Tuesday, December 1, 2009

At Their Mercy

I fired up the laptop Sunday to learn it was no longer "recognizing the AC power source." Called customer support and, after 20 minutes of being on hold, learned that this problem is apparently so common the guy could diagnose it within the first 2 sentences out of my mouth, and tell me I need a new motherboard. I need to send it in to the manufacturer so they can replace it. I had about 40 minutes of battery life left, so I had to then quickly dump my most important docs (e.g. the novel, family pictures) to my back-up hard drive. And I'm now awaiting a box they are sending me so I can send my laptop to them, which they can then send back to me, fixed, in about two weeks.

The laptop is less than six months old, so the replacement is free. But it is shockingly difficult to be without my laptop, even though I have a work desktop in my office upstairs. What, I can't edit the novel while making supper tonight? I can't check Facebook while on the toilet? They've made me (okay - I've made myself) utterly reliant on having a laptop by my side at all times. So now that it's broken, I'm utterly reliant on them.

Scary.

5 comments:

Sabra said...

Well, and the scary question is whether or not they have actually fixed whatever the glitch is and why haven't they issued a recall if it's so damn common?

Is this mac or pc?

I went mac after I needed two pc laptops to get me through grad school. Dell's screens kept glitching out -- expensive, non-warrantied repair.

Hilary said...

Oh.. Brillo pad to scrub my brain, please. That Facebook checking position was a visual I could have lived without. ;)

I hope your baby is repaired and returned shortly.

Eric said...

It's tough, isn't it? My laptop is all I've got, and part of the reason I haven't gotten some somewhat necessary repairs on it is I'm afraid it'd be gone for a few days. I'd be completely up a creek. As much of a luddite as I claim to be, I use the thing all the time.

meno said...

Sadly, my laptop is "my precious."

I feel for you.

Clowncar said...

It's a PC, Daisy. My first laptop lasted years and years, and worked like a top til it got sick earlier this year. This one didn't last 6 months. Grrrrr...

Hil, sorry to have offended your delicate sensibilities. You'll never be able to look at Facebook again without thinking of me being on the toilet (ha! did it again!).

It really is kinda disturbing, Eric. My left mouse button's been broken on it for a month (I spilled Orgina on it) and I couldn't part with it for the 2 days it would take to get fixed.

Meno, do you say it in that creepy way like Schmiegel ?