I've been telling myself I'd post this for months, and now, finally, I'm going to do it. unfortunately my memory of the events has since grown slightly fuzzy, but the important points are difficult to forget. So without any further delay, on with the show!
Chapter 1: Full of Hope
The tale begins in September of 2008, weeks before I begin my last year at WWU. I think to myself, "self, I'll be living in a small room for an undetermined period of time, spending most of my days on campus or at the Birnam Wood apartments, all the while wanting access to my pictures, facebook account, email, and all those other things. I feel like a laptop would really help." These thoughts, combined with my long-held desire for a tablet or other stylus-based input device, led me to look into tablet PCs, which are unfortunately not nearly as widespread as conventional laptops. Understandable, but still pretty fricking lame. After many hours investigation and research, I made my choice. Which would turn out to be my first mistake.
Chapter 2: A Sign of Weakness
My family has bought several computers from Gateway in the past, and all have presented no problems whatsoever. Apparently, things have changed. Once my computer arrived (the day I left for Bellingham), I eagerly tried it out, accustoming myself both to the new interface method and to Vista. Everything seemed to be going swimmingly. Then, during one of my first sessions actually using the tablet functionality, disaster struck.
I was in my Emissions class, thinking myself pretty cool for not typing my notes into my laptop. My smugness proved unfounded, however, as the screen went black. Laughing silently at my attempts to revive it, I soon resorted to the dreaded hard-boot, holding the power button down until the computer shut off, then starting it back up. Lappy gave me an angry glare in the form of an improper shutdown screen, but relented upon my further insistence and ran normally. Until I rotated the screen to write on it. This behavior seemed to increase the likelihood of crashing immensely, so I soon learned to avoid it. unfortunately, around this time the screen also started showing a bar of corrupted pixels along the bottom of the screen. This was only a few weeks after I received it, so I sent it in for repairs.
Chapter 3: Lost in the Repair Ward
I contacted Gateway customer service, and after a short explanation of my problem, the tech recommended I send Lappy in to be repaired. They wouldn't send me a box to send it in, so down to the UPS store I went. There I said my tearful goodbye, and sent it off double-boxed.
Weeks pass, and no word from Gateway. I call and inquire, and am told that it should be fixed by a certain date. Seems reasonable enough, so I wait. The day came, and went, without word of my wayward machine. I call again, and am informed the reason for the delay is that the part needed is on backorder. So I wait some more. I call a few more times once I realize its not showing up, get lost and confused in the maze of tiered customer support each time until finally I talk to one person who seems to know whats going on. Their news is not good. I'm informed that when I bought it, the computer was in fact refurbished, not new as I had assumed. So Gateway wouldn't fix it. By this time, the lappy had been gone for a few months. they agree to send the computer back, untouched, and let me at least use it.
Chapter 4: A Somber Homecoming
Lappy came home in the same state he left. I have made amends, apologized for not accepting him as he is, and we now lead a reasonably content existence where I keep my taskbar on the top of the screen and don't push the rotate screen button, and he only crashes sometimes while logging in. I have since covertly made a few more calls, both to Gateway and to TigerDirect (where I bought it, it was the only place I could), but eventually decide my best bet will be to try and fix the damn thing myself, because no one is taking any blame for their failures. I think Lappy understands. He knows he could be so much more.
Chapter 5: The Current State
A replacement screen can be had for a little over $100. I'd like to either replace or just try and repair the screen connection cable first, as a few techie friends and I agree that it could easily be the culprit of the corrupt bar on the bottom of the screen. I've tried opening the case up, but didn't get far enough to try it, and I'm kind of scared to break the thing when it still basically works. I've also tried reinstalling the OS and display drivers to fix the whole crashing thing, which also hasn't worked. So. Nothing has been fixed. Nothing (thankfully) has gone wrong beyond the original fiasco. My computer mostly works, I can write and draw on it when the screen is still in its original orientation, overall its not as bad as it could be. but its certainly worse than it should be. weee!
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