New HP Laptop: how does Customer Care work?

Annemos

outtatune said:

Annemos said:

https://www.hp.com/gb-en/services/consumer/smartfriend-overview.html#section=plans

It is quite pricy.  Might be worth it for one year, I suppose. 

I'd say that's unbelievably cheap for a year's worth of unlimited tech support.

I would agree if it is trustworthy. And if one is likely to use it at least a couple of times for help. 

But I have seen reviews that question whether the advisors always know what they are doing. 


I am a very basic user. If I get stuck, I will try the IT chap up the road. Or bribe my nephew! 

Eyeful

Instead of paying HP to answer your problem, why do you not use the resources that are available to all and are FREE.
(a) State your problem to an AI chat bot and ask it to explain its answer in simple terms. Tell it your a basic user may also help.
(b) See if the problem can not be solved by looking for the solution on YouTube.
(c) Ask for help on this forum.

Annemos

Update. It arrived today. Took me about 2 hours to set up. Not totally there, but it is well on the way. (I do find it quite a stressful experience. Several options to unselect, as they take you through the Start-up procedures.)

So new HP laptop.... now Windows 11. 


The great thing was being able to sync the Edge Settings between the 2 Computers, so I still have all my favourites. 


Here are the minor irritations that needed to be dealt with, so far......

1   HP has a certain Antivirus already on the Laptop. So, I had to uninstall that to be able to use my own favourite antivirus  ........

2    On that note:   I always buy the N.... Antivirus from Argos with a Product code.   I decided to buy a new one for the new Laptop, as the old one had only 5 months left anyway and I thought it might be less hassle to just use a new Code. (Instead of one of the 2 remaining old licences on the old Code. I also had a fear I might not do that properly!)

What surprised me was this:   I do have Auto Renewal switched off on the old Laptop. (And I have ALWAYS had to manually go in and change that after purchase to switch it off.)

But on this new one. I was prompted to enter my bank card details and I received a Bank Authorisation Request for ZERO pounds. But the Auto Renewal has been automatically switched off on this new one!!  I did NOT have to go in and switch the Auto Renewal off!  (It must be something to do with the settings for the old code carrying over to the new one. Both separate Codes are in current use on the two separate Laptops.) 

I have made a note that when the old one expires in January 26, I will go in and make sure the new one has not then reset itself to Auto Renewal! 

3   There is no Wordpad and I love Wordpad. So, I have had to copy it over from the old Laptop!  


4.  Annoyances that I did have to search on the Web for.............oddly enough, this has just happened to my OLD LAPTOP!  ........ (Must have happened due to the Syncing??)   

I ended up with a Mountain scene behind all my Outlook e-mails. It just suddenly appeared out of nowhere and I did not like it.     It turned out it was in   Settings:  Appearance/Modern Themes.    I could go in and click on a Plain White Colour instead. 

Same with the Edge tabs. That also had suddenly obtained a picturesque Landscape theme, whereas I prefer blank. And that was just a right-click to remove it. 

===================


Final thoughts:   

I am gradually being overrun with laptops: 

a    Old Vaio: Windows 7: Used to store and process photos because my old camera program only works on Windows 7. (I also love that Laptop so much! It is a Dream.)  

b     Old HP Laptop with Windows 10, becoming obsolete.    I am considering continuing using it just for my Music. (Via Bluetooth connection to the Music Player in my Living Room.) 

c     And now my new HP laptop for ongoing use with Internet. 


Thanks everyone for all your suggestions. 

PHK

If you mean Norton Antivirus, I would uninstall that and save your money. Windows Defender is included with Windows and regularly updated. 

Annemos

PHK    I have always got on really well with Norton. It does stop attacks if I accidentally hit on a dodgy website when Googling.

Neil_Jones

Annemos said:

Here are the minor irritations that needed to be dealt with, so far......

1   HP has a certain Antivirus already on the Laptop. So, I had to uninstall that to be able to use my own favourite antivirus  ........

2    On that note:   I always buy the N.... Antivirus from Argos with a Product code.   I decided to buy a new one for the new Laptop, as the old one had only 5 months left anyway and I thought it might be less hassle to just use a new Code. (Instead of one of the 2 remaining old licences on the old Code. I also had a fear I might not do that properly!)


3   There is no Wordpad and I love Wordpad. So, I have had to copy it over from the old Laptop!  


4.  Annoyances that I did have to search on the Web for.............oddly enough, this has just happened to my OLD LAPTOP!  ........ (Must have happened due to the Syncing??)   

I ended up with a Mountain scene behind all my Outlook e-mails. It just suddenly appeared out of nowhere and I did not like it.     It turned out it was in   Settings:  Appearance/Modern Themes.    I could go in and click on a Plain White Colour instead. 

Same with the Edge tabs. That also had suddenly obtained a picturesque Landscape theme, whereas I prefer blank. And that was just a right-click to remove it. 

1) That's normal.

2) Windows has anti-virus built in, you don't really need anything else and you didn't need to buy anything else either.

3) Wordpad was removed in the Windows 11 24H2 update in favour of Word for more complex documents and Notepad for basic ones.

4) Those are default options that you can change as you've found out.

Vitor

OP should try ChatGPT/CoPilot/Gemini for answers to tech questions.

Annemos

Do they need Smart phone apps? I don't have a Smart phone. 


I usually end up on the Microsoft Consumer questions which, if you look through carefully, often have the solutions.

And somebody called Tom pops up on-line who also makes useful points! 

I am also finding the Bing AI thing gives useful entries these days.