How Long Should a motherboard last?

MrsTig

Hi All,

My daughter has just started Uni and is having to deal with stuff by herself!

Last week her laptop died - it was playing music and suddenly stopped, the screen went stripey and then it went off and wouldn't restart.

She bought the HP Laptop is 22 months ago, so it's out of warranty.

In a state of panic (lecture notes etc) she dashed to PC World where they plugged it in and told her that there was a fault with motherboard. She asked about her rights under the Sale of Goods Act and was told she would need to prove the machine was faulty when she bought it.

Trusting their word and not knowing how she could do that she handed over £180 (student budget instantly blown) to send it off and for data recovery. She was then told it could be up to another £300 for parts.

Was she advised correctly? Surely the motherboard should be expected to last more than 22months? Or is it reasonable to expect this fault at this time? Or could the laptop be considered not of "satisfactory quality"?

All advise appreciated.

Fightsback

Best asking in the consumer rights section:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.php?f=173

bsod

it wouldn't restart means what

no, she's been had

the drive, she could have removed that herself and recovered her data for less than £5 with the aid of a usb hard disk caddy

lecture notes should be backed up

the remaining £175 would have paid for a new machine, or gone a considerable way towards buying one. And £300 for parts on top is laughable.

22 months is not a reasonable time, five years at least

Fightsback

bsod wrote: »

it wouldn't restart means what

no, she's been had

the drive, she could have removed that herself and recovered her data for less than £5 with the aid of a usb hard disk caddy

lecture notes should be backed up

the remaining £175 would have paid for a new machine, or gone a considerable way towards buying one. And £300 for parts is laughable.

22 months is not a reasonable time

Make a sentence out of these words:

Door, horse, bolted.

The op first needs to write a letter of complaint to the vendor of the laptop.

Wording of the letter will be best advised by the consumer rights section and the next course of action.

Paying the rip off prices of PC World is another matter entirely unless of course that is the original vendor.

MrsTig

Thank you - I've duplicated post there.

bsod

don''t talk nonsense, this happened in the last few days

if the motherboard is broken, she's been badly advised and ripped off about data recovery, and should take it up immediately with pc world, it could still be sat behind the counter for all we know. The sale of goods act is a longer term issue.

http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/computing-accessories/components-and-upgrades/hard-drive-enclosures/1113_8406_71495_xx_ba00001690-bv00123556/1_20/price-asc/xx_xx_xx_xx_4-5-7-8-9-criteria.html

Fightsback

bsod wrote: »

don''t talk nonsense, this happened in the last few days

if the motherboard is broken, she's been badly advised and ripped off about data recovery, and should take it up immediately with pc world, it could still be sat behind the counter for all we know. The sale of goods act is a longer term issue.

Just because the price of a contract is high does not make that contract null and void in the eyes of tort, it's still a valid contract.

However as I stated earlier if PC world is the original vendor of the laptop then they would have a good case against the high charges and what is a reasonable amount of time for a laptop to last.

bsod

nothing to do with the price of the contract, data recovery isn't necessary if the motherboard is the faulty component, what is necessary is a usb caddy, which conveniently they sell at pc world for £4.99, she's been had

https://www.knowhow.com/uk/support/data-recovery.aspx?country=uk

Fightsback

bsod wrote: »

nothing to do with the price of the contract, data recovery isn't necessary if the motherboard is the faulty component, what is necessary is a usb caddy, which conveniently they sell at pc world for £4.99, she's been had

https://www.knowhow.com/uk/support/data-recovery.aspx?country=uk

Data recovery isn't necessary however you've just linked to a data recovery page ?

It's recovering data from a HDD and thus called data recovery.

People pay £50 to go and watch a footy match yet I can watch a free one down the local park.

Does that make the £50 football ticket null and void as a contract ?

Alternatively I can buy a tap washer for 50p however I engage a plumber to fix my leaky tap and he charges £50. Does that also make that contract null and void ?

bsod

I linked to their prices, and what it covers. The link to their caddy is in an earlier post.

it's not recovering any data, if the motherboard is faulty, no data has been lost, deleted or damaged, no software has to be run, no clean rooms or expertise need to be involved, no data has to be copied to new media - 4 or 5 screws, place into £5 caddy, done. A rep from a reputable company would have and should have advised her of this option before mentioning a £180 service, it's not clear exactly what this covers - an engineers assessment of the fault maybe, but she's still been done up like a kipper.

if this was your daughter would you be advising her to go oh well, just see what happens that's the price you pay nowadays, or would you be saying, lets go to pc world and get your machine and your £180 back, you've been ripped off love.

Fightsback

bsod wrote: »

I linked to their prices, the link to their caddy is in an earlier post.

it's not recovering any data, if the motherboard is faulty, no data has been lost, deleted or damaged, no software has to be run, no clean rooms need to be involved - 4 or 5 screws, place into £5 caddy, done.

if this was your daughter would you be advising her to go oh well, just see what happens that's the price you pay nowadays, or would you be saying, lets go to pc world and get your machine back, you've been ripped off love.

So what do you do ?

Go and punch someone in the face at PC world ?

She has engaged into a legally binding contract, fortunately not a seriously expensive one such as a mortgage and this might teach her a valuable lesson, caveat emptor.