An Acer Experience

[donoevil]

An Acer Experience

I first fell in love with an Acer laptop while I was using a friend’s
Aspire 5680. Ever since I purchased my Acer notebook- Aspire 5610 a
year ago, my experience has been anything but acerbic. I even vowed
that my next workhorse would be the 64-bit Acer Ferrari, but that
might not be again as a result of my bitter encounter with Redington
Nigeria Limited.

Acer products come with a year’s warranty. If you buy your appliance
directly from the above-named company as a reseller or indirectly
through any of its accredited resellers, you are privileged to bring
your defective Acer products to Redington, an Acer service provider,
to fix as fit within the warranty product. I did not have any problem
with my laptop until the eleventh month. One sultry morning in January
2008, as I powered on my machine, an horrible message dialog informed
me that my hard disk might fail imminently. I was therefore advised to
save my data, if possible.

That incident led me to Redington. I was promptly attended to and
told to come back in three weeks. According to them, they were sending
the notebook to an Acer regional office outside Nigeria and it would
take that long before it could be returned. Their relatively
exceptional work culture was very refreshing and I was soon sharing
the news among friends. The courtesy displayed is a trait that is
lacking in some Nigerian businesses and institutions.


Two weeks on, I went back to know the current status of my job so
that it might not exceed the promised period. I was pleasantly
surprised that my notebook was available for collection. “These guys
are just great!” I thought. From the attached job card, I noticed that
the job was actually done in Lagos. Obviously, the Acer story was just
to minimize the pressure from their patrons. They have fixed the hard
disk problem but there was another hitch. The door of the DVD drive
was not locking properly in place. The service engineer, Ratheesh,
said it might be due to poor handling. He tweaked it a little bit to
close it but the outer panel was still shaky. He said that he would
have loved to change the component right away but the supplies of the
pertinent drive were not available at that particular time but I might
bring it for replacement later. With my warranty period less than a
month to go, when is later? Apparently, the later would be outside the
warranty period when I would have to pay for what got damaged at their
office! I was reassured that there would be no problem with the
functionality of the drive itself as only the outer panel was
affected. With slight misgiving, I accepted

. A day later, I realized that the utility software-Acer eRecovery
could not be accessed. The program is used to make a disk image of the
entire system and is useful for reinstallation in case of some serious
problems like malware infections or systems failure. A few days later,
I came back to complain about the eRecovery. I was made to understand
that the utility comes preloaded with the hard disk right from the
Acer plant. This is nothing new to what I have read about in the
user’s manual. Nonetheless, if the replacement hard disk as I was made
to understand is sourced from the same Acer factory, why was it not
preloaded with the utility? They did not have a convincing answer for
this.

Since I have a disc image made earlier with Acer eRecovery before
the unpleasant hard disk incident, I asked if it could be used to re-
install my notebook in case of any mishap. The engineer said it might
work but could not guarantee it. Right there in their office, we tried
but the process did not work and that necessitated the reloading of
the operating system again. For this relatively simple task, I was
again given a job card and told to come back for the machine in the
next two days.

Two days later, I found out that the operating system have been
upgraded -without my consent - from Windows XP Service Pack
2(formatted FAT 32) to Windows Vista Home Premium (formatted
NTFS).Even though the new Windows is a higher operating system with
certain new security features, I was not too much excited because I
have read reviews, which are freely available on the internet, on the
new operating system. All indications point to the fact it is yet
relatively unstable, and that means a lot of security updates to be
downloaded. In fact, the first comprehensive , post-beta suite of
such updates- Widows Vista Service Pack 1, which was released to
manufacturing early February was still being awaited publicly then.

In the next few days, I experienced applications closing down
inexplicably when you badly needed them and a lot of other computer
annoyances. Three days on and about forty Microsoft security updates
later, I realized that my Bluetooth application was not working at
all. I thought it could be some driver problems as I have read that
Vista is still incompatible with certain drivers. I decided to
download the Bluetooth drivers from the Acer website.

I ran the software and lo and behold the message dialog came up
indicating that the Bluetooth hardware device could not be detected! I
was dumbfounded because the discovery was totally unexpected. Stealing
is common among the road side technicians. That is why some Nigerians
– including me - love to patronize the institutional service providers
despite the relatively higher charges. At least the assurance that
one’s components would not be tampered with or out-rightly stolen is
ostensibly discernible. If my blue tooth hardware device was stolen,
in the current circumstance by an institutional service provider,
where could one run to? Questions, questions, questions.

Why did they remove my hardware device when the brief was to load the
operating system? If they had worked on the hardware itself, one would
have considered the case an oversight. This was clearly a case of
stealing. It was at this juncture it occurred to me that the DVD drive
might have been replaced with another one as well. Now, the audio is
barely perceptible while playing back DVD.

Again, I went to their office to register my complaints. The first
question the impudent rascal of an engineer asked me was clearly
preposterous. He asked how I knew my notebook had Bluetooth! Thumbing
through the configuration panel on the notebook, he concluded that
since Bluetooth was not listed, therefore it is unlikely the computer
came with the device. Since I had long known how to keep my
emotions in check, I explained to him without visibly showing much
anger – even though I was furiously enraged – that I bought the system
principally because it is Bluetooth-enabled, and also that it was
still functioning after they initially repaired my hard disk. I
demonstrated how I realized that the device was missing. He said he
would have to look inside to actually confirm. The day being a Friday,
he said I should come back for his findings the following Monday.

Prior to Monday, I had arranged the conclusive evidence that my
notebook was Bluetooth-enabled. The first is the sales invoice from
Gafunk Nigeria Limited. The dutifully diligent clerk had clearly
detailed every configuration from WiFi to Bluetooth. The second is the
packaging material, which incidentally I had not disposed of .Clearly
inscribed on it is the unique serial number and the fact of Bluetooth-
enablement. On the 25th of February, when I got to their office, my
machine was ready with the Bluetooth device restored. Once bitten,
twice shy. I had to sit down for almost an hour looking at every
aspect of the computer from the Device manager to the System
configuration. Eventually, I realized that my motherboard has been
changed. My Aspire 5610 board have been substituted with that of
Aspire 3690! I called the attention of the engineer immediately.

Sheepishly, he said that there was a slight problem with my
motherboard; therefore they had to change it. I protested vehemently
why they have to take such extensive liberties with my system without
my explicit permission. My motherboard had no problem I knew of and
there was no need for a change. It is either of two things:
apparently, they got my motherboard damaged while making away with the
Bluetooth device or they simply decide to steal my motherboard. What
is the guarantee that the new motherboard would function as my changed
motherboard? Even though I know (through the user’s manual) that my
Aspire 5610 share similar configuration with Aspire
5680/5650/5630/5610Z/3690 Series; why must it be replaced with the
lowest configuration in that family? Why must it be replaced at all?

I registered my protest against the appallingly unsatisfactory
services they have rendered to me all along. At that moment, he
offered to restore my motherboard if I insist on having it back. With
my limited experience with this firm, I knew far better than to accept
that trouble-loaded offer. He could have swapped in another defective
5610 motherboard from anywhere and call it mine. I was not even ready
to extend my relationship with this den of petty rogues for an
additional hour. I decided to take my leave. I came with hard disk
problem and reaped a harvest of others. The DVD was messed up, the
Bluetooth stolen (and restored) and now, a changed motherboard! That
is not all. I had to make six trips from Ile- Ife to Lagos when two
should ordinarily have been adequate. That translates to thousand of
Naira as loss. I lost prepaid money on internet access. Do I need to
quantify the wasted time resources?


In retrospect, I know I could have gotten a better deal if I had
bought another hard-disk from the open market and have it fixed by a
good technician .After all, not all the so-called road technicians are
bad. In reality, I have actually not gained anything but lost many
things among which is easily the most useful of all Acer software-
Acer eRecovery. My laptop is a veritable caricature of its former
self. It is definitely much slower and scrappy. The restored Bluetooth
is even far less usable than the earlier one. . When next you take
your machine to Redington, just pray that it comes out better or at
least in the same state you brought it in. Terrible things do happen
behind those “No Admission” doors.


I have created a blog (acercheats.blogspot.com) as a round-table for
all who have had similar bad experiences with Redington in particular
or with any other computer vendor or their agents globally. This is
quite essential when you realize that Redington also represents some
interests of such global giants like Hewlett Packard, Toshiba and
Fujitsu in Nigeria. You may contribute to the forum by your comments
or send full articles/ features detailing your experiences for
publishing consideration to adeolu....@gmail.com