How long will send-it-back support take?

May 27-July 2
(Note: My gripe is with Alienware, not with any of its individual staff. To prevent this from reading like a personal attack on some of Alienware's staff, I am using obviously fictitious names instead of real names. I refer to the primary technician who worked with me as Larry, to Larry's boss as Mo, and to a third staff member as Curly.)

From May 27 to July 2, I sent 15 notes to Alienware. Larry sent me 7 notes and Mo sent 3. I also had at least one phone conversation with Larry and one other full reconfiguration of the system at my house. Going through these emails in sequence paints a story that is too confusing. Instead, this posting and the next will focus on specific issues, that came up in several of these messages.
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I wrote several notes to Larry describing the failures that the system was showing May 27-29.

About the RAID failure, he wrote back,

"Normally, the "Incomplete RAID set" message will mean either a failure of one of the hard drives that are part of the RAID array or a failure of the S-ATA RAID controller card.

"The fact that you got random artifacts on the screen while attempting to rebuild the array makes me suspect of the RAID card."

Yeah, I thought these random artifacts were bad news too. That's why I had mentioned them to Larry repeatedly when we configured the computer with this card. He's the one who sent the card to us. We proceeded, trusting that he knew the characteristics of this type of card. He encouraged Becky and me to continue with installation and setup of the system, without once saying that this suggests a bad card.

Larry encouraged me to send the system back for repair at Alienware's factory. I concluded my May 29th diagnostics report this way:

"I need to understand expected turnaround time on this system once I do send it to you. The machine has been pretty much out of service since you called me in April. The fact that this machine is sitting idle now does not mean that it was scheduled to sit idle. I had expected to work extensively on this system throughout May and June. Some of those tasks involved collaboration with other faculty or students. Instead, I am postponing several tasks (which may mean losing them altogether) and squandering my own time and the time of a paid research assistant (Sam Oswald) on troubleshooting instead of collaborating on content development. I am extremely unhappy that the unresolved instability of this system is interfering with my summer research.

"I know that you have invested several hours in this system. I appreciate your work. But I still don't understand why this hasn't been a matter for onsite support. My expectation of competent on-site support isn't unreasonable. As an individual consultant-consumer and as a department manager, I've made a practice of buying the best support contract offered since 1980. I've seen a lot of good onsite support."

After that, Larry and Mo repeatedly refused to provide onsite support and instead encouraged me to send the computer back to Alienware for repair at their site. Posts on the Net had commented on the slowness of these repairs--even 45 days. I couldn't afford a long delay. I had plans for video work this summer. I needed a machine that worked, right away, now, not some distant time in the future. That's the biggest benefit of onsite support, which I bought--the technician comes, the technician fixes the computer, the computer is fixed today, and the technician goes away. No shipping delay, no sitting on the shelf in the factory waiting for someone to get to it, not much down time.

I raised the issue of turnaround time--how long would it take them to repair the computer and get it back to me after I sent it to Alienware for repair-- on May 29, May 30, June 10, and (I believe) in at least one telephone conversation. Larry and Mo both told me that the computer would get "VIP" treatment, with "timely" turnaround, but they offered no specifics.

I needed the computer NOW. I was working on a borrowed computer (and told Alienware that). I was so concerned about timely repair that I finally hired my own onsite technician, who reconfigured the system on June 15 (with Larry on the phone because I can't open the box without him or I void the warranty).

It wasn't until June 30, after the June 15-reconfigured system crashed, after I advised Alienware that I ordered a replacement system from Dell, that Larry finally sent me a note telling me that the computer would be repaired within "5 business days plus the shipping time both ways."