Newegg refuses to repair defective laptop because user installed Linux

I recently discovered that bad software can really cause hardware to fail. I switched from using the proprietary AMD fglrx drivers to the open source radeon driver a few years back. For some time, my notebook has been running pretty hot after being powered on for a few hours, even when idle. I always put this down to a dust-blocked heat sink. When the problem persisted after cleaning out the fan and heatsink and replacing the thermal grease, I started to research other causes. Turns out that clock gating, a technique that clocks down the gpu when it is idle in order to save power and reduce heat output, is disabled by default in the open source radeon driver [1]. However, I discovered this too late - the constant overheating has already seems to have damaged the gpu to the point where random color artifacts appear on the screen and the system will freeze after being powered on for a few hours.

So as it turns out, Linux may really be bad for your hardware. Still, there's no way I'm going to stick with Windows on my new notebook.

[1] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ATI#Powersaving

What you say is completely incorrect.

Linux distributions (keyword: distributions) have often shipped in a default configuration which can result in damage from overheating. There's no need to accuse the OP of "messing with something he doesn't understand."

Vendors often perform QA on hardware to ensure that it operates properly in conjunction with an operating system. When hardware is designed such that it requires particular operating system behavior to prevent damage then it is absolutely reasonable to require that operating system be used to maintain the warranty. Closing the lid of a laptop is completely normal behavior -- and it's a fact that many linux distributions ship with a configuration that will not properly suspend the device, leading to potential damage.

This is not a matter of "user unfriendliness." This is primarily a matter of hardware vendors limiting their testing to the behavior of certain operating systems (and thus limiting their warranty -- you can't warranty what you haven't tested; what isn't well-specified). I wouldn't be surprised if Apple refused to warranty a device which had Windows installed on it.

There's no need to get religious here. It's merely an issue of vendor support, and hardware which relies on particular OS behavior to operate safely.

The point he is making is Newegg shouldn't have to warranty a defect in a user-installed OS, not whether or not Linux is user friendly.

Do you understand the meaning of the word "anecdotal"?

I think almost everyone carries a laptop in a bag, and most don't have ventilation. The problem was that even though my linux configs were set (correctly) to sleep when closing the lid, it would often get prevented from sleeping by a program or driver that didn't respond properly to the sleep request. I did mention the case where Windows had a similar issue.

I was only trying to show that the OS and Software can play a big role in the health of the hardware. Software bugs can cause hardware failure, and a notebook not going to sleep when the lid is closed is usually a bug unless it is specifically configured to do that.

Wrecking things with a default build is still an option with binary blobs and sneaky variant hardware. Our dev team standardized on the x120e's a while back; the first one or two were great, but the second batch had a serious flaw in about half of them -- the fan speed reported to the kernel is inverted. (How you invert a PWM count, I've got no clue.)

Same distro, same config, and half the batch has a death wish, shutting down the fan in response to increased CPU temp.

>It is a matter of you messing with something you didn't understand, jamming the machine in a bag to overheat, and then having to replace the battery.

Wrong.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AsusZenbook#Suspend

>If this workaround not used, there have been reports that the laptop's memory controller setting may be screwed. After an incorrect suspend, if the corruption happens, many memory blocks starting with ~1G will be corrupt. Good way to see it is to use "memtest86+". The only way to fix controller setting is to open the case and plug off the battery. Please note that on this ultrabook the battery is not a user serviceable part and this could mean that by opening you can get your warranty void! If you start Windows or Linux with a corrupted controller, you will get system crashes or/and damaged file system. More info here: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=42728 and https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/962798

Am I the only person that images my manufacturer's HDD when I first get a new box? I thought that would be fairly standard operating procedure for any geek who wants to avoid this sort of crap.

For every warranty repair I've ever done with a manufacturer they have asked for the HDD to be removed before sending the unit in. As a retailer, or maybe even just a drop shipper in some cases, I just don't see NewEgg doing anything other than replacements.

I certainly wouldn't expect, nor trust, Amazon to do this.

Yes it should. Blaming the OS is like blaming a userspace program for a kernel panic.

Weird, because every now and again my Macbook will just die after waking up. I also find that while initially it was really fast and worked great, it's now really slow and takes up to 10 seconds, while my linux laptop (which doesn't even have an SSD) wakes up pretty much instantly

My apps crash frequently after I wake up on Lion.

Both me and my father have had "sleep" incidents with our macbooks where the computer ran at full blast with the lid closed in our bags until they were too hot to touch. I'm on Lion now and I still occasionally have this problem. Apples are not immune, but I agree that they are the best at sleep and wake I've had so far.

Some of the newer PCs aren't too bad with this. My desktop sucks with sleep, but the two laptops I use are pretty flawless (though one's battery is terrible). I haven't shut one down in 3 weeks, and the other in a week. They're pretty standard, too; the good battery life one was around $600.

Haven't used a Macbook, though, so can't compare.

Because it is part of the agreement with Visa. You purchased something that came with an agreement, they didn't hold up their end so you can reverse the transaction. End of story.

Partly because it just is. Partly it is because with a debit card you would have to fight to get your money back whereas with a credit card the provider would have to fight either you or the retailer to get their money back if there is a dispute.

Debit cards carry reversal rights as well - at least in the United States. It's simply a mechanism to protect credit and debit card holders against technical issues, quality issues, fraud, etc.

Way easier IMO and I have done both.

A debit transaction processes as an EFT against your checking account. A credit transaction goes through your credit card company. You don't get the liability coverage Visa/Masetercard/Amex offer you when you pay with a debit card - its up to you and your bank to try and get your money back, not the big credit card companies' lawyers/fraud departments.

It doesn't cost the credit card company any money to to a chargeback, they just shaft the merchant whether the chargeback is legit or not. It's not like the merchant is ever going to stop taking Visa or Mastercard -- they'd lose way too much business. On the other hand, consumers are much more likely to switch credit card vendors if they get a better deal or better service elsewhere.

For a long time, there was no mechanism even to protest a charge on a debit card, so conventional wisdom has always been that credit cards were superior. Another poster here seems to be indicating that that's not the case any longer, but I haven't seen evidence of that claim yet.

From an outsider trying to reason why that's the case, this is what I've come up with: when you pay with a debit card, the money was yours, and now it's theirs: it's effectively an immediate transfer from your account to the recipient's account. When you pay with credit card, on the other hand, you promise the credit card company to pay some amount of money, and the credit card company promises to pay the merchant some amount of money. Credit card companies pay merchants in batches, not for each individual transaction, and so there's a significant amount of time before any money actually changes hands. Furthermore, even if you contest a charge after money has changed hands, the credit card company will simply withhold the contested amount from the next batch payment to the merchant, who is under contract with the credit card company to resolve the dispute appropriately or simply lose the money.

Credit card companies have a lot more leverage than individuals to lean on companies to respect their own return policies.

All new major debit cards come with the same ability to chargeback and coverage for bogus charges. But as mentioned elsewhere the major difference is that the debit card uses your money for a transaction and the credit card uses the bank's money. You could claim that the bank wants to get their money more than they want to get you back your money, but realistically it's probably more that the system is setup better currently for credit cards.

But the my vs. the bank's money is the reason I use my credit card almost exclusively for in person and online purchases. If I go to the Kwick-E-Mart, and pull out my PayPass (or other RFID) enabled credit card and someone snipes my credit card number from it as I swipe for cheetos, I'm fine if it's a credit card. They can run up 20k in charges on my credit card and I don't care (even if the credit card company doesn't stop it), I'll call my bank and tell them that they need to fix that, and probably go find a bad guy, also, I'm not paying that.

If they run up 20k in charges on my debit card before I or my bank notices, I am missing $20,000 from my account. Then I have to hope that the bank can and will fix it before my bills are due.

If used properly credit cards are month long interest free loans with no risk if someone steals the loaned money. Debit cards are wooden door to your bank account with a really aggressive, sleepy, deaf hound that you have to sic on the bad guys after you realize your money is gone.

I think it boils down to the Truth In Lending Act [1] requires credit card companies to provide more protections than the Electronic Fund Transfer Act [2] requires banks to provide. And according to Wikipedia, the TLA is ~10 years older than the EFTA, so at one time only credit card transfers were protected at all.

And regardless of the law, it kind of makes sense. A debit card transfers money directly from your account to the vendor's account. With a credit card they have to get the money from Visa, and Visa has to get the money from you. If you say, "This isn't what I wanted, I'm not paying," it doesn't matter with a debit card because the money is already gone. Visa isn't going to get screwed, so if you threaten not to pay, they're not going to give money to the vendor until it's settled.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_in_Lending_Act

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Fund_Transfer_Act

Yeah I was surprised by those changes as well when I had to return something. The CSR I spoke to apologized then sent me a prepaid label and charged me no restocking fee.

So great customer service but the charges almost seem arbitrary when the CSR can just apologize and wipe them out...

Wow ... I've spent thousands of dollars on merchandise from Newegg and it's a bit sad that it may have come to an end. What I really appreciated was competitive prices and excellent service. Perhaps you can't have both and stay in business.

It's a very sad day.

Heh, me too. Also, I just discovered http://pcpartpicker.com/ yesterday. Looks pretty cool. I might do my research there and buy on Amazon. I might feel a little less guilty. :) The restocking fee policy (which screams "shady retailer" to me) on Newegg is only reason I stopped shopping there.

OTOH, Newegg seems to have a much larger catalog of tech items than Amazon.

Also the search feature on Amazon is quite bad: try searching for '16 gb ram' and sort by price. It will insist on showing you 2 gb packs also.

Everything except the default sort order sucks. Which doesn't inspire confidence that Amazon isn't listing the items with the highest margins on top.

What? Amazon is no stranger to restocking fees on electronics.

Who wouldn't?

Yeah, except amazon has always had amazing customer service, at least for me. That said, I doubt I've spent less than $2k per year there any of the last 5 years since with prime amazon became the source of everything we used to buy at target.

Seems like the opposite, at least as far as returns go. See this recent example of a customer's experience returning an item to Amazon: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4091840

Also, I think few would agree with you that Amazon is annoying to use or that wanting to be like Amazon is a "bad thing".

I think the kind of price disparity they enjoyed was bound to dry up. There's only so much innovation and undercutting a retailer can do before they're just not profitting any more.

My local brick and mortar computer store checks most of their prices against Newegg regularly, has a "will match anything on newegg 100%" all over their ads and in their store, etc. I don't use Newegg because I can get the same thing in 30 minutes instead of 3 days, without paying S+H, at (or better than) the NewEgg price.

Now, if y'all want a retailer who is KILLING IT on accessories and wires and offering zomg-level discounts on quality goods: www.monoprice.com is your home!

And a screen problem is pretty much obvious to anyone straight away.

Intermittent problems on anything else will either not be noticed by ordinary users or blamed on Windows!

When wiring our datacenter, buying bulk ethernet cables, you'll find a bad cable every 100 or so cables. Still beats the failure rate of making cables yourself.

Not that Newegg sells them, but I've had bad luck with Monoprice's analog cables (1/4" or XLR).

I have never heard of the mere act of installing Linux damaging any hardware, ever. I would like to hear substantiation before I start believing that.

Back in the day you could hose your CRT by trying to set a graphics mode it didn't support, but that would take a special effort to do.

Not just that, in fact, a guy from Canonical commented on reddit saying that this specific model was certified for ubuntu.

You could get a second hard drive. Pull the first one out, put the second one in, do whatever you want. When/if it's time to return, put the first drive back in. They'll wonder why you've barely used it but whatever.

I did this when laptops were $1500. Now that they are $400 it's usually not worth the bother.

I kept one box and the styrofoam in case I had to return a unit.

I remember Sun once sold mini box versions of their workstations (rather than the original pizza box) - their claim was that at the square footage cost of a Wall St trading floor the machines would pay for themselves in 'n' years.

Then there was a note on the pallet sized box that the machine + 19"CRT came in - saying that you had to keep it for warranty returns!

Picture this: You bought 10 of something, all identical items (minus some sn on the box). You throw away the packaging material for 8 or 9 of the 10 items (remember, it's all identical). You then have a device DOA/fail that isnt the EXACT packaging you saved. What difference would it make to newegg take the item out of the box and scan the barcode inside? A little customer service goes a long way.