Back in the Blog (and Alienware Sucks!)
After quite a long break (in part, voluntary) it feels good to be bloggin’ again. The hiatus began as I started a couple weeks of work on my English 201 course for the fall—-a new syllabus and a new website meant lots of reading for possible course texts, drafting of assignments, playing with CSS, then going back to tables in Fireworks and Dreamweaver (Oh! The pain!) because I know how to do it that way. After a couple weeks I felt satisfied with the rough cut of the course and planned to get back to blogging, but disaster struck in the form of a rapidly dying motherboard. The second in as many years! Apparently, I’m not the only with Alienware problems: href=”http://www.badsoftware.com/alienwaresucks/”>Alienware Sucks!.
Coincidentally, I was just beginning to move—-a month long odyssey across the isthmus of Madison—-and had purchased a several hundred dollar, 3-year warranty. I didn’t mind waiting for the laptop to be prepared. The only problem was that getting the laptop back after a couple weeks I only had time for checking email and the weather. However light that computer use may seem, it was enough to cause my power supply to die after a few days. No worries though, Alienware said I could purchase a new one from them for $90. I told them I had purchased a 3 year warranty, and they replied that power supplies were only covered for a year. Sure, I was p.o.’d, but I need my computer. It doesn’t end there.
At first the I was told they didn’t have any in stock and that it would take 2 weeks to get a new one. This was a little frustrating with only 3 weeks before classes. But it gets worst. Eventually, I was told that there were no power supplies available thru Alienware. With a 3 yr old computer, they had discontinued carrying the part. Everyone buys a new PCevery three years, right? Well, maybe Bill Gates and Michael Dell do.
So after many, many hours on the phone with the wonderful staff at Alienware, I luckily found one on Ebay for $55. So I had my computer back a couple weeks before classes began and spent that time getting 201 completed and the CompRhet website updated and a little Madden 2005 played (it was $2.99 at EB Games) because I new I could enjoy some technical diffiuclty-free fun on the Xbox . Yeah, right!
Anyway, I look forward to getting back to the blogs I read regularly and my prelims.
