Dell review: hard drive failures 118

I too have been extremely unhappy with my Dell Inspiron. The hard drive totally crashed after eight months, was replaced under warranty, and then crashed again THREE WEEKS LATER! When I raised my concerns with Dell customer support, they told me it was an extremely rare occurance and replaced the hard drive again. Judging by these posts, it's not so rare after all!
I would not recommend Dell to anyone. Their products are shoddy and their customer service is dreadful.

Add me to the list of unhappy customers. I bought my 1525 machine November 2008 now in April 2011 the hard drive has failed! I am not a computer technician nor do I have the desire to learn how to physically repair this machine. When I purchased the thing I expected it would last a lot longer than it has. Before the hard drive decided to call it quits I had to reset the machine back to factory settings many times. My experience with this machine has been one of complete frustration. It is very clear to me (now) that DELL uses cheap parts in the construction of their machines. This learning experience has cost me time, money and lots of lost data (my BSOD always happened before scheduled backups)! My advice to anyone considering buying a Dell laptop computer is NOT TO!

Wow i wish i did my homework and read this before buying my dell inspiron 1525 laptop ! Hard drive died after 6 months also ! Ive had hp desktops for many years never had a hard drive crash before even after 7-8 years of continous use, and a toshiba laptop for about 4 years with no problems.Apparently dell knows about this problem for quite some time from the dates of these posts! and i bought mine august 28th 2010 and they are still selling the stupid thing with the same problem ( what bs this should have been recalled and corrected! ) This was my first dell and will be my last dell ! They should be sued and put out of business for continuing to sell a known defective unit !

Well, reading all the comments I think I can consider myself lucky. I have buy my Dell Inspiron 1525 in april 2008 and the hard drive didn't start freezing until a year ago. So, it's more than the average 18 months. Kinda crap anyway. Also, I live in Europe, and Dell claims that they don't sell that hard drive any more. Actually, it's been impossible to find it. Even if I would find it I guess I won't bother replacing it, as long as I am reading that it will eventually crash again. I will just wait until the computer dies completely, with the help of Dropbox and my external hard drive.
Thanks for the comments, open my eyes. Good luck with your next laptop.

My wonderful and loving wife bought me a Dell 1525 laptop for Christmas 2009. By MAY 2010 the HD crashed. Guess what? Here it is NOT A YEAR LATER and the HD crashed again. Thank GOD I back up all I can to an external drive, but I make my living with this P.O.S. (not to mention with all the extra functions I needed this machine ran over $1200). I keep a cooling fan on under it every time I use it and I am very careful to keep it from being "jarred or bumped". Dell, you are pathetic. You are thieves and I wish to GOD your support people spoke English. If you are considering a laptop avoid Dell like the plague. They are the disease of the computer industry. I do NOT consider a $1200 purchase buying "cheap", but I do consider the failures an expensive "screwing".

my brother and i both have the same inspiron 1525. within the same month our computers just started failing. crashing, freezing, and dumping memory. it took me a few hours but i was able to restore my computer to factory setting. it never showed sign of a failure like before. but i have had many crashes/freezes/and memory dumps thoughout the years. i first turned the computer on on novemember 1st of 2008. this computer is my only computer and i use it almost every day. i got a fan that it sits on because it would heat up to the point it burned me when i set my hand down on the keyboard. ever seince then i've been doing everything in my power to keep it cool. i also use this for gaming. i play a semi well known game called Combat Arms(combatarms.nexon.net) and i do everything to keep my computer fast. but its still only half [censor]. i guess i can say over the years i have learned a lot about my computer. ive never had a $3, 000 desktop in my life so i wouldnt know what top performance really is. but those who try to game on this computer i would recemond keepin as much space on the hard drive as possiable. use gamebooster(gamebooster.com) and clean their computer monthly(ccleaner.com) and removong temp files and %temp% files too. ive done so much to my computer my brother and i have the same computer and mine to noticeably faster then his.

is this a problem of over heating itself? because i just got a warning about mine.

The HD on my 1525 died after 18 months. So pissed, lost my pics. The thing is I only use my laptop on the weekends since I have a work computer and it still died. I'm going mac or vaio as my next computer. I do have a reminder to back up my HD after 6 months, so when it dies again...

I just got the hard drive failure pop up myself and I am NOT happy! I paid A LOT of $ for this piece of crap in 2008 for it to last more than two years! I will NEVER buy another Dell.

Hello!
I notice you are having Dell Inc problems with Inspiron. I too purchased an Inspiron 1525 that's had several issues since purchasing it in 2008. Including overheating, random shut downs, lines across the screen etc. The Inspiron brand is faulty.

I'm preparing a court case against Dell Inc. I want to file a complaint at the District court about my experiences with Dell Inc regarding the Inspiron Brand.

My court case will pave the way for others having similar issues to automatically file a claim

I have prepared a form, you just print it and fill it out or type it out. sign, date and have it notarized OR you can just sign it and attach a copy of your ID/state license card.

Let's stand up to these crooks!

Please email me so I can forward the form to you. sparklyuniverse@gmail.com

I can try sending it to your attached email but it might go to your spam box. so send me a short email and add my address to your contact list.

I'm looking forward to hearing from you.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Same problem..I purchased the Dell inspiron 1525 in August 2008 and had problems with overheating from the beginning...now after only two years of use the hard drive has failed...MAC time?

We have had all fo the same issues with the 1525. But really, what do you want for $500? It's my kids laptop and they wreck the darn thing, anyway. We have had Dells since 1992 and the higher end desktops and dt replacement laptops have been great. It's the low end stuff that craps out.
I've replaced the HDD in the 1525 3 times now - working on my 4th, but my kids run it sitting on the couch, on the bed, on top of the big furry dog! They leave it running with the DVD paused for a couple of hours...
Don't get me wrong - the thing is a piece of junk, but I have no intention of replacing with a $2000 MacBook. I say buyer beware. The Inspiron 1525 is not the first peice of junk laptop DELL has made -class action suits, on even higher end ones, go back to the 90s - do your homework before you make any investment!

Huh. I bought my Dell Inspiron 1525 in July 2008. I LOVED it...it was exactly what I needed and wanted. Seemed perfect for me. And a couple weeks ago...the hard drive died. Just out of no where stopped working. When I would start up it wouldn't. And when I ran diagnostic it said there was no hard drive. So I took it to my dad who knows computers and after checking it out said the hard drive wasn't even trying to start up. Just sat there. Nothing.

I ended up here because I was googling what type of hard drive I would need to purchase for my dad to replace it. Now, needless to say...I'm a bit wary.

I worked my butt off at a fast food restaurant amongst the grease the year before I started college for this laptop. Dang it. Thanks alot Dell.

My Dell laptop worked great for two years, and then just started failing, freezing, and so on about a year ago. It's been a pain ever since, particularly since the battery has run out. I wonder whether it is the Dell or that laptops are just generally bad. Our Dell desktop has been working pretty well for about six years, so I think part of it is the laptop and part of it is the later Dell models like the Inspiron 1525.

Add me to the list of Dell victims. The place where I bought mine told me my Inspiron was NOT overheating while they had it overnight to check out the overheat problem. I told them I have another laptop and it doesn't burn my hand like the unInspiron does. They acted like I was crazy. Then I read all these posts...But too late for me because my hard drive kicked the bucket and I'm not wasting my time taking it to the place where I bought it. Hp here I come.

Holy Macaroli . . . . . . mine died last night ! ! ! I wish I knew about this before but I thought Dell was a leader in the PC industry. Me thinks they may have "side deals" going on with manufacturers who keep selling us new drives! Tonight my son is going to try to retrieve some files from my Fried Drive. Jeez...

I purchased DELL inspiron1525 on Oct 2008.I really disappointed due to hard disk failure with these days. Also the way Customer care responded is not pleasing their customer. Their talk is not to solve the problem, but its all about commercially to earn money for DELL...If any body want to have a laptop, Please do not go for DELL...

Add me to the list of victims! First hard drive lasted about 6 months. Replaced in Feb 10. Now in May 10, HD #2 just died. At least I learned from the first failure to backup on an external HD often. Now I can put all my pics, videos, music, etc. on my new HP that I will be buying. This was my 4th Dell in about 7 years with no issues until now. Bye-bye, Dell!

I purchased a dell 1525 in 2008, and have had four hard drives in it so far, and this one just went out. When I called dell they had lost where I purchased the laptop and all the problems I have had with it, and pretty much accused me of stealing it from best buy. This is my first dell and I will never have another, and I tell everyone how bad tehy are.

Same thing happened to mine. i always kept it propped up and it still overheated and fried the hard drive. Has any one tried the class action lawsuit?

I too am the unfortunante owner of an Inspirion 1525 I have had to replace the battery twice now once under warranty and just did out of warranty, had to replace the keyboard because a key came off and you can't just replace one key then I get that done and of course the HARD DRIVE FAILS as everyone else's has...My question is has anyone had any luck with this piece of junk they call a computer I love my computer but i am tired of the problems think it's time to switch to HP mine's only about 2 years old and this is ridunkulous all the problems!

I also purchased a dell inspirion 1525, of course the warranty ran out and then so did my hard drive. But before i called Dell about the defective hard drive. I went to a site i know of and downloaded the complete Dell diagnostics suite on one of my other pc's. Once i ran it it told me that my hard drive was defective, and that it needs to be replaced. So then i call Dell, but they would not inform me of anything unless i payed them like $40 for tech support. And if their tech support told me the same thing, i would have wasted the money that could have bought the replacement. All in all over the past ten years we have purchased over 100 pc's to donate to schools and others in need. Starting in 2008 we started purchasing Dell laptops, because their customer and tech support were supposed to have a five star rating. Well i have relized that there is only one pc manufacturer that we will be purchasing from now on, HP. Their tech and customer support does have five star rating because they care about their customers. They realize that a happy customer, will return to do more business.

same thing happened with me. i have a dell inspiron 1525 and my warranty expired 50days ago. My note book started freezing and over an hour of telephonic conversation and diagnostic tests, I was told my hard drive has to be replaced... Dell... Go to Hell..!

Same here... My Inspiron 1525 is about 18 months old. During the past few months it randomly freezes. I just ran the diagnostic test which resulted in a failed HD test [protected] status 70) :( Seems like quite a pattern here. Looks like Dell shipped Inspirons with defective hard drives. Very disappointing.

My inspiron 1525 went out again, twice now, in september 2009 and now again march 17 2010, and i too utilized my warranty and got it fixed the first time but then now it went to hell again so Imma do what the discussion beginner did above and sell the shelll of my laptop on amazon or ebay and get a Mac cause Dell is a ### brand with a bunch of indian people for customer service reps... NEVER EVER EVER EVER GET A DELL NOPE NADA... APPLE IS A WORTH WILD INVESTMENT!1

I am also, from the looks of things, the unfortunate owner of a Dell Uninspirin' 1525. I was actually mere minutes away from ordering a new hard drive, but thought I would take a look at other complaints just in case. Thanks, everyone for your comments! You probably saved me a couple of hundred bucks. I am just going to admit defeat with what appears to be a lemon-laptop and find another company to patronize. (I wonder how long before our Dell desktop calls it quits?)

Same thing happened to us we bought a Dell Inspiron 1525 April 08, the hard drive failed, after complaining several times about over heating and about getting the message "no hard drive found" almost every time we opened the laptop. Dell refused to help and said since we bought it at Best Buy the Geek Squad had to take care of the warranty. Geek Squad claimed traces of viruses but the SMART and other on board diagnostics we ran said hard drive is failing {we saved our pics and docs just in time} Called Dell since they changed the policy about not working on the computers bought at Best Buy the tech there said all I can tell you is to remove the hardrive and reseat it. (remove it then put it back in.} That worked for 2 weeks then it became worse called Dell again they said sorry there is nothing we can do you our out of warranty. For 1 month after warranty ended complete hard drive failure! Dell has lost a customer!

I have had exactly the same experience as Sam_LeBlanc who wrote a comment 55 days ago. "bought brand new and within 2 months the hard drive crapped out... it was replaced under warranty and 11 months later.. you guessed it... crapola!" I did call Dell again when the second time because there is a warranty for 1 year for the hard drive, they told me to call the manufacturer. I have bought so many computers from Dell since 1994 (about 1 every year for the last 10 years). I have recommended them to many of my friends. I was so discussed with their customer service lately that I am switching to HP.

I got a Dell Inspiron 1525 as a gift in March 2009. I was happy with it. Than about a month or so on it stopped recognizing the dvd rom drive. Lucky for me I managed to figure out how to get it working by reinstalling the driver for that online. - and I found out from other owners that the dvd rom problem was a common one for this model. I had problems with keys sticking or coming loose from the keyboard- luckily I could fix that myself. Things were more or less fine until one day in August 2009 the hard drive failed. - So I got about 6 months? of use out of a new computer? How shabby is that? I found out what a hassle Dell's tech support/customer service could be, and since I got it as a gift from a friend, I didn't want to worry about having it sent off for repairs and so on. I suspect it over heated. It often ran warm despite proper ventilation. Anyway I shelved it and relied on my old PC until I could get around to replacing the HD. I managed to get a good 500GB drive for around $100 at a local electronics store and installed it myself. I handle the thing with kid gloves and baby it- and I wonder how long the new HD will even last. I've noticed a lot of complaints about hard drive failure with the Inspiron. in online forums. I suspect it is bad design, low quality parts, and careless assembly at the factory. Its a great looking machine with good features at a reasonable price, - when the thing actually works! After my experience with the DELL Inspiron- I cannot recommend buying one. Opt for another brand- there are comparable models out there that are more reliable- and cheaper probably.

I didn't realize there were this many issues with Dell Inspirion. I purchased mine in Sept 08, the motherboard failed Sept 09 before the warranty expired and then a few months later the hard drive crashed. I was told it was because of a virus. However, after reading all of your responses, I see that it's a feature of Dell. Now I'm contemplating whether or not to buy a new hard drive because the inevitable is going to happen and that's called FAILURE. The unfortunate thing about it is that I am not in a position to buy a new PC. Decisions, decisions... Well when I am, I'm going to convert to Apple... You get what you pay for.

I don't know what the hell is wrong with this damn Inspiron 1525, but reading all over the rest of the reviews let me know that DELL GOT ME GOOD! Im a person who uses my computer for hours at a time a day, and sometimes can go a while without shutting d0wn. N0w, its freezing up, hard drive problems, and on top of that I'm tried getting rid of programs to see if they were the problem. My advice to anyone, stick to HP or Gateway, these DELL ### are screwing people and not really giving a damn about it. And then want to charge you if your product is pass warranty...###!

Dell Inspiron 1525, bought brand new and within 2 months the hard drive crapped out... it was replaced under warranty and 11 months later.. you guessed it... crapola! Dell will not stand behind their products, they are too busy sucking hard earned dollars out of the pockets of unsuspecting consumers.

I also have a dell 1525 and my hard drive just went bad (so I think). We had previously purchased a laptop dell 1501 brand new, messed up from the start. After hours on the phone and techs coming to my home; I told Dell I wanted a new notebook or my money back. They told me that they would send me a new notebook out. Since they didn't make the model they would send something out equivalent to what I had. I get the notebook, it's a 1525 refurbished! WHAT! I paid for a brand new one! Ok so I said forget it, it does have extras like blue ray blah blah. I called and told them I wanted my warranty extended since they gave me a refurbished. They said they would til Oct 09. Ok today is Sept 26, 2009 and guess what the hard drive went out. Go to call and my warranty has ran out (they lied, why would that surprise me!) and so I'm stuck. My advise to all "NEVER BUY FROM DELL" they lie and the products are a piece of junk!

Similar problem- Inspiron 1525 HD completely shat itself. SMART failures, overheating, PC freezing. Actually went through 1 hour of telephone diagnostics only to be told that I should buy a 3mm Philips screwdriver to remove the HDD myself in order to continue the telephone dignostics.
Despite purchasing warranty and 3yr support that includes "In-home service after Remote Diagnosis"..

They'll argue that the Remote Diagnosis isn't complete so they won't send out an engineer. I say they had an hour of my time performing diagnostic tests. That's enough. I'm not an engineer so I'm not going to unscrew a HDD. Funny thing is that it would take 10 minutes of a Dell engineer's time to suss out (admit what everyone suspects)- that the Inspiron 1525 HDD's are either of poor quality (overheating) or badly configured.

Have Dell really got so bad that they're asking home customers to buy a screwdriver ?

Check out www.classadvocate.com. Click on Dell and see pending class action investigations and lawsuits regarding their service and computers.

dell service is very bad

i was dell fan but now no more... i have few systems from dell. but from last 3 shopping every time i get faulty system. they do free replacement but what is the use. it takes at least 10 to 15 days. now i have issue with XPS M1330. and this time i am planing to ask for refund for sure.

Try this attorney, I wrote to them tonight!
E-Mail: mail@lchb.com
Firm Website: www.lieffcabraser.com

My Dell laptop actually burned my arm this time, after 3 trips in for repair of the same problem, and still it is faulty. It overheats, burns out the components inside. Now they tell me that my warranty has run out and I have to pay for tech support and any repairs, and shipping! Why would I believe they'd fix it this time because I'm paying for it? Why should I have to foot the bill for something they assured me less than 6 months ago was fixed? I'm not sitting here and letting them get away with this, I will do something or die trying. I spent a bit of time in tears today myself, after an hour on hold and of arguing with 2 of their tech support idiots. Someone needs to put this company out of business... with enough lawsuits for the harm they've caused, maybe there is hope that Dell will finally Die! Dell computers...spawned by Satan and attended to by his flock. Time for God to step in and squash them flat!