Nice try Dell sales guy.

He's not a spam bot, even if the post reads like one minus the link to Dell.

That actually makes perfect sense.  Since the casing wasn't burned off, in which case you wouldn't have had a recognizable notebook left, it didn't get that hot.  HD's operate at high temperature already, the shock from shit falling on it would have been much more likely to toast the drive than the fire itself was.  The skinny ones would most definitely be toast.

Let's see an iPad do that!

I agree that Dell is a great computer, but way too proprietary for my taste. Glad you got all your data back, seems Dells are well built.

Nope, just a long time blogger.  You can check my profile.

That bad huh?  I was just happy that I could do a favor for my SIL.  And I have never made secret my love of Dell (I like Acer too, but that is another story).

That makes sense!  It could have been an HP, but it was a Dell.  And I think your explanation makes a lot of sense.

The laptops or desktops?  I have found the desktops to be pretty "off the shelf" as far as parts (I hate the Gateway power supply).  But as I usually get extended warranties on laptops, I do not open them up much.

The worst for proprietary was the old Compaqs!  You could not even slip in a new floppy unless it was Compaq.  But I always figured laptops were proprietary by nature.  They kind of have to be to fit all that stuff in such a small space.

My Dell Studio XPS died in June after 6 months. They had a guy here in 3 days. I couldn't believe it. He replaced the motherboard. No go. Then he replaced the video card. Still nothing but a blinking green light. I told him I thought it was the processor and he agreed. Dell then sent me a NEW machine with a newer processor and twice the video ram! I'm happy although I wish they had extended the warranty which expires in October. That would show true confidence in their product. All things considered, I think I was treated fairly.

Sorry, I was just being facetious. I wasn't really trying to make an accusation. It's just in jest.

Let me tell you all something about Dell.

Servers: Outstanding. never had much issues with them.

Workstations ( business class ):CRAP!

Dell has been plagued with Capacitor blowing issues for years. We have had to replace hundreds of motherboards on them since around 2004.

Within the last 2 months alone we've had a rash of Optiplex 745 motherboard capacitors blow.

Thank goodness that Dell lost the HPG Purchasing Contract ( a MAJOR HUGE one btw ) and we now have to purchase HP. ( time will tell on that one ).

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/29/technology/29dell.html

If you're smart....sell the story to Dell as ad copy for a new laptop for your s-i-l...

I mostly meant drivers. Dells won't use any generic drivers. I once had to reinstall a Dell for someone who did not have the discs that came with it. Getting drivers was a pain in the a$$. I never actually had any experience with the hardware.

www.dell.com/support.

Select For Small Business or Home, Go to Download Drivers section, Enter the Service Tag, OS etc.. bam. Put em on a thumb drive and away you go.

The only parts that are really proprietary in Dells these days are the motherboards.  For some models you have to shop for a power supply that will fit too but since the time that Dell bought Alienware they made sure that their PCs would fit most graphic and sound cards unlike those compaqs and hps which can be pretty tricky.   You will actually see proprietary dell motherboards in alienware PCs these days as well.

Here's my story about DELL resilience......

In April of 2005 I purchased a DELL Inspiron 6000 with the following specs:

1.6GHz Centrino Processor

128MB ATI Radeon X300

1GB RAM

80GB HD

CDRW

XP Pro edition

3 days after I had it......the drive died.  DELL attempted to replace the drive with a refurb, and when I told them that wasn't acceptable they attempted to replace the entire notebook with a refurb (which I promptly sent back).  The original drive was a nice WD (western digital) and when they finally agreed to a new drive replacement (since it died within a week of me getting the new system) they sent me an Hitachi "death-star" which was a tad noisier than the WD but was brand new so I caved. 

2 days later I noticed a cluster of dead pixels on my nice 1680x1050 WXGA screen ( I absolutely LOVE that screen res and that is one of the reasons I still use this notebook today ) and called DELL yet again!  This time they sent me a brand new screen (which I replaced myself) and a dual-layer DVD burner for all the trouble I'd been having with my "new" notebook.

Fast-forward about 2 years......I'm moving some clutter around on my desk and a stapler falls off my desk and lands on its edge smack-dab onto my notebook power adapter cord severing it internally (the outside sheathing looked fine but you could tell the wire inside had been severed).  Another call to DELL and a new power adapter was on its way.

Fast-forward to the release of MS Vista Business (yeah yeah... I know...why would I want to run that?).  Anyway, upgraded the 1GB RAM to 2GB and albeit a tad slower than XP Pro on this notebook I ran Vista Business just fine until Windows 7 was released.  I then upgraded the 80GB "death-star" to a 160GB WD (nice and silent drive operation again) and my DELL Inspiron 6000 from 2005 is running Windows 7 beautifully (much more responsive than Vista was that's for sure).

As I explained above, thanks to the unusual screen resolution of 1680x1050 I use this notebook the most out of all of the system I have at my disposal (my eyes thank me at the end of the day ).

Oh and it runs Sins of a Solar Empire just fine!  

the Monk