Hint of Fall to Dell Nightmare

The past several mornings Autumn has whispered in my ear, “Summer is ending. I’ll be with you soon.” The morning chilli greets me the instant DH leaves the house for work. The first sign the season is coming to a climax. Not that I mind or anything because in truth at this point in summer, then I welcome the change.

I soak up the refreshing sensation of the first hint of fall. A sense of excitement builds in me. I begin longing for creature comforts associated with the impending season – bulky sweaters & turtlenecks, pumpkin spiced lattes, burnt wood scents, fleece blankets, and fried apple pies to name only a few of my favorites.

Reality snaps into place by mid-day when the sun is high in the sky and the earth heats up. Just another reminder of warm days followed by cooling evenings that Fall isn’t too far away. You didn’t stop by to hear about all of this now, did you? It certainly conjures a lovely picture, though. Don’t you agree?

Monday brought a mixture of flurry – Internet research and phone calls. Let me back up to explain what’s going on.

On Saturday, we FINALLY opened our desktop tower and removed the hard drive (HD). We connected the data reader cable to the HD in attempt to recover the date. This process wasn’t new to us, as we’ve done it several times successfully before. I was confident this time we be no different. After everything data retrieval was not possible. In fact, the hard drive wouldn’t spin. That sounds horrible, I know. Mechanical failure of mega size here. The only thing that kept swirling around in my brain was, “It’s gonna have to go to a clean room!“

What’s a clean room? Anytime a hard disk has to be physically opened and this is what has to be done when the disc doesn’t spin usually, then the safest way to do a data recovery is in an environment which will not allow any dust to filter onto the discs. That being said, you probably figured out this process is an expensive one, right? Yep, it’s costly. The prices range $400 and up into the thousands.

With a shot HD on our hands, we accepted our fate and buried ourselves in figuring out which new internal HD we wanted, who do we  get to manually pull our important files off our crashed drive, and how do we get Windows 7 operating system (OS) loaded back onto our computer. What? you say.

Like many of you, I’m sure of it….when we bought our Dell desktop in 2010 they began this whole thing to pre-load the HD with the OS and did away with sending customers the original OS program on compact disc. That’s cool. Dell assured us our pre-loaded software would stay on Dell’s server for future extraction. That’s not exactly how things are going down.

Our computer is out of warranty. Yes, that’s right our 2-year old high-end computer is out of warranty. We did not opt to get an extended warranty when we bought it. We took a gamble and it backfired. The real kicker to this all is how Dell wanted us to PAY them for our copy of the OS which they pre-loaded onto our system and did not make it available for us to even buy for a few bucks more. We would have bought a copy just for emergencies such as this, if we had the opportunity but Dell did away with that!

After a lot of frustrating phone calls and getting no where, I remembered the trial Dell Carnegie program I joined at the beginning of the month. I was looking to gain a little support without a huge expense since we are out of warranty. This seemed like a great opportunity to take advantage of.  I opened a chat dialogue last night and in a matter of minutes the Tech Specialist agreed to sending out our very own hard copy of our Windows 7 OS program, along with a recovery disc which includes all the necessary drivers. The news elated me! If that gal had been in front me of, then I would have given her a great big ole kiss-a-roo! So, special thanks to Maria M from Dell Carnegie where ever you are!

Oh but wait, I do have a bright spot of news. DH took the hard drive to Best Buy. They can ship our drive to Kentucky where their sister company has a clean room and will be able to retrieve our data or at least give us the heads up on it, if they feel certain a successful recovery is possible. Anywho before we elected this immediate step, DH asked the Geek Squad Rep to test our drive to see if they can get any activity. As it turns out, they were able to get it spinning and the Techy felt good that they can do the job in-store. So, we shelled out $150 (this includes data recovery & an external hard drive for the data retrieval to be stored).

At the moment, our out-of-pocket expenses are: $170 for new hard drive + $150 for data retrieval equaling $320.  That hurts the wallet – yes! But, if no more expenses come down the pike and everything works out excellent then we can count ourselves VERY blessed. We learned a BIG lesson from this experience. This first thing is stay diligent with all routine data backups. Don’t put it off! Secondly, always insist and NEVER accept “no” or “that’s not necessary” or “we aren’t doing that anymore” for an answer on getting a hard copy of all system programs from the manufacture. Don’t let manufactures take advantage of you because in short someone is always out to screw you over on purpose or accidental and then you find yourself in a tight jam!

Take a few minutes to enjoy a cup of coffee with your bloggy friends, as you enjoy some  random reflections, considerations, or broodings. While you’re at it, join in on the fun – create your own post and link up!