[geeks] Laptops taken out of the U.S.

[Geoffrey S. Mendelson]

Shel,

I see a lot of laptops, questions about laptops and used laptops
for sale. One of the more popular sports here is playing "fix
the laptop" followed by "ditch the laptop". Due to the fact that
the customs agents at the airport seldom, if ever, even look at
laptops, buying them in the U.S. and bringing them in to avoid the
taxes (17%) and the high markup is very common.

However it is fraught with problems. Some things will be different
in France than here, some will not.

First of all, the only brand that you can buy and be 100% sure that it
will be fixed when you get to France is APPLE. WHile you are at it 
buy the extended AppleCare warranty. As somone else said, it's a
computer, not a lifestyle. While I like MacOS, if your wife does not,
the new ones run Windows perfectly well. They can be set up to boot 
directly into Windows and run only Windows, if that's what she wants.

Two caveats are that they don't have modems, and you may have to wait
a week for Apple to approve the repair if you need service. If you
call Apple support and get them to agree that you need a repair
(which is pretty simple), you ask them for the incident number and 
include that when you bring in the computer for service. 

Then there is no delay.

IBM (now Levono) Laptops have worldwide support and usually can be fixed
under warranty almost anywhere in the world. The problem with walking into
a random computer store and buying one is that you can not be sure the
exact model is imported into France and therefore if not, there will be
no spare parts.

It's not hard to tell, if you can read French, you can check out some 
retailer's web sites and get model numbers.

HP aka Compaq, is more difficult. HP does not manufacture laptops, they
subcontract them out to various job shops. Some things are the same
in all versions of a particular model, some are not. If your hard drive
dies, it can be fixed under warranty, if you buy a warranty that is valid
in France. Check, International warranties are often you ship to the depot, 
and the depot is in the Ireland.

However if the case cracks, or the screen goes, you may find that the
local importer/subsidiary never imported your version of the laptop
(although they sell a different version with the same model number)
and have no parts. Off your laptop goes to a depot which could be 
Ireland, or Singapore, or the U.S.

Dell is even worse. Not only do they have the same submodel problem,
they often do not conduct buisness outside of the U.S. For example,
Dell computers are sold by several importers here and each one of
them will only sell parts for or fix a computer they sold. 

People often buy Dell computers, bring them here and find out they can
not be fixed. One person advertised his Dell laptop for sale with a wonderful
pickup at your home/office within 24 hours warranty without bothering
to mention that it was only valid in the U.S. If you took it out of the country,
it was not warrantied.

Acer has similar warranties. If you buy their international warranty, 
It's only valid if you are out of the country in which you bought it
for three months. If you have been out of your "home" country for
longer, the warranty is invalid. They require a copy of your passport
page showing a recent exit stamp. They also require that you ship the
computer to a depot, which the closest one to Europe is Singapore.

Brand X laptops are even worse. There often is no service, no support
and no parts available, including power adaptors and batteries.

Geoff.
-- 
Geoffrey S. Mendelson, Jerusalem, Israel gsm at mendelson.com  N3OWJ/4X1GM
IL Voice: (07)-7424-1667 U.S. Voice: 1-215-821-1838 
Visit my 'blog at http://geoffstechno.livejournal.com/