Laptop's build quality and tear and wear

[grisevg]

Hey guys,

I had a lot of bad experience with DELL in the past - the casing on all laptops I had would start falling appart after 6-12 months, with hinges being the worst.
DELL's customer support was always useless blaiming me for dropping the laptops (which I never did) or saying that tear and wear is not covered by warranty, while the problem was universall for a lot of customers due to poor build quality. The customer support would on purpose drag all conversions as long as possible so customers would just give up.

I would like to avoid that for the next laptop I buy.
How do you find "Extreme Gaming" laptops surviving 12+ months of use: do hinges fail, or plastic starts to break?
How reasonable is PCS support: if hinges on a laptop would fail after 6 months without any fault of mine, would they cover it? Or if they would charge me for repair, would the price be reasonable (DELL requested a fortune - I had to buy parts on ebay and fix it myself).

Is there specific base models to avoid? Is there any base models with metal/aluminium cases.

 

[keynes]

how do you find "Extreme Gaming" laptops surviving 12+ months of use: do hinges fail, or plastic starts to break?

with good care you can avoid that.

How reasonable is PCS support: if hinges on a laptop would fail after 6 months without any fault of mine, would they cover it?

that is something difficult to say as I think it depends on particular circumstances.

would the price be reasonable

what do you consider reasonable? I think the cost would be mainly parts as labour cost is included unless you are the one damaging the laptop. Customer support is excellent, any RMA raised was dealt promptly.

Is there specific base models to avoid? Is there any base models with metal/aluminium cases.

My view with the clevo chassis is that it is an affordable choice compare to other brands like Alienware or Asus but there is a compromise with the chassis. I got the vortex chassis I am satisfied with it, the speakers are not as good as I would expect and the trackpad is extremely sensitive but that doesn't bother me.

 

[ubuysa]

In my experience the biggest cause of laptop hinge damage is a poor opening technique. It's always wise to open any laptop by lifting in the centre of the screen edge and never at the corners. I've watched a great many people open laptops and most people lift at the corners, this produces unbalanced loads on the hinges and stresses the screen too.

You don't have to drop a laptop to damage it.