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Dell RMA, will they pay shipping? How's it work?

Muse

Muse

Lifer
I haven't bought from Dell for several years. Just bought a Western Digital 2TB Green Caviar WD20EARS, received 2 days ago, formatted it yesterday (put in an empty WD Elements 2TB enclosure and connected to XP laptop). It's an advanced format drive. Figured there was trouble when the format (I set it to 4096k allocation size in XP, single NTFS partition) stalled at ~67%. At the rate it was formatting it should have taken 4.5 hours but it turned out something like 7 hours. I ran WD Align on the disk to align the partition and the utility after about a couple of minutes reported that it wouldn't work, "BAD BLOCKS."

I figured it was a bad sign when I saw how it was packed (small box inside a really big box, no cushioning, so the small box thudded around bang, bang inside! Ouch!).

How's Dell with RMA's? Can I get them to pay for shipping the drive back to them? Will they cross ship? How do I contact them and proceed? Savvy guidance appreciated.
 
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usually for me they send a shipping label to print out so that's paid for. doubt they'll cross ship though.

i would call, although they do offer internet chat as well. i've used both and they both seem to get the same results.
 
erikistired said:
usually for me they send a shipping label to print out so that's paid for. doubt they'll cross ship though.

i would call, although they do offer internet chat as well. i've used both and they both seem to get the same results.
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You got the number by any chance? Thanks.

Edit: The info I have in my computer data is from 2003:

1 800 624 9897 Customer Care

Maybe it'll work...
 
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Amazon packed by WD Elements in a similar fashion. But that drive come preformatted and seems ok. Bunch of low buck, don't care folks must work in shipping.
 
Chat works a lot better as you can pretend to do troubleshooting steps that you know won't help. Also the language barrier is a little better via chat.
 
Muse said:
You got the number by any chance? Thanks.

Edit: The info I have in my computer data is from 2003:

1 800 624 9897 Customer Care

Maybe it'll work...
Click to expand...
Dang, I called them, finally got a human who got my info and transferred me to a department. That turned out to be a machine that told me they weren't accessible until 8AM Central, which was 10 minutes away, so I heard "goodbye..." :whiste:

TwiceOver said:
Chat works a lot better as you can pretend to do troubleshooting steps that you know won't help. Also the language barrier is a little better via chat.
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The gal I talked to had good English, she just didn't realize it was 10 minutes too early for the dept...

Edit: It's 8AM Central right now, I'm gonna call again and hope to hear good English and etc....
 
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bruceb said:
Amazon packed by WD Elements in a similar fashion. But that drive come preformatted and seems ok. Bunch of low buck, don't care folks must work in shipping.
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Well, if you're still in warranty, were I you I would check the drive, run some serious diagnostics on it. It's your drive, but just saying...
 
Called, got a guy in India. After much ado and this and that...


OK! They'll send me another along with a label, I put my current one in the box and send it back to them. On hold again... And again... this takes a WHILE...

Edit: What strikes me most about this whole thing is that with Dell, seems like the right hand doesn't know what the left is doing. I keep getting asked for my name, email address, phone number, address, the item information, the order number, purchase ID... Why is this stuff necessary? I'm a database programmer. They should be able to look all this stuff up in 3 seconds. None of it has changed. 😕

I'm on the phone more than 1/2 hour! Then he thanks me, says I should get the replacement in 2-3 business days, then wants me to wait on hold and talk to his manager! Now it's telephone muzak! I'm updating my data...
 
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bruceb said:
Amazon packed by WD Elements in a similar fashion. But that drive come preformatted and seems ok. Bunch of low buck, don't care folks must work in shipping.
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Even so, Michael Dell has been a billionaire for many years, go figure. Guess their margins cover their losses from RMA's no problem.
 
Would you not be dealing with Western Digital directly, instead of Dell? I have been using WD drives for about 10 years, and in fact, just yesterday received an RMA *advanced* replacement drive. Got it 3 days after making my online request. I now have 30 days to send the bad one back before they charge my credit card, (they hold the #).
By doing it this way there is hardly any down time. Western Digital has one of the best warranties in the business, and is second to none in customer service.

http://support.wdc.com/warranty/rmapacking.asp
P.S. Have you tried using their Data Lifeguard Diagnostic utility?
http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=612&sid=3&lang=en
 
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It should be ok, the drive was properly packed inside the WD box and the outer carton had no damage. Running diags over USB 2 would take a while.
 
runzwithsizorz said:
Would you not be dealing with Western Digital directly, instead of Dell? I have been using WD drives for about 10 years, and in fact, just yesterday received an RMA *advanced* replacement drive. Got it 3 days after making my online request. I now have 30 days to send the bad one back before they charge my credit card, (they hold the #).
By doing it this way there is hardly any down time. Western Digital has one of the best warranties in the business, and is second to none in customer service.

http://support.wdc.com/warranty/rmapacking.asp
P.S. Have you tried using their Data Lifeguard Diagnostic utility?
http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=612&sid=3&lang=en
Click to expand...
Thanks for your reply. I just now saw it and the RMA with Dell is already in progress. if I get another dud from Dell, I'll very seriously consider dealing with WD directly. I've read several posts indicating good warranty service from WD. I'll see what lifeguard says, probably tomorrow morning. I don't expect it to give good news. The WD Align utility gave a serious looking show stopper error about 2 minutes after it started running: "BAD BLOCKS" ...... I figured that meant what I figured, there's plenty of bad sectors on it. Why else would the format have stalled so long at 67%?
 
Over the phone when I set up my RMA they told me they'd send a mailing label in the box with the replacement HD. I got the drive today, but no label, only an 8.5x11 with instructions, a complex bunch of stuff, evidently they expect me to send it on my dime. WTF. I'm going to call them in the morning and bitch!

I'm formatting the replacement drive. Will run full diagnostics on it starting tomorrow. The failed drive failed a test I ran today, WD's own Lifeguard Extended Test. The message was "too many bad sectors."
 
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Muse said:
Thanks for your reply. I just now saw it and the RMA with Dell is already in progress. if I get another dud from Dell, I'll very seriously consider dealing with WD directly. I've read several posts indicating good warranty service from WD. I'll see what lifeguard says, probably tomorrow morning. I don't expect it to give good news. The WD Align utility gave a serious looking show stopper error about 2 minutes after it started running: "BAD BLOCKS" ...... I figured that meant what I figured, there's plenty of bad sectors on it. Why else would the format have stalled so long at 67%?
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Drive could be acting wonky due to a bad IDE/SATA cable, or a problem with the port on the MB, or the MB itself. There are plenty of reasons a HD won't format successfully
 
QueBert said:
Drive could be acting wonky due to a bad IDE/SATA cable, or a problem with the port on the MB, or the MB itself. There are plenty of reasons a HD won't format successfully
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In this case I think it's damage, internal damage in the hard drive. It's in a USB enclosure.

You doubt that the drive is bad? Just read the reviews at Newegg for this drive. You'll see that there are a whole lot of duds. Cruddy QA. Some people have gotten several before getting a good one. I hope I don't have more than one dud, but I'm less than confidant, far less.
 
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JEDIYoda said:
why ask in these forums? Pick up the phone....
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I wanted to know where I stood before doing that. Not stupid. When I did call they told me I'd get a shipping label. When the replacement drive came today it did not have the label. I'd have called tonight but their call center is down until 6AM Wednesday.
 
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