Powermac G4 Problems

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Last seen: 15 years 1 month ago
Joined: Dec 22 2005 - 20:40
Posts: 15
Powermac G4 Problems

Powermac Headaches

Ok, way back in late july, I bought a Powermac G4 (Mirror Drive Door) from Small Dog Electronic- a dual boot (prefirewire800), dual 1.25ghz G4, 2GB ram, airport card, 120GB HD, superdrive, 6 port USB2.0 PCI card, etc.

When I got it in early Aug, it was immediately clear that something was wrong- it would boot, work for ~5-15 minutes, then freeze.

On Aug8th I sent an email to small dog, since they have a garrenteed not DOA warrenty on their sales, and clear it was DOA.

They said "your problem is interesting, we'll look into it"- and I didnt hear back from them for quite some time (weeks).

So in the mean time, I had a local apple retailer & repair center look at it. $200 in shop fees later- they found out that the cpu module and/or logic board was shot.

So I tried calling Smalldog- but I could never reach tech support (would get an answering machine), when talking to their sales rep, I would get effectively "oh, this is wierd- i'll transfer you to tech support's answering machine"

so I started to email tech support.

Then, after just over 3 months after I sent them the first DOA alert email, I finally got a response (side note, they will take returns up to 90 days after the sale for a store credit of the sale's bill- dunno if they ignored me on purpose until this expired or what).

Then, after abt 3 months of more emails back and forward with their tech support guy, I got them to send me a new cpu module, which I installed myself.

This helped the problem, but did not fix it- now it will work for about an hour after boot (sometimes less) and then freeze- so aparently the local shop was right in that both parts were shot.

I then emailed smalldog to report the progress, after a few weeks of correspondance, they agreed to look at the computer IF I payed to ship it back to them.

They also suggested that they want me to help pay for part of the repairs for something which was warrenteed against being DOA.

So I shipped the computer.

On the 20th they got the machine, according to UPS.

I have yet to hear back from them, even in so much as letting me know if they've looked at it yet or not (a simple one sentence yes or no would be ok as a status report).

This has effectively given me a $1750 paper wieght.... which now is currently sitting in their shop.

What am I supposed to do? I need that computer, right now I have to barrow machines to use while this one gets fixed.

Its been about half a year since I got the machine, which was supposed to be a working, not DOA order.

I can not afford to eat the $1750. I've already spent ~$250 between shipping and shop fees, I have spent countless hours trying to get support and trying to troubleshoot the machine. I believe my patients, as the customer has been beyond what the situation would require.

I feel I have been scammed, used and abused by this apple retailer, and I need help- I have no clue what I should do about it.

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Last seen: 15 years 1 month ago
Joined: Dec 22 2005 - 20:40
Posts: 15
Update! Smalldog has resol

Update!

Smalldog has resolved the problem.

They could not figure out what was wrong with the old machine, so to make everyone happy and end this long story, they ended up building me a dual 1.42ghz MDD G4, with 2GB of ram, 120GB HD, airport card, superdrive, etc.

They shipped it to me overnight after they finished building it, and now all is well, working correctly, and happy.

Thanks for the advise to anyone who replied.

Jon
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Last seen: 12 years 10 months ago
Joined: Dec 20 2003 - 10:38
Posts: 2804
A couple faster CPUs for your

A couple faster CPUs for your trouble sounds nice. Did you end up still having to pay everything for shipping it around?

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