a lot of people say they wont shop at Best Buy again but you see them 2-3 weeks later.. If you go to my store, I'll make sure to send you to emachines to get the hinge fixed.
EDIT
--------------------------------------
Oh unless if you're from the HF, then I'll let it slide.
Vesentac said:
Vesentac,
Thank you for a look "behind the curtain". Is there any number or reference id for the memo. When I went to my store the guy said there was no memo, nor a ETK. There was no way to force him to look (although.. i thought about it!)
jstevens44
n00b
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2004
- Messages
- 53
When I brought in my M6805, they swapped it with no problem. I had the service warrenty though. When it came down to the swap, they did it by price and pretty much nothing else. The M6810 was the same price then as the M6805 when I bought it, so it would have been an even swap. I opt'd for the M6811 and paid the difference. It was a $200 difference, but there was a $100 rebate, so really it's only a $100 difference. That was last week. The new M6811 had an issue with the Music button at the top and the touchpad. The music button didn't do anything and the touchpad was going in an out. Nothing that makes the laptop unusable, but it's really really annoying when you're trying to work on it. I just brought it back and swapped it out again. The serial on this new one was xx48, so I shouldn't have the hinge problem...which makes me happy. Another thing everyone might consider is this. I had to track down a store with the M6811 in stock. I asked if they were getting more in, and I was told they were not. I contacted emachines about this and they told me that they supply the stores every quarter with new merchandise. The next quarter is coming up and they are bringing in a new line of laptops. The new models will be out soon with bigger and better stats than the M6805-M6811. If anyone has a swap to make, they have the extended warrenty, and they want a newer machine, just wait. Hell, I may "find something wrong" with my laptop and exchange it again for one of the newer ones if it's worthwhile. If they're just a tad faster, like they're running 3500+ instead of 3400+, then I won't bother. If the graphics card is better and everything else in general is pumped up, it may just be worth it though. Just a thought for everyone.
Does anyone have an inside scoop on what the new machines are going to be boasting? The guy at emachines claimed not to know yet.
Does anyone have an inside scoop on what the new machines are going to be boasting? The guy at emachines claimed not to know yet.
Strike two.
I brought it to a different store and spoke to the manager. He looked the memo up in the computer and found it but refused to do the swap. His reason? It couldn't possibly be for my computer since its 9 months old and the memo is 2 months old. Even though Emachines has personally told me that my computer is one of the bad batch.
He said "It can't be your batch since its from January..." I asked to see the memo to see what batches it covered and what exactly it said (I only read it partially from shoulder surfing) and he said "I can't do that. Its against policy"
The funny thing is that he didnt even check any numbers in the memo against the numbers off my computer.... he just "knew it couldn't apply to mine"
I tried to go over his head..but there was no one higher there! The store manager is in on Friday.
I explained that this swap has already been done at other stores...his reply was to "go to that store then. Unless I get a written letter from corporate.. I won't do the swap"
If i only had a copy of that memo....
I brought it to a different store and spoke to the manager. He looked the memo up in the computer and found it but refused to do the swap. His reason? It couldn't possibly be for my computer since its 9 months old and the memo is 2 months old. Even though Emachines has personally told me that my computer is one of the bad batch.
He said "It can't be your batch since its from January..." I asked to see the memo to see what batches it covered and what exactly it said (I only read it partially from shoulder surfing) and he said "I can't do that. Its against policy"
The funny thing is that he didnt even check any numbers in the memo against the numbers off my computer.... he just "knew it couldn't apply to mine"
I tried to go over his head..but there was no one higher there! The store manager is in on Friday.
I explained that this swap has already been done at other stores...his reply was to "go to that store then. Unless I get a written letter from corporate.. I won't do the swap"
If i only had a copy of that memo....
Phantom said:
Ohhhh yeah. But I used my wifes "PT Cruiser" as the example. He said "It couldnt be your batch.. that memo is from Sept. Your batch is from January" I said "did it mention a certain batch number or serial number?? Did you check that?" He repeated coldfaced "It couldnt be your batch, yours if from January"
When I asked to compare the numbers to what was in the memo.... thats when he refused to let me see the memo. We both know... my batch was in the memo, it was only Him who didn't want to acknowledge this.
if i only had a copy of that memo....
Best Buy (Dublin, Ca) had no idea what I was talking about when I contacted them this morning. No memo, nothing in the system. He even asked the other guys there, no one had heard a recall or a swap program for the 6805.
I'll try and give eMachines a shot and see if I can get this thing fixed. I've noticed the flickering the past few months, but until I saw this thread today, I never noticed the big crack in the left hinge. Odd. Just wish I could have resolved this through Best Buy today rather then having to ship it back.
-izike
I'll try and give eMachines a shot and see if I can get this thing fixed. I've noticed the flickering the past few months, but until I saw this thread today, I never noticed the big crack in the left hinge. Odd. Just wish I could have resolved this through Best Buy today rather then having to ship it back.
-izike
jstevens44
n00b
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2004
- Messages
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With emachines you have to send it to them, but with the Best Buy warrenty you can just bring it in to them and swap it. To me, it's worth the extra money.
Before exchanging my 6805 at BB I called eMachines about the cracked hinges. They said they would replace the clam shell to repair it.
Exchanging for a better model seems cooler to me, would the BB service plan guarantee the ability to exchange at the store or might they just replace the clam shell?
Exchanging for a better model seems cooler to me, would the BB service plan guarantee the ability to exchange at the store or might they just replace the clam shell?
jstevens44
n00b
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- Aug 19, 2004
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From what I understand, the emachines laptops are not servicable by Best Buy, so they replace it if an issue comes in. They replaced mine for the cracked hinge issue and then again for an issue with my touchpad not working correctly. The emachines fall under something called DEVO or DIVO or something like that. It means that they get replacement costs from the vendor, so they just replace all units that come in with new ones.
Someone over on notebookreview said they only do the swap the first year and after the first year they send it in or they'll replace but it'll be the end of the PSP. I read alot about BB sending in things for repair and they'll keep it for weeks or months, so I wouldn't want them to send it in. Is that true after the first year thing? Maybe someone that works at BB can confirm.
I have the extended warranty and it says that after the manufacturers warranty expires (1 Year) REPLACEMENT of the merchandise fuffills the terms of the warranty, Repairs only do not end the warranty.
I went from an m680 to m6809 to my m6811 with no problem.
I went from an m680 to m6809 to my m6811 with no problem.
Just because you have a service plan doesn't mean it will be replaced. usually laptops can be replaced the first few months then after that we have to send them to our service center for repair. It depends on if we have a deal with the manufactuer to give us credit for returnd products. But most computers are sent to service with an average wait time of 2 - 3 weeks, but at the moment it takes about a month since they changed repair places again and the whole system was trashed for a few weeks.
If you have to bring one of the e-machines in I would goto the Geek Squad bench first but you experience there will all depend on how the bench is managed. At my store we usually try and do whatever we can to get something replaced, but at other stores the techs are only there to boost sales and not do anything else.
There is a constant struggle between mangement and geek squad at my store, it's even gone as far as cutting our hours for doing what we are suppose to do. We had "training" with a bunch of stores one time and it was amazing how some of the techs only cared about boosting sales, at one point my store had to tell then to fuck sales and fix shit, of course they were the ones asking all the dumb questions like how to remove spyware.
The whole point of geek squad to boost customer service but that has failed miserably due to mangement not wanting to change and only caring about sales.
Back on topic....
Tell them that the memo is in Employee Toolkit and to look it up, but really it al depends on if you have an ass running the bench or someone with any real knowledge.
If you have to bring one of the e-machines in I would goto the Geek Squad bench first but you experience there will all depend on how the bench is managed. At my store we usually try and do whatever we can to get something replaced, but at other stores the techs are only there to boost sales and not do anything else.
There is a constant struggle between mangement and geek squad at my store, it's even gone as far as cutting our hours for doing what we are suppose to do. We had "training" with a bunch of stores one time and it was amazing how some of the techs only cared about boosting sales, at one point my store had to tell then to fuck sales and fix shit, of course they were the ones asking all the dumb questions like how to remove spyware.
The whole point of geek squad to boost customer service but that has failed miserably due to mangement not wanting to change and only caring about sales.
Back on topic....
Tell them that the memo is in Employee Toolkit and to look it up, but really it al depends on if you have an ass running the bench or someone with any real knowledge.
The[H]uman
Secret Agent Man
- Joined
- Feb 16, 2001
- Messages
- 5,608
jstevens44 said:
Yes it's called DEVO and it means that what you are buying is JUNK in english and that the manf. has given BB the option of just tossing it in the trash DEVO means dont fix just toss out.
I was Dist. Tech for BB for a few years and I know what i'm talking about GL on your exchanges guys and the reason some stores will exchange and some won't depends on there Store ranking and there #'s for that week.
If the #'s are good then manager ass isn't sore from Corp. = you will get a exchange
Three strikes.. I'm out.
Ive tried to do the swap at 3 different BestBuys. The final one today took over an hour, went thru the store management and they said they couldnt do the swap because I bought it at bestbuy.com (and 'its past 14 days, if you bought it here we could do it, but since you bought it online we have no way of returning it").
And this was with the toolbox internal memo in hand. It was like they wanted to do it.. but didn't know how. It finally ended when the manager came from behind the back office and handed me the phone. On the phone was Emachines tech support who was ready to issue a RMA for the repair. Its hard to argue my point then. "They will fix it for you"
But.. I have the memo now and Ill post a scan of it tomorrow. Maybe it will help out someone else.. It was of no luck to me.
The memo says:
Department News
Defective e-Machines
There is a batch of e-Machines notebooks with bad hinges. They tend to crack more often than others. Luckily, the problem seems to be limited to only one batch of notebooks.
Customer Service is aware of the situation and they are quickly replacing units for any customer who call. ((thats the confusing line.. they possibly mean Emachine customer service NOT bestbuy customer service
DEVO any defective units in the store and return them through the normal return process for credit.
Date: 09/03/2004 2:36:21
Store/Loc #: 990
Item#: 169228
Topic: Miscellaneous
((Number at top of page says 0468:SW14))
Ive tried to do the swap at 3 different BestBuys. The final one today took over an hour, went thru the store management and they said they couldnt do the swap because I bought it at bestbuy.com (and 'its past 14 days, if you bought it here we could do it, but since you bought it online we have no way of returning it").
And this was with the toolbox internal memo in hand. It was like they wanted to do it.. but didn't know how. It finally ended when the manager came from behind the back office and handed me the phone. On the phone was Emachines tech support who was ready to issue a RMA for the repair. Its hard to argue my point then. "They will fix it for you"
But.. I have the memo now and Ill post a scan of it tomorrow. Maybe it will help out someone else.. It was of no luck to me.
The memo says:
Department News
Defective e-Machines
There is a batch of e-Machines notebooks with bad hinges. They tend to crack more often than others. Luckily, the problem seems to be limited to only one batch of notebooks.
Customer Service is aware of the situation and they are quickly replacing units for any customer who call. ((thats the confusing line.. they possibly mean Emachine customer service NOT bestbuy customer service
DEVO any defective units in the store and return them through the normal return process for credit.
Date: 09/03/2004 2:36:21
Store/Loc #: 990
Item#: 169228
Topic: Miscellaneous
((Number at top of page says 0468:SW14))
Here you go.. be gentle to my server!
Now if only i could get mine swapped.
JPEG Version
PDF Version
Now if only i could get mine swapped.
JPEG Version
PDF Version
Has anyone had trouble with 6811 not responding? I've had mine for about a week and twice it has locked up solid. Once It was just running windows media player and the second time I was doing some light weight CAD work. The unit has successfully chugged through some heavy duty CAD work, the type of stuff that keeps the CPU busy for a few minutes.
The machine's history was open box, restore Ghost image from my 6805, install XP SP2, ran for a coupf days then crash #1, today crash #2, uninstalled Speedswitch XP, now USBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB is having issues where the keyboard hesitates or gets stuck as you see with all those B's. There have also been a lot of skipped characteeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeers.
The lock is a lot like a heat problem but my office is about 65 farenheit today so I hope that's not it.
Latest antivirus installed and AdAware was run yesterday.
The machine's history was open box, restore Ghost image from my 6805, install XP SP2, ran for a coupf days then crash #1, today crash #2, uninstalled Speedswitch XP, now USBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB is having issues where the keyboard hesitates or gets stuck as you see with all those B's. There have also been a lot of skipped characteeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeers.
The lock is a lot like a heat problem but my office is about 65 farenheit today so I hope that's not it.
Latest antivirus installed and AdAware was run yesterday.
jstevens44
n00b
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2004
- Messages
- 53
I've got an M6811 with SP2 and I don't have any problems at all. It could be that you ghosted from your M6805. Theoretically they should have the same software, but who knows. I had a cracked hinge on my M6805 and traded it in for the M6811. I know when I had my M6805 it came with a trail version of Office 2003, but the M6811 does not. So there are software differences. Who knows, maybe it's some sort of crazy driver issue, but I doubt it. Try backing everything important up and run a fresh install from the M6811 restore disk, then install SP2 before you do anything else on the machine. That's what I did and it's been working great for me.
skiguy said:
I restored my 6805 ghost image onto my 6811 with no problem at all. XP recognized the different hardware. I rebooted and everything was fine. Didn't even have to reactivate XP or Office 2003. Then I installed SP2 and still no problems. I wouldn't think ghosting from your 6805 to your 6811 would be the cause of the problem.
scatpack said:Here you go.. be gentle to my server!
Now if only i could get mine swapped.
JPEG Version
PDF Version
Thank you!
Hi, I bought my 6805 in the early days. During the time it was often $1299 after rebates at Best Buy, plus hard to find instock.
I've posted in this thread many times, but it has been many months so I missed a lot.
I heard about this cracked hinge situation from a guy at work. And I see that memo now you guys posted. I'm wondering if there is a common model number or something so I can check if mine has a high probability of cracking.
I don't use my laptop fulltime, and I usually open it carfully. The only problem I have is it sounds a bit creaky when opening and closing than it use to. Which part cracks around the hinge, is the silver area on the screen case, or the silver on the laptop?
Oh, and what's the situation with SP2. I just installed it because I was having odd icon problems, SP2 fixed that, but now my function keys don't work. For example, trying to dim the screen results in a hardlock.
Thanks to anyone who replies and brings me up-to-date
I've posted in this thread many times, but it has been many months so I missed a lot.
I heard about this cracked hinge situation from a guy at work. And I see that memo now you guys posted. I'm wondering if there is a common model number or something so I can check if mine has a high probability of cracking.
I don't use my laptop fulltime, and I usually open it carfully. The only problem I have is it sounds a bit creaky when opening and closing than it use to. Which part cracks around the hinge, is the silver area on the screen case, or the silver on the laptop?
Oh, and what's the situation with SP2. I just installed it because I was having odd icon problems, SP2 fixed that, but now my function keys don't work. For example, trying to dim the screen results in a hardlock.
Thanks to anyone who replies and brings me up-to-date