Dell Laptop Burns House Down

Nuclear Elephant writes "The Consumerist is running a story about a house burned down by a Dell laptop. 'My 130-year-old former farm house was engulfed in flames, with thick dark smoke pouring out of the windows and roof... Hours later, after investigation the fire marshal investigator took me aside asked me if I had a laptop computer. Yes — I told him I had a Dell Inspiron 1200.' It was determined that the laptop, battery, or cord malfunctioned after its owner left for work, leaving the fire to spread through the entire house. All attempts to contact Dell have failed. 'I have tried to call Dell to at least notify them of my problems, but each time I have called I get transferred into an endless loop of "Joe" or "Alan" all speaking a delectable version of English I presume emanates from Bangalore. I have been outright hung up on each time I get someone who speaks a reasonable version of English, or sounds like they might be in charge of something. Promises of call backs have gone, of course, unreturned.'"

Comments

Slashdot fixed it!

[Turn-X Alphonse]

I had some problems with getting Dell to complete my order (some recovery CDs were missing). I posted about it on Slashdot a few months back and got a reply from a US Dell employeee telling me to drop him a line and he'd help fix it (I'm in the UK) and try to his word after a couple of phone calls everything was sorted out and dandy.

So before everyone starts ragging on Dell, remember there are at least a couple of good apples there.

Re:Slashdot fixed it!

[thestuckmud]

Maybe not, but I walked into a busy Apple store yesterday with a failing MacBook Pro battery, explained that it had a bulge, and walked out with a free replacement 15 minutes later. Makes me feel a little better about paying premium prices. BTW, they required me to show them the laptop.

No surprise...

[evilviper]

I imagine this has happened many times before. It can just be hard to narrow down the cause to a single source.

5 years ago, 6 out of 100 of our new 17" Dell monitors went up in flames, over the first 3 months. This was fortunately an office building with very high ceilings, so there was little risk. I've long imagined just how bad that could have been in a private home, with a low ceiling, and wall nearby. That experience alone stopped me from ever buying anything from Dell.

All the articles on Notebook fires are very old news. Dell's been having fire problem with their entire product range for about the past 10 years. Passing it off as Sony's fault ignores Dell's long history of similar ocurances with all of their machines.

Since it happened to me, I've been wonder when I'd hear about a class action against Dell, but it's never been forthcoming. I guess residential building fires can cover up the evidence pretty well. Sooner or later, it's going to have to come out.

Is this real or a hoax?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder if this is a hoax. The Portland News site does not say anything about the cause of the fire. It does not even name the owner of the house. All we have is some guy named Dan (no last name) writing a letter to a blog claiming a Dell laptop burned down his house. Has anyone bothered to check the facts?

Re:Agent for service of process

[anagama]

Second, Dell has issued a safety recall and anyone who has chosen not to participate is going to have a hard time winning a case. Third, the Inspiron 1200 wasn't one of the affected systems.

So let me get this right. It's his fault because he didn't participate in a battery recall program in which he couldn't participate because his system wasn't on the recall list. You my friend, should consider running for public office.