Laptop Warranty

[mtn26bkr]

I'm looking for a laptop before I go away to college. I'd like to keep it on the cheap like ~$1300. But then I won't be able to get a warranty with my laptop. But why do I need a warranty are laptops that unreliable- I've never had one, used some at school, and they all seemed reliable- and easy to break. At Dell I thought I saw two laptop possibilities, latitude D610 and inspiron 6000, but then the warranty and accidental damage would tack on ~$500.

Laptop warranties worth it?
Reliability of laptops?

Thanks

 

[fbrdphreak]

If you plan on keeping the laptop for more than 1 year, get a warranty. You will have a problem eventually. The only chance a trouble free life is if it sits at a desk 24/7, but even then there are chances.

I own one of the best built machines out there, a Thinkpad T42 15". Because I know it is so well built, I do abuse it. One day the system would randomly cut out, nothing on the display, have to hard restart and then it would randomly do the same thing within 10sec-2min. Luckily I have a 3 year warranty w/accidental damage coverage. Got it back 3 days later (including all shipping & waiting time) with a new system board.

If you don't get a laptop warranty, consider the laptop disposable.
If you plan on taking your laptop out & about, get an accidental damage coverage.

As I mentioned in your other threads, Dell has great coupons. Put the bare specs you want in the config, add a 2-3 year warranty w/Complete Care, and then add more specs to bring it up to the requisite price for the coupon to be valid. Bingo

 

[TheCanuck]

The extended warranties are usually good for those systems that you pay $2500-3000 for but for a low end machine probably not worth it. A basic Inspiron w/1 yr warranty, is going for under $700 right now. You could pay for that with an American Express Blue Card (or something similar Gold Card etc) that doubles the manufacturer's warranty. If anything goes wrong with it after 2 years you could just sell the parts on Ebay and with that money + the money you saved on the extended warranty you would be able to get a much better machine!

Laptops are so cheap these days that they should be considered disposable. Check out: http://edealinfo.com/ for some deals on laptops.