5 posts shown.
Another day, another thrill. I’m staring down a completely distorted BSOD. It looks like I'll be hauling this thing into a repair shop. Honestly, how much can these issues actually be traced back to just the OS alone?
Hey everyone,
About a month ago, my girlfriend picked up this Dell over at Best Buy.
It came pre-loaded with MS-DOS, so I took care of installing Windows 10—the same version I run on several other laptops without any hiccups. However, after a little while, things started getting weird. At completely random intervals (we're talking 3 or 4 times per charge), a warning would pop up right in the middle of the screen saying the battery was at 6%, only for everything to return to normal two or three seconds later. This doesn't happen when the laptop is plugged into the charger. On top of that, the display occasionally glitches out while using browsers; I can't quite put my finger on it, but there’s this heavy distortion where black and white colors stretch out diagonally across the screen.
Assuming it was just a missing driver issue, I went to the official Dell support site and pulled down their driver scanner tool. The very first thing it suggested was a BIOS update. Being optimistic, I figured a stale BIOS might actually be the culprit, so I went ahead and flashed it. Immediately after, the machine refused to boot in UEFI mode (though I can't be certain if it was set to Legacy before I installed Windows). It felt like it was stuck in a loop: I'd enter the boot menu, select the option to boot from the ATA drive, and the screen would just go black for a second before kicking me right back to the same menu. It didn't seem limited to the hard drive either, because the same thing happened when I tried booting from a USB drive. Once I switched the settings back to Legacy mode, I'd see the standard white logo on a black background, which looks like this logo
The battery issue persists, and now I'm left scratching my head over why it won't boot in UEFI mode. I eventually wiped it and installed Windows 8.1; while it behaves slightly better, that annoying battery glitch is still popping up.
Since these glitches are sporadic and brief, I don't feel like I have enough "hard evidence" to justify a warranty claim or sending it off for service. That said, the boot issues have seriously shaken my confidence in this machine. To make matters worse, after running a Windows update on Windows 8.1—which had been working perfectly fine until today—the desktop icons vanished. When I navigated to this PC, I got an error stating the desktop folder couldn't be found in the system32/config/ directory.
I'd really appreciate some insight here. For a brand-new laptop, the behavior is highly suspicious, and I'm starting to suspect there might be underlying hardware flaws.
I just had a pretty unpleasant run-in with ADM, and they flat-out refused my return on an antenna. It was incredibly frustrating because the guy helping me—who had explicitly told me last time that I could return it as long as I kept the packaging intact and everything was exactly how it was originally—started completely twisting our previous conversation once his manager showed up. He suddenly started claiming they could offer an exchange instead, even though it was crystal clear he wasn't suggesting that when I first walked in asking about the return. I didn't want to make things awkward for him by causing a massive scene in front of his boss just to get my money back, but honestly, it’s just wrong to go back on a verbal agreement and make a customer look like a fool for trying to return used gear. In the end, I settled for a 32GB Kingston USB drive at a 25% discount for the same price I paid, and I walked out into a total downpour. Look, I get it; businesses don't always love it when people try to return items, but the bare minimum should have been telling me upfront that they don't offer refunds so I could decide if it was worth the trip. Instead, they gave me this "sure, bring it in" vibe only to backtrack later. I know for a fact they lost another customer recently because of this exact kind of unprofessionalism and making people feel embarrassed for shopping there in the first place.
darkowl72 said:You’re just going to stress yourself out and have no idea if it actually works until you buy the antenna, which basically means throwing money down the drain. It’s hard to get anywhere with this without testing things out and measuring the signal strength first.
The smartest move is to just run a wire. See if you can drill some tiny holes along the floorboards that nobody will even notice, or just tuck the cable along the wall. If you sand down the door thresholds just a little bit, the cable sits perfectly flush—it's not rocket science, and you can make it look invisible. Plus, it's the most permanent, high-quality solution you can get for next to nothing if you're willing to do a little DIY. Any tech shop can cut a UTP cable to whatever length you need, and if you've got a Chipotle nearby, they usually have cheap cables available...
If that’s too much work for you, then look for a store or a repair shop that offers a return policy if you aren't satisfied with the antenna, assuming you can even find one that does that...
I stopped by ADM today to pick up the antenna, and I managed to strike a deal where I could return it. Honestly, the unit itself looked used, and the packaging was pretty beat up. I’m heading back tomorrow to drop it off and then I'll finally get to work on the cabling. Thanks for the input.
Greetings,
I just moved into a new apartment where the internet setup is a measly 10mbps via broadband, running through a Thomson router. My bedroom is situated at the far end of the unit, separated by two walls, and my PC sits about 30 feet away from the router itself. Does anyone know where I can pick up a high-gain antenna for this router here in Washington, D.C., without breaking the bank? The connection drops constantly, especially when multiple people are online at once.
EDIT: I managed to find a few options on Amazon, so I’m curious to get your take on them:
http://www.kupikupi.eu/airlive-10dbi...AI101/product/
http://www.kupikupi.eu/edimax-antena...-io9d/product/
http://www.kupikupi.eu/tp-link-tl-an...l-MOL/product/
$33 I feel like spending a fortune on an antenna might be overkill, so I'm wondering if these cheaper alternatives actually work.