Alienware Refusing Customers As Thieves

ChrisPaget writes "Thinking about buying Alienware (now owned by Dell)? Think again. After buying an almost-new Alienware laptop on eBay, I've spent the last week trying to get hold of a Smart Bay caddy to connect a second hard drive (about $150 for $5 of bent metal). Four different Alienware teams have refused to even give me a price on this accessory, instead accusing me of stealing the machine since I didn't buy it directly from their eBay store. They want me to persuade the eBay seller I did buy it from to add me as an authorized user of his Alienware account — they have no concept of 'ownership transfer' and instead assume that if you're not in their system, you must be a thief."

Comments

Re:Alienware are overpriced anyway

[mysidia]

Most members of the public have no business trying to build a PC on their own.

And even if you're a computer enthusiast, and you completely know how to do it.. Computers are a commodity now, and there's really no point in building them, once you've done it a few times and had your fun.

I for one would rather spend time designing software, programming, writing, and doing the things one gets a computer to do. So yeah, maybe it's laziness, or more about wanting to concentrate on more interesting things.

Nothing I build on my own will look as cool as an Alienware laptop, or other vendors that make equipment for high-end computers users, utilizing specialized parts.

Alienware uses custom designs you can't just buy off the street and build yourself, not without a lot of pain....

Re:Cars

[BitZtream]

You sound like a fantasticly shitty lawyer to be then. Laws are different in different parts of the world, and i know for a fact that the act of knowingly accepting or holding on to stolen goods is illegal in at least three different states that I've lived in.

As a law student I would expect you to be aware of something so obvious. You also should consider that when you say you law student people will tend to think you have a clue, so in your case please preface your statements with something like "I'm a know it all student with no real world experience and I'm probably wrong or at least wildly inaccurate."

Re:Cars

[fishbowl]

"Now if the user bought the computer legally on e-Bay, he should have some kind of sales receipt, or at least know the name of the person he bought it from."

Blah blah blah. If you accuse me of a crime, you'd better be prepared to repeat the accusation to my attorney and to a judge. You'd also better have some evidence, or you might be headed down a dangerous road.

After you accuse me of a *crime*, the burden of proof is on YOU. You don't get to ask me for receipts, names of the people I know, or anything else. The police are going to be asking YOU for YOUR evidence, and when it turns out you have none, my case against you for slander and defamation will be simple to make.

Re:Cars

[d3ac0n]

Not to be a "nooge" or anything, but you pretty much DID buy an oversized PDA. An X31 is a remarkably primitive laptop by today's standards.